There may be trouble ahead

The light on the dash warned that there was a problem. It was a symbol with which I wasn’t familiar. I checked in the handbook and found it to represent low tyre pressure. The advice was to check the tyres and if required, add air at the earliest opportunity, as not doing so could prove hazardous. I was on my way back into Arizona and was set to cover some miles, so I planned to pull into the first gas station I came upon and fix the problem.

The first attempt ended in frustration and failure. The air line was working fine, but had no gauge, to A. - check the current pressure in the tyres and B. - indicate how much air was going in. The next place had an air line with a gauge, but it didn’t work. I ended up letting more air out than I managed to put in. I gave up the DIY method and decided to look out for tyre dealer. Fortunately, I was coming into the outer limits of Tularosa NM, where I soon found a tyre place. It took minutes to get the tyres checked and inflated to the correct pressure. They were ‘all kinda low’ according to the obliging fitter, who said the light may not ‘go out for a day or so, but that everything was now fine’. I trusted him and ignored the light for the next four days before it finally went out.

I got to Las Cruces around mid-day feeling hungry, as I hadn’t had breakfast that morning, wanting to get some miles on the clock early in the day. I found the old adobe historic district that Michael Hurd had talked about, but didn’t look too hard for the restaurant he had recommended. He had been a little vague on the exact location and driven by a rumbling emptiness of stomach I wasn’t minded to spend a lot of time driving around. For the same reason, I skipped a search for the rail crossing that features in my Hurd print. According to Michael’s wife Tiffany, he had left out a lot of stuff that wasn’t key to the composition, so I may have struggled to recognise the spot even if I had come across it. Instead I found a cosy little diner, full of lunching locals and overlooking the old town square, where I duly filled myself up with some good home cooking.

Heading south out of Las Cruces I was soon clear of urban sprawl and driving what became a country road through alternating maize fields and pecan orchards. ‘DO NOT PICK THE PECANS’ warned the signs along the verge. There were no signs saying ‘DO NOT CUT THE MAIZE’. Not as likely I guess. Not many people travel with a combine in tow, but a ladder and a basket can fit into the back of any pick-up. I did neither. I had other plans for the day.

I had it in mind to take Country Road A003, a route that hugs the Mexican border from just west of El Paso TX, through to Douglas AZ. I’d driven it in the opposite direction some years previously and wanted to take the same route going west. It’s one of the remotest that I’ve driven in the southwest, the rare traffic that there is comprising of farm vehicles and the 4WD’s of the US Border Patrol. Thousands of illegal immigrants choose the remote tracts of harsh terrain in this area to make their bid for the promise of a new life in the United States. If the punishing desert doesn’t get them – hundreds have perished in the attempt, mainly due to dehydration – then the brown uniformed Immigration Officers will try. Roadblocks are common, so it’s advisable to keep the passport within easy reach.

Along the opening stretch, the razor wire fence and lights are just a few hundred yards from the road. It was even more desolate than I remember with a straight, empty road stretching out before me. Occasionally a patrol vehicle with smoked glass windows would sweep past, to return a few moments later in the opposite direction, or be spotted a few miles on, partly hidden in the scrubby vegetation that lined the road on both sides. My grey Nissan hire car was of no interest to them. Unlike the group of Hispanic men, seated on the ground, hands cuffed behind their backs, their trail bikes scattered around them as a patrolman in Aviator sunglasses summoned back-up while his colleague, a Stetson shading his eyes, looked on, hand on hip, covering his holster. As well as people, drugs are also trafficked out here in these badlands.

After miles of nothing, signs of habitation began to appear and I was soon entering Columbus NM. I pulled into a parking lot at a crossroads that divided the town into quarters and picking up my camera, stepped out of the car to stretch my legs. I fired off a couple of shots of a water tower and a passing school bus, when a pick-up with official looking letters down the side pulled up behind me. Damn. I’d left the passport in the car. The truck crunched to a halt on the gravel. The driver’s window came down. A middle-aged guy in a red baseball cap, bushy moustache decorating his upper lip, nodded in my direction, eyes friendly, voice deep.

‘Hi there. No problem’, he said, sensing my slight unease. ‘Saw you carrying a camera there and wondered what you had. I’ve just ordered myself a new camera on the internet. Over $1000 worth of kit, so I’d be interested to take a look at your set-up’. He extended a hand. ‘The names Bob Wright by the way, I’m the volunteer Fire Chief around here’.

I introduced myself and showed him the camera. I hoped he wouldn’t get too technical, as that’s not my strong point when it comes to photography. For example, I can never remember the spec for the lens I use, having to read the tiny gold type printed around the perimeter and even then, I’ve little idea what it means. But I know how its technical capabilities manifest through the viewfinder and I always figure that’s the important thing. I’ve never been big on theory and if I can, will avoid any kind of operational manual except as a last resort. That said, my mate Charlie convinced me to explore the possibilities of the digital camera when I got it, which I could only really do by reading up on it. I used the empty hours of a long flight to break the habit of a lifetime and so am consequently better informed than normal with something that's new to me.

The conversation moved on from cameras to the town. It had once been home to the United States Army, garrisoned here in strength to patrol the border with Mexico. When Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary led a raiding party into US territory it was troops stationed here, commanded by General John J. Pershing, that pursued him into Mexico using motor transport for the first time, rather than horses. Bob told me that all went well until the trucks ran out of petrol. They couldn’t move until a mule train with fresh supplies of fuel arrived from across the border. General George S. ‘blood ‘n’ guts’ Patton also served at the base early in his military career.

‘Be sure to send me some of your pictures when you get back home,’ said Bob , handing me a business card. I said I would, wished him luck with the new camera and bade him goodbye.

I set off with the sky threatening a storm. I was soon running the gauntlet, thunder and lightning crashing and flashing both sides of me, the road cutting straight down the middle towards the watery yellow light of a sun sliding towards the horizon. Steven Spielberg couldn’t have staged it better. With rain sweeping across in waves either side of me, only a few spots made it onto my windscreen. I felt like Moses fleeing Egypt, the waters parting before me. I pressed on, bound for the shelter and succour of a motel in Wilcox, Arizona.