On my way up to Wickenburg from Patagonia I drove through Why and Ajo, skirting the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. At Ajo the townsfolk were preparing for a festival for World Peace in the town square, a well-kept park shaded by mature palm trees and bordered by an arcade built in the Spanish style. There was to be music from the high school band, food, dancing, and readings. The folks setting up the stalls were in party mood and cheerily invited me to stick around. I thought I might do just that and called in at a B&B where I had stayed some years previously, but there were no vacancies. A little disappointed I took this as a sign of something destined not to be and instead, pushed on to Gila Bend.
“Howdy from the middle of nowhere,” say the souvenir postcards sold in Gila Bend. The tiny town is a truckers’ and traveller’s way station along Highway 80, which ribbons through the cactus-dotted desert between Tucson and Yuma. The town gained international notoriety for a brief spell back in 1973 when a real-life melodrama, not unlike the many scripts that have been shot on location in the surrounding desert, was played out in the dusty little courtroom. An inquest was being held into the death of the young business manager of English actress, Sarah Miles. David Whiting had been found dead in Miles’ hotel room during the shooting of MGM’s western, “The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing’.
Whiting had rowed violently with Miles the previous evening, following her return from dinner in Ajo with members of the cast and crew. A fight had ensued in Miles’ room with both parties sustaining cuts and bruises. Miles had sought shelter in another room and returning the following day, found Whiting dead on her bathroom floor. The county medical examiner testified that Whiting had died of an overdose of drugs, including methaqualone, Benadryl and a Librium-type drug. The verdict of suicide left Whiting’s mother unsatisfied with the testimony, especially the infliction of certain wounds on his body that were left unaccounted for.
It was a hotel that first made me aware of Gila Bend, with a series of photographs by German film director Wim Wenders that featured in his book ‘Written In The West’. The book records places throughout the southwest that Wenders had visited while seeking locations for his movies. Stout’s Hotel was closed down and locked up when Wenders discovered it, but he set about tracking down the keyholder and persuaded him to open up. Once inside, Wenders took several shots of the shadowy, unlit lobby, untouched since the hotel had closed its doors for the last time. Stout’s still stands to this day, but remains firmly shut and padlocked.
A few blocks away, very much open and seemingly thriving, is the splendidly titled ‘Space Age Lodge’. Run as a Best Western, it has a mural in the lobby depicting space travel and features various decorous space-age touches throughout, most notably in the adjoining restaurant. I considered staying the night, but the sun was still high in the sky and so I decided to press on northwards.
And so it was that my last overnight stop of the trip was in Wickenburg, Arizona. The town was founded in 1863 and named after Henry Wickenburg, a miner of German descent who had been drawn to the area in search of gold. His quest was rewarded by the discovery of the Vulture Mine, where over $30 million in gold has been dug from the ground. According to 2006 Census Bureau estimates, the population of the town is 6,423.
After a night in a motel I awoke to my last day. I was booked on an evening flight out of Skyharbor International Airport in Phoenix non-stop to London Heathrow, so had a day to fill. After a wander around mainstreet under a hot early autumn sun, I found myself in the cool, temperature controlled shade of the Desert Caballeros Western Museum. Again, this is an example of an excellent museum of a kind found in many small towns throughout the United States. The museum contains fine examples of Western Art, Cowboy Art, Native American Art and Western History. The volunteer staff appeared to comprise exclusively of silver haired senior ladies, who could easily have been the inspiration for ‘The Golden Girls’ TV sitcom.
I was warmly welcomed at the desk with a synopsis of what delights were to be found throughout the museum. I set about my tour with the printed guide in hand. I encountered several ‘Golden Girls’ as I moved from room to room, each one keen to know what brought this Englishman to their town. One lady told me how much she and her husband enjoyed ‘your TV shows’, shown on the BBC America channel. Favourites were ‘Keeping Up Appearances’, ‘Hetty Wainthropp Investigates and ‘As Time Goes By’. She had tried, so far unsuccessfully, to acquire a US copy of a ‘Mrs Brown’ DVD, as they were big fans of Dame Judy. And Patricia Routledge, of course.
After an hour or two in the company of these genteel, well-informed townswomen, I took a short stroll to the museum shop. This too, was staffed by one of their number, who greeted me brightly from behind the cash desk. Pleasantries exchanged, she launched immediately into an enquiry as to whether I had driven into town via their new ‘roundabout’. Her terminology took me somewhat by surprise, as in the US the rare occurrences of such traffic controlling installations are usually known as ‘traffic circles’ or ‘rotaries’. I thought for a moment and said, ‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I had’.
‘What did you think of it?’ she said, barely unable to control her excitement at this alien phenomenon built in the,midst of her town.
‘It was fine’, I said. ‘Back home in the UK we have them everywhere’.
‘Really?’ she said, as if I had informed her that we all flew around in jet cars. ‘We’ve never had one before. I don’t know how folks are going to get on with it. They say you give way to traffic already on the roundabout. And what about the trucks? How are they going to manage?’
I said ‘Back home the trucks manage just fine and it was just a question of people getting used to it’.
‘I guess so’, she said, giving me a look that displayed her scepticism towards my foreigner’s assurances to the contrary. I left her wondering, with some concern, if the roundabout would discourage visitors from braving its unknown procedures and by-pass Wickenburg altogether. I felt that further propaganda as to the merits of roundabouts would be fruitless and that, in time, her fears would melt away and be proved groundless.
With that, I took my leave of this charming town and its society of gentlewomen and aimed my faithful Nissan towards the sprawling metropolis of Phoenix, some 60 miles to the east. On route, I diverted to spend a couple of hours of quiet reflection in a state park overlooking the tranquillity of a large lake, deep blue under an azure sky: my last chance to gaze on the big country that has lured me away from my own crowded little island again and again. I knew that once I entered the suspended time zone of the airport terminal, the spell would be broken and my return to a lifetime spent in another place would begin. The only outward sign of my adventure would be the red dust in the creases of my shoes. As on many occasions such as this, the lyrics of a song came to mind.
Say you were split, you were split in fragments
And none of the pieces would talk to you
Wouldn't you want to be who you had been
Well maybe I want that too
So better take the keys and drive forever
Staying won't put the future back together
