Two Wheels on my Wagon (33 page)

‘Nice dogs,' said Per.

‘Lovely,' I agreed.

‘They liked me so much they tried to eat me,' added Trevor.

We were also keen to replenish our drinking supplies. The sun was now high in the sky and shelter was a redundant concept in this barren, treeless land. The map had already promised one gas station (which turned out to be abandoned) and two stores, one that turned out to be a gas station without a shop and one store that had in fact been a Laundromat.

‘A Laundromat? In the middle of the desert? Why?' I asked, though I knew there was no likelihood of an answer.

Even more inexplicable had been the presence at the side of the road of four churches, roughly double the number of houses we had seen. Apart from the distinct smell of sulphur that we had encountered an hour or so previously, there seemed nothing to justify the existence of one church, let alone four. Yet four there were, all with suitably inspiring names: The Rock Springs Holiness Mission; the Angel Food Ministries; the Tinion Baptist Church; and last, but far from least, God's Mighty Warriors Church. The free market in religion was obviously thriving. Or maybe the souls of local dog owners needed a lot of rescuing. There was even the North Fork Baptist Church Memorial Gardens, though evidence of a garden was somewhat thin on the ground. Either that or the gardeners were intent on cultivating the types of plants that grew in the surrounding desert. In which case it was a great success.

The sun continued to blaze in the sky. The temperatures continued to rise. We continued to pedal.

Four parched hours later, and 116 miles since Cuba, we arrived in Milan. Not the cultural and consumer capital of Italy but, judging by the presence of four well-drilling and welding company workshops and very little else, the small-scale engineering capital of this inhospitable corner of New Mexico. There was also a Cross Roads Motel, the appeal of which was lost on Trevor and Per.

Not in immediate need of having anything welded or any wells drilled, we continued to the neighbouring town of Grants, the charms of which we hoped would be more considerable. Things started brightly enough as we turned onto Route 66, America's most famous road and an essential element on any road trip such as ours. That was as good as it got, however.

The most flattering way to describe the rest of our experience of Grants would be ‘unpleasant'. Downright miserable would be closer to the mark. Even the guidebook was less than effusive. After describing a past predicated on periodic mineral exploitation that had once earned it the slightly dubious title of ‘Uranium capital of the world', it added: ‘Today, as residents await the next boom, Grants plugs along as a service town, selling meals and motel rooms to travellers on Interstate 40.'

Even selling decent meals seemed to be beyond it, however. The sole virtue of the charmless concrete block dressed up as a Pizza Hut was that it had air conditioning. This more or less made up for the inability to serve pizzas that bore any resemblance to our order. Or even to food, unless pizzas were supposed to resemble the box in which they were dispatched to takeaway customers. The waitress, whose pained facial expression revealed that she had obviously had to suffer life in Grants far longer than we had, had no need to spell out that it was futile complaining.

After what passed for lunch, and with there being no evidence of any other grocery stores in town, our next port of call was Wal-Mart.

‘My first ever Wal-Mart,' I announced.

‘Me too,' said Per.

‘Then we're all Wal-Mart virgins,' said Trevor.

Unlike sex, however, it was not an experience you would wish to repeat. The expertly sycophantic ‘greeter' on the door was the antithesis of the genuine hospitality experienced so far on the trip that had done so much to rid me of my European cynicism.

‘Hello, hello, come in, come in, welcome, welcome.'

Clearly, everything had to be repeated twice for emphasis. Having been lulled over the past four weeks into dispensing with my native instinct to ignore such behaviour, I returned the greeting. It was a mistake. The pitiful wretch grasped both my hands and said she'd always wanted to shake hands with an Englishman; her eyes suggested sincerity, but it was sincerity bought at the minimum wage. It was nauseating.

Instead of being sick, however, I had a nosebleed. Maybe it was all the adulation. More likely it was the dry air. I managed to avoid despoiling the store, but only through the expedient of bleeding into my cycling top. It seemed to make little difference to my already unappealing appearance.

Inside, the choice was overwhelming, and any useful provisions that could be found invariably came in multipacks. Even in my thirsty state I realised I would struggle to consume six cans of Coke, though I bought them anyway. It was not a place to linger, but the soaring afternoon temperature deterred us from leaving. Eventually our role of novelty attraction for passing gang members circling the car park in their pimped-up rides lost its appeal. The New Mexico furnace seemed the lesser of two evils.

As we left town, we rode over the railway tracks, though which side was the wrong side was not evident.

‘Did you see that guy scamming outside the store?' asked Trevor.

‘You mean the guy doing the competition?'

‘That's what he was saying.'

I'd noticed someone purporting to offer the chance to win an exotic holiday. I'd also noticed the practised ease of his patter, targeted exclusively at attractive young women (‘You have two choices, you just have to tell me where you'd like to go, Acapulco or Paris? I bet you're a Paris woman. I'm right? You'd go to Paris? Oh, that's where I'd choose myself, it would be so romantic. I've never been lucky enough to have the chance to go like you, but I'm told it's beautiful. Would you take your husband? You're not married? I can't believe someone hasn't fallen for you yet . . .').

‘They could only enter “the competition” by providing their bank details,' Trevor explained.

The good news was that we were leaving all this behind us. The bad news was that we were riding into El Malpais – the badlands. Not just any old badlands either. The area had been awarded its own special accolade. This was the El Malpais National Monument.

Fortunately, the lands were only bad if you wanted to farm or live there. As cycling terrain went, they were pretty much perfect. Once the heat of the day finally began to wane we were able to admire the stunning scenery caused by an ancient volcanic eruption. To our left was an abrupt escarpment turned a thousand hues of red by the lowering sun. At least 10 miles long, the otherwise impenetrable wall was temporarily breached by a vast, natural arch, the proportions of which dwarfed the greatest cathedrals. To our right, the lava flowed horizontally across a broad valley clad only in the sparsest, hardiest shrubs.

Eventually the structure of the valley was lost as the cliffs to either side diverged and we rode into another broad plain. We were now in ranch land, though the absence of any cattle confirmed the impression that this was still unforgiving terrain.

It was past 8 p.m. and our increasingly southern latitude meant the sun was setting fast. We had left Grants with no particular plan, which had been peculiarly liberating. There were no towns or campsites for another 70 miles, a distance that we knew was beyond us. Instead we simply intended to pitch our tents at a suitable spot at a suitable time. That time had now come.

We rode off the paved surface and began another long section of dirt road. After two miles, with no change in the topography likely, we decided to call it a day. We had ridden 165 miles.

‘That's further than I've ever ridden in a day before.'

‘Me too,' said Per.

‘And me,' said Trevor.

Perhaps we were beginning to pass muster as cyclists.

The sagebrush and grasses were sufficiently sparse to make it easy to pitch our tent on the sandy soil at the side of the road. I looked for a piece of wood with which to sweep the ground, Ray Mears-style, and deter arachnids and insects.

‘Don't worry. They'll get me first,' Per said pointedly, unfurling his bivvy bag.

Day turned swiftly to night. To the west was the setting sun. To the east, silhouetting the now distant escarpment, rose a full moon. For the first time, New Mexico was living up to its nickname. It was, for now at least, a land of enchantment.

W
ith not enough candlepower to be able to ride the desert trails in the dark, we let ourselves enjoy the natural pleasure of waking up to the dawn, Per having survived the night unmolested. The sun and moon had swapped roles and places, the sun now rising to the east as the moon set in the west. Under an achingly clear sky it was scarcely above freezing, yet it was already destined to be another hot day.

Breakfast was a perfunctory affair. It mattered not. Thirty miles away lay the glittering oasis of Pie Town, where such luxuries as a cooked breakfast and, we hoped, pie, lay waiting.

Actually, glittering oasis was something of an overstatement. The ‘town' part of Pie Town was another misnomer. It boasted, according to its own website, little more than a few far-flung dwellings, and the essential services of a post office and a chiropractor; living in New Mexico was, we all agreed, back-breaking work. But there were also two ‘world famous' cafés specialising in pies. ‘Home Cooking on the Great Divide', as the town's resident marketing gurus put it.

In fact, it was the pie specialisation of Texan immigrant and World War One veteran Clyde Norman in the 1920s that earned the town its name. Capitalising on the designation of the town's US Highway 60 as a transcontinental route, his well-advertised wares came to symbolise the town itself. The association was then formalised by the US Postal Service, arbiter of all habitation nomenclature in the US, and a town was born.

When we arrived, the choice of cafés was reduced by 50 per cent. It was Tuesday, so the Pie-O-Neer Café was closed. That left the Daily Pie, which was welcoming and warm and suffused by the smell of freshly baked pies. It was, in fact, a wonderful place.

On a white board behind the counter was drawn ‘the world's only true pie chart'. There were actually three pie charts, each detailing some of the delicacies to hand.

The largest was ‘Standard Flavors': Apple; New Mexico Apple (with added chilli pepper and piñon); Peanut Butter; and Key Lime Cheesecake, all for $3.99 per slice.

Then came ‘Primo Flavours': Cherry; Peach; Blueberry; Coconut Crème; Blackberry; and Vanilla Crème, slightly dearer at $4.75 per slice.

Finally there were ‘Pielets': Piñon and Pecan for the princely sum of $3.00 each.

There was also a slightly alarming injunction to ‘please order pies with a 48-hour notice', though the array under the counter suggested this wouldn't be necessary for hungry passing cyclists.

Perversely, in spite of all these pie riches, we ordered cooked breakfasts. I chose sausages, bacon, scrambled eggs, toast and pancakes. All together – I had succumbed at last.

‘When in Rome,' I said quietly to myself as I watched Trevor pour maple syrup on his pancakes and his bacon.

We also had coffee, which came in mugs outlining the café's unique pricing plan: ‘One cup $1.50; one hour $2.00; half day $2.50; full day $5.00 and keep the cup ($4.50 if you go home for lunch). Finger snappers and spoon knockers all pay double.'

Clearly, neither Pie Town nor the Daily Pie Café were places for the impatient.

It was catching. Although we were keen to finish, we had by now become sufficiently confident about what lay ahead to enjoy the relaxation. Indeed, yesterday's record mileage meant for the first time since Banff we had dared to let ourselves think of how close we now were to our goal. By the end of the next day we should be in Silver City. Although that was not the finish, there remained just 120 more or less flat miles until Antelope Wells, 80 of which were on paved roads. In any other circumstances it would have seemed a considerable challenge. Now it seemed a walk in the park.

It also seemed we were not the only people thinking about our imminent arrival at the finish. Midway through breakfast I returned from the bathroom to find Per wearing a gnomic smile.

‘What's up?' I asked.

‘I've just had a nice conversation with your wife.'

Thanks to the wonders of modern technology through our SPOT tracker, and in spite of the fact that I hadn't spoken to her since Sargents, Catherine had not only been able to ascertain our precise location but then to find the phone number of the Daily Pie Café as well. And I had chosen that precise moment to answer a call of nature.

‘Would you like to use the phone to ring her back?' offered the woman behind the bar, sensing my disappointment.

‘Well, if you don't mind. I have a phone card so it shouldn't cost anything.'

‘Oh, don't worry about that.'

The reason behind Catherine's call was an offer from her cousin Steve, he of the ‘rather remarkable reach', to help extricate us from Antelope Wells, or ‘that shit hole in the desert' as he picturesquely described it. Per and Trevor looked suitably impressed when I told them he might be able to re-route a truck off Interstate 40 to collect us and deliver us straight to Phoenix for our return flights. I said I would ring him when we arrived in Silver City. I also told them that Stephen was officially out of the race. He had called from Albuquerque saying neither his stomach nor his knee was sufficiently remedied for him to consider riding any further, though his intestines had subsequently been restored to full working order.

It was with high spirits, therefore, that we eventually summoned the motivation to leave the Daily Pie. It was also with a slice of pie ‘to go'. It seemed impossible to leave without any. It had also seemed impossible to choose from the myriad varieties, so I didn't. I defied my three and a half decades spent learning that, in terms of culinary experience, less is more, and selected ‘mixed berry' pie. It contained the unlikely combination of apple, blackberry, blueberry and strawberry. It was delicious.