Over the Hill and Far Away……….

We awoke to another dreary, rainswept day – no, sorry, that was you – ours was ridiculously warm and sunny as usual.

We had decided to stay on another day to take a trip to the Mexican border which lies about 40 miles to the south. Having received warnings both at home and abroad about the potential dangers of the border area we hired mariachi costumes to enable us to blend in with the locals but unfortunately the sombreros kept blowing off on the bikes.

The route to the border at Lukeville took us down Highway 85 through the Sonoran Desert and the Organ-pipe Cactus National Monument. This was a classic ride down a quiet two lane highway through spectacular desert scenery.

We stopped for petrol about half way in the tiny town of “Why”. Speculating about the origins of the name we imagined the original settlers being asked “Why (on earth did you choose to live here)?” Or maybe it was founded by a grizzled pioneer called Ebenezer Why. In fact it turned out that it owes its name to the fact that Highways 85 and 86 used to intersect there in a “Y” junction but state law required all town names to have at least 3 letters so “Y” became “Why”! By the way the gas station was, of course, called the “Why Not”.

There was plenty of County Sheriff and Border Patrol presence along the road and in fact the day began to take on something of a law-enforcement theme from thereon. We reached Lukeville and the Mexican border at the aptly named Gringo Pass. With assurances that we would have no trouble getting back in we were waved over the border on foot to the Mexican side.

Having set foot in Mexico, I had a bottle of Coke while Mark was being mugged and having his organs harvested. We then walked back to the American side where we had to pass through Immigration again, which was slightly unnerving but our reception seemed to be a little warmer than that of the Mexicans who were coming through at the same time.

On the way back we stopped off at the Organ-pipe Cactus National Memorial Visitors’ Centre, which was fascinating. The area was set up to help restore the biodiversity of the area that had been over-grazed in the past. It’s hard to imagine a desert becoming more barren but that is what has been happening and the original desert that they are working to restore is actually very rich in plant and animal life.

About 10 miles north of the visitors centre we came to a Border Patrol checkpoint. Mark was taken to one side for questioning which caused me some slight anxiety as I followed him in! A Border Patrolman then came up to me, fixed me with a steely stare and asked if I was a US citizen. I naturally retorted “Certainly not old chap. I’m British!” This seemed to have the desired effect and I was waved on my way. I then had an irrational urge to say “Go easy on my friend. He’s a Mexican and he doesn’t speak much English”. However I decided that neither the Patrolman nor Mark would be likely to appreciate the joke. Fortunately my companion was released soon after and we were able to continue on.

A few miles further along, Mark had to stop to check some equipment on the bike and the local Sheriff rolled up and asked him if he was OK. So all in all we seem to have seen quite a bit of the law on this stage of the trip.

We rounded off the day with a visit to the centre of Ajo which is quite a pleasant old Western town. The huge open-cast copper mine there closed down in the 1980s, the railroad stopped running and the population dropped from 10000 to 2000. We visited the local history museum which is run by volunteers and occupies the church of what had been an Indian village until the mining company moved them out! They had some quite fascinating old artifacts which had all been donated by local people and we had a very interesting talk through it all by a retired local history teacher.

So that’s it for today. Tomorrow we aim to get to Benson which is east of Tucson and should put us within a day’s ride of New Mexico.

The day… (can I leave you to fill in the rest). Anyway it was a little cooler than yesterday with temperatures hovering just under 100F (all temperatures here tend to be in Fahrenheit and I can’t be bothered to convert so you Celsius-heads will have to do it yourself).

We were back on Interstate Highway 10 and after about 5 miles we crossed the Colorado river and were into Arizona.Quite spookily, large cactuses started to appear almost immediately. We noticed that we were passing through the “Colorado River Indian Reservation”. The Native Americans must have been absolutely chuffed to bits to have been gifted all these acres of barren desert and scrub brush (which they probably thought that they already owned). There were none in evidence to ask so I suppose we’ll never know.

We rode down i-10 for about 120 miles until we joined Highway 85 which took us through Gila Bend to Ajo. We had a mixture of three lane, two lane and single lane roads and the desert scenery was practically unvarying for the whole distance. There were rocky hills and outcrops and flat stretches of sandy desert. From a distance this looked green because of the bushes that grow in it but close up these are fairly widely dispersed in what is otherwise barren sand. There are also a few cactuses dotted about here and there. We half expected to see a posse ride across the road.This is the sort of scenery we had always imagined riding through when we planned this trip.

The road itself was fairly deserted and often all we could see was it disappearing into the blue heat haze far in the distance. The desert landscape did become rather monotonous and we did get somewhat bored with it although it was quite exciting to discover that a one point we were passing through a US Airforce bombing range. The occasional dust storms were also quite amusing

We were really struck with admiration for the tenacity the original pioneers. After about 10 miles in this desert on a horse or mule we would have said “Sod this for a for a game of settlers, I’m off back to the saloon”.  They would have made a film about it called: “How the West was Largely Ignored on Account of it Being Too Hot and Dry and Dull.

After 195 miles we arrived in Ajo and booked in at the La Siesta Motel and RV Park at about 3pm. Even though this is a very small town, seemingly like all American towns it is widely spread out and we were alarmed to find that the nearest place to eat was about 2.5 miles away. Why, I hear you ask, would this be a problem? you have motorcycles surely? Well the answer starts with b, ends in r and there are a couple of e’s in the middle. We then discovered that there are no taxis and the only public transport is a local bus service that only runs till 6 and has to be booked in advance.

We booked a pick-up for 3.15 to take us to Marcella’s Diner and dashed round like scalded cats beautifying ourselves. When we got on the bus we were told that in fact the latest we could get back would be 4.20! This being the only option we piled into Marcella’s shouting for double orders of beer and the menus. Aside from the big blue and green plastic mugs they gave us to drink from, the meal, if somewhat rushed, was more than adequate. I had a beef chimichanga, which I’ve always wanted to try, and which to my surprise was a sort of Cornish pasty in choux pastry. The home-made salsa was delicious. The clientelle seemed to sum up this part of America, with Native Americans, Anglos, Latinos and what appeared to be a Weeble. We got talking to a lady whose family had moved to Ajo from Mississippi after the Civil War 150 years ago and who described herself as mixed Native American-Italian. Everyone seemed to be fluent in both Spanish and English.

We got the bus back at 4.20. The only other passenger was  a disabled lady who grumbled to the driver about her neighbour who had just got out of jail in Tucson and was making a nuisance of himself out in the street on his skateboard. The driver helped her into her house when we got there and we thought what a really nice service it was for people who are either too poor, too disabled or (in our case) too drunk to be able to drive. And it was only 75c each.

That then was the end of our night out in Ajo and I am now sitting in the shade by the pool just about to add the last full-stop to the blog for today. We will be staying here tomorrow and visiting the Organ Pipe Cactus National Park and maybe having a quick hop into Mexico.

These are a few shots from our trip across the desert today

After our swim yesterday and a clean-up we took ourselves off into town. Redlands is another grid-pattern, widely spread out town so we called a taxi to get us the 2.5 miles into the centre. Just as we were about to leave, an elderly American lady accosted us and asked if we had come far “on those little bikes”! We modestly explained that they were in fact quite large bikes and yes we had come quite far. The conversation would no doubt have gone on much longer had the taxi meter not been ticking,

We followed the hotel receptionist’s recommendation and went to a “British pub” in downtown Redlands. Its main redeeming feature was that it was not particularly British. Apart from the obligatory pub bore who had presumably been imported specially, the clientelle was American, as was the food and most of the beer. We passed a pleasant couple of hours there. Redlands seemed like a nice town with some tree-lined avenues and views of hills in the distance.

This morning dawned…… (I think you know where I’m going with this one) and we set off down Interstate Highway 10 which would take us, via Palm Springs, all the way to Blythe which is just on the Californian side of the Arizona border. The countryside was a mixture of mountains and desert and at times was quite breathtaking. The frustrating thing about travelling on the Interstate is that it is not easy to stop and capture the views, although some good photos did get taken. Mark is also convinced he saw a body that had been wrapped in plastic and dumped in the central reservation but we didn’t get chance to go back and check!

We broke the journey at Chiriaco Summit, a gas station and diner set up by Mr and Mrs Chiriaco about 1925, just before the highway was built and which is still run by their family. There is also a General Patton Museum on the same site as this was apparently the training area for WWII US troops before they were sent to the Middle East. We got some nice pictures of tanks before departing.

When out of the mountains we were mainly riding through flat desert. The heat was intense and registered as 108F on the temperature gauge on Mark’s bike. It was so hot I did begin to have morbid thoughts about what the flash-point of petrol might be! Raising the visor on the helmet was like putting your head into a hot oven. As if that wasn’t enough, at one point near the end of the ride, an insect the size of a light aircraft hit my visor and I did the last 30 miles squinting out through squashed bug.

The desert wind was strong and we could see dust devils swirling either side of the road. Occasionally a cross wind full of dust and sand would hit us, which helped to break the monotony no end!

The most amazing thing was saw today however has to be a large party of cyclists making their way along our route. We were struggling with the gradients, the heat and the cross-winds even with 1250cc of Japanese technology to help us but these guys seemed to be taking it in their stride and waved cheerily to us as we passed them.

Despite the conditions we made good time and arrived in Blythe at 2pm. After a short prayer of thanks to the god of ice machines we then went on a shopping expedition to Kmart and Ace Hardware for essentials for the travelling motorcyclist such as gaffer tape and leather restorer. After that we cooled down in the pool.

Rather than try to discover if there is actually a downtown Blythe we ate at very pleasant diner just across from the hotel. I ordered zucchini (courgettes) as a starter and received a massive plate of breaded and deep-fried slices with blue cheese dip. I ate about half and commented on the size of the portions when refusing the offer to put the remainder in a take out box. The waitress proudly told me that “No-one leaves here hungry”.
By this stage the temperatures had dropped to a mere 100F. The waitress told us that her strategy for keeping cool was to take her kids and go and sit in the Colorado river. We are however putting our faith in the air conditioning in the room.

Tomorrow – which will doubtless dawn sunny and bright – we are planning to get to Ajo in Arizona.

We covered 164 miles today and our total so far is 1100 plus. Only another few thousand to go now!