Lordsburg, NM: Dust Devils

Miles since last blog: 32.3
Miles Total: 3123.7

Route

You know that road to hell, the one paved with good intentions, guess what, I walked down that road today.

Last night I decided to listen to my navigators and ignore my instincts which told me to brave the illegalities of Interstate trekking, I should always listen to my instincts. I'd say I've learned this lesson before, but obviously I didn't. The farmer, or rancher, whom I never met, was nice. He drove up a little before 6 am and then read my sign and left again without bothering me. I laid there for a long time in and out of sleep.

The day started innocuously enough, walking away from the interstate and into a the desert on a dirt and sand road, sand is my arch nemesis by the way. The road wasn't much of a road but rather two thin dirt paths that are a wheel well's width apart from each other but five miles in it's already to much work to go back. Shortly after I got 5 miles down my path I encountered the first of many gates, private property, both of my Nav. systems had agreed on this path and sent my off emptying my carrier, lifting it atop the gate, holding it in place with one arm while scaling the gate to take it down on the other and then go back again to get my things. It's pretty work intensive and on a hard, hot day it's the last thing you want to add to your trail several times over.

As I set down Ando (the carrier) the first time I noticed a problem. While I had been focused on my left tire which was low, the tread on a spot of the right tire had ripped open exposing the tube. I've barely had these tires for a month, hard roads out here. An hour or two later a bubble of tube started bulging out after a particularly hard hill where the road had eroded into two parallel chasms where wheels would have gone. The bubble caught my eye and I stood back just in time to see it explode, I guess I should have gotten new tires in Las cruces after all, green sealant goo exploded out and left a slimy spot on the dirt. I looked around, nothing, the interstate was miles and miles away with no path to it and town was still 20 more, mostly up these rough roads.

I should have trusted my instincts, I tried to be lawful and avoid the interstate only to break the law destroying my body and cart over private property. It was late when I finally arrived in the town of Lordsburg, I need to find a tire, there doesn't seem to be a bike store or wal-mart or anything I know of that would sell a tire for my cart. Somewhere in this town must exist a tire for me, tomorrow I'll have to find it pushing Ando who now has a limp where the bulbous burst was and I with a limp on the opposite side from the blisters and sore muscles of pushing on a dirt road for so long. The pair of us will hit the city looking for what will heal us both, a tire for Ando and a hotel room for me to have a day off and rest my smelly and dirt caked body.

The heat is getting intense out here and it only promises to get hotter.

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