Hitchhiking Adventures – Part 12

The three people I went with wanted to go back to Albuquerque in New Mexico. A trip of about 500 kilometers through the desert. Nice!

The next day we left Mount Graham. Since the three were traveling with a pick-up truck, there was a lot of space left in the loading area of the truck. While one man was driving, the rest of us three made ourselves comfortable in our sleeping bags in the loading area. Quite a pleasant way to travel. Sleeping, talking, reading, watching the desert. I don't know if it was allowed on a highway to sit in the back of a pick-up, but I didn’t think about it. It became hot, and the wind during the drive reminded me of a hairdryer, and after a few hours I had the impression that something started to boil in my head. I started to feel sick and it was time to protect myself from the sun.

A house made of sandbags

We didn’t make very quick progress on our journey. Our driver, about 30 years old, with a beard and long shaggy hair and wearing torn pants, had the plan to build his own house. It's not that complicated in New Mexico to build your own house, because everyone can build what they like the way they like. You don’t need any permission. If you think you can do it, do it. A friend of his, he told me, built a house entirely out of car tires, and another one out of glass bottles and clay. He now had his own plan. He wanted to build a house out of sandbags. And since there were construction sites on the highway every few kilometers that were closed that day, since it was a Sunday, he stopped every few kilometers, calmly cutting open the small sandbags lying around at each construction place with his knife, and letting the sand trickle out and then throwing the sandbags to us in the loading area.

Naked in the desert

It was getting dark, and rarely before in my life had I been as happy as that day when the sun disappeared. I was told that we would soon turn off the highway and drive to a certain place in the desert. We would sleep there and enjoy the stars and experience something special the next morning. A little later we were lying in our sleeping bags next to the pick-up truck in the desert and looked into the star-studded sky. It was fantastic but nothing compared to the next morning. That’s because, after waking up, I realised I was in paradise. We were right at the edge of a small valley in which a river about 10 meters wide ran through the desert. It was only 20 meters from my sleeping bag to the place that we used as a bathroom that day. On the slope, down towards the river, there were several mud holes from which warm to hot water came out of the ground. My new friends told me to enter the mud holes very carefully because you never know how hot they are.

Fantastic, just us four in hot water in the middle of nature after a bit cold desert night, and with a little backache, because we were only lying on a thin mat all night. So, if you were brave or curious, or both, then you put your fingers in the mud. And it got really hot, inch by inch hotter, so you quickly pulled them out again.

Incredible, a place where you can really feel how much the earth below you is alive. Nobody was there except us. There were no signs, boundaries, no trash cans, no beer-garden, nothing, not even a real way to get there. We were guests in pure nature. I started to have a real feeling of happiness. At some point, I wanted to see how warm the water was in this desert creek next to me. I went down to the river. The water was pleasantly cool, only 10 to 20 centimeters deep. The bottom was very sandy, firm and smooth. On the left and right, loamy embankments went up three to four meters. And, in the banks, there were many holes in which black swallows had their nests. They hunted back and forth across the river to catch insects for their little ones. There were many swallows that flew around me and disappeared into the holes every few minutes or even less to feed their young. They didn’t pay attention to me at all. It was fantastic and I didn’t know what to do with my happiness and energy. I started to run through the water, following the river, one curve, then another one. It was terrific to run completely naked in this beautiful river through this fantastic untouched nature. After a while, I thought: "When are the others going to go on?" I just left them without asking or telling. The river just carried me like a magnet. Then I briefly imagined what would happen if they just left with all my belongings. I, alone, naked, without anything, without a passport, food or money, in the desert. On the way back, I was still happy and also a little bit worried. I wasn’t afraid because I was traveling with nice people. But when they were still there, I was kind of relieved.