Samuel Intercourse

 

 

The tent was comfortable and we slept on our forest beds until 9am. We packed everything up and then found our way back to the Grand Canyon National Park. Our first stop was the park's public toilets, where we washed our face, brushed our teeth and did what ever else was needed to be done. Second stop was a viewing point on the way to the Westward exit of the park. We took our last gaze into the canyon and bumped into Jonie and Chris again. We chatted for a bit longer this time - genuine people. We left the park, found our bearings on our now dilapidated map of Arizona, and headed off towards Nevada.

Now if you ever plan to motor west
Travel my way take the highway that's the best
Gets your kicks on Route Sixty Six

Brian Setzer

Route 66 - 'The Mother Road' - arcs from Chicago to LA. During the Dirty Thirties the road gave farmers and factory workers who were looking for a fresh start the opportunity to leave their dead farms, to look west for a new start. The road was alive with prospects of adventure, with the premise of a new beginning: CALIFORNIA, or just anywhere but here. Motels and bars baited the mass of hopefulls. These were Beat Era’s killing fields: Kerouac, Cassady, Ginsberg. Route 66 is now a ghost, having been laid to rest by more efficient multi-lane highways. 

The section we drove was very poetic. I think we might have seen two other cars, otherwise it was just us, the road, the odd gas station, and the desert. Now and then a clump of those old bars and motels - remnants of the route’s bustling past. Now novelties. The traffic is gone, business is down, and the lights in the big signboards need replacing.

We stopped at a gas station filled up the tank and got some ice cream. Since Mexico I’ve had a thing for Eskimo Pies. 

Looking in the rearview mirror I could see the beautiful Arizona unfolding away behind us. Soon we would cross into Nevada - whilst crossing over the Hoover Dam.

The Dam is big. I got a bit wobbly looking down over the wall. Its high. Visually its awesome. And from an engineering perspective its pretty awesome too. Not that I know much about engineering. Theres a huge amount of water on the one side, and hardly any on the other, it was built about 80 years ago and its flipping huge and that’s good enough to impress me.

Whilst we were watching the sunset over the hills that surround and enclose the dam who pulls up but Jonie and Chris. We chatted until it got dark. If you bump into Jonie and Chris, which it would seem you have quite a good chance of doing (they’re everywhere), tell them we I say hi.

So, it was now dark. And thats what we wanted. Chest tightening, the adrenaline was beginning to kick in - Vegas was on the other side of those hills...

 

 

 

The area extending up north, away from Tempe, is dotted with hundreds of big cacti. Standing proud, their silhouettes almost personified, like scarecrows in the desert - effective, it would seem, in ensuring that absolutely nothing, besides the odd tumbleweed, trespasses on their precious land. 

The Arizona desert is deceptively mercurial - you could spend dreamy hours travelling through it and feel like nothing had changed. But then you look closely, and you see that everything has changed - is changing. All of a sudden there are no cacti. And then you look at the thermometer and you see that the temperature has dropped from 85F to 60F in the last 90 seconds. You’re nearly 3km above sea level. And then you’re in Flagstaff - a town as strangely familiar as its name.  Davie Crocket territory. Tall pine trees cover voluptuous hills and shade carpets of brown grass and wispy bushels. Here and there the odd Hick. An old pick up with a rounded steel bonnet and a wooden carriage. And then the hills stop, and the pine trees come to a halt. And this happens all so suddenly that it catches the dry grass and wispy bushels completely unawares, and they continue to race out into the desert until they realise that they are no longer under the protection of the pines, at which moment they stop, immediately. And the town has gone too. When did that happen? Did it happen? What was it called again?  It looks just like it did earlier, but without the cacti. The colours are different - there are only deep, desaturated, mid tones - sort of like evening colours that last all day; the sky is clear but the light is strangely oblique in the thin atmosphere.  Behind us the hills are black in their own shadows - great big tar facades rising up from the blonde earth. And look, the sand is thin now, masking a hard layer of stone underneath. Colorado plateau I think its called. Its not really sand now, no, its more like dust. The vast ancient plateau stretches ahead, masked by a thin layer of red dust. The air reflects the dust, the dust reflects the air, and now everything looks pink. Everything has changed and you’ve only barely noticed. 

We needed to stop for some gas and decided to make use of this opportunity to take some time to wonder about this barren place. We all strolled off into the flat abyss in different directions. I found an old track, the dust pressed chalky-thin by use. Again, the terrain quietly misleads you - makes you think its featureless, plain... When I came too, the horizon had disappeared, the sun was hidden, and I was inside the walls of sharp and well defined gully that seemed to drop from nowhere - it was hinting at the grand canyon; I turned around and headed back for the car.

It starts, a big crack in the desert terrain, and then, magnificently, there it is: sinking beneath you, rushing away from you, leaving you breathless, speechless. Silence. Absolute silence. As soon as you see the phenomenon you are struck with a special feeling: that you are privy to what is surely one of the most beautiful and special sights on this planet.

We watched the sun sink, filling the canyon with dusky evening light. And then, as the sun dropped below the horizon we watched the canyon fill with crisp, clear, cool, darkness.

Cool, now cold. Jackets. For Claudia, her leopard print fau fir coat was the only thing that was accessible. It had been a weird day, and the coat seemed to fit. So she wore it.

It was now dark and, yet again, we needed to find a place to stay. The plan was to pitch the tent near the canyon, but it was so cold that we decided to sleep in the car. In fast found retrospect, it became quite clear that it would have been better to brave the cold and pitch the tent - the time and effort it took to rearrange all our luggage just to fix a cramped uncomfortable sleeping arrangement that didn’t provide much more than 12 cumulative hours of sleep certainly wasn’t worth it. Still, we rose at dawn, happy. 

We found our way to the only cafe in the Park, ordered our food and didn’t pay for it. We didn’t pull a runner. You see breakfast was on Jesus this morning. And I say that quite seriously. A rustic looking fellow who lives in the Grand Canyon National Park, and is known by locals only as ‘the rogue’, had a dream the night before. He saw Jesus. And Jesus told him to buy us breakfast. Well, who were we to argue? We tried, but Jesus had been very convincing. Funny thing is that the rogue didn’t come across as the God fearing type, and said that prior to his apparition he hadn’t been, but from thenceforth he most certainly would be. Apparently he had been shown our faces and told that we would be at the cafe at the time we were there and that he had to pay for our breakfast. He didn’t think much of it, but thought there was no harm in going to the cafe and waiting to see if we arrived. He got there a little early, didn’t order anything, and when the staff asked if they could help he told them he was waiting for 3 foreigners - 2 girls and a boy. The staff knew the man well - he had been living in the area for over 5 years, came to the cafe regularly, usually kept to himself, and now and then requested that he could use the cafes address for online book purchases. When we arrived they thought we were old friends of the rogue, or friends of friends. To us, at first, the rogue looked a bit like blithering idiot - or a pervert. He wouldn't stop staring at us. Later we told the staff the story, wondering if he had done anything like this before, and they were all quite taken aback. They said he had definitely never done anything like that before.  The Rogue. Jimminy Jesus. Who are we to question?

We wanted to hike down the Kaibab trail to the bottom of the canyon, swim in that exotic river water, and then trek to the Bright Angel  base camp where we would sleep, departing early the next morning. The walk down would take 8 hours, with another 3 to the campsite. The campsite closed at 10pm and there was a hefty $2000 fine for being in the canyon, outside the campsite, after that time. We still needed to collect a permit to sleep in the canyon. The whole free breakfast thing had taken a fair bit of time (not that we were complaining) and it was already 10am. We needed to get the show on the road. We started the walk. It was pleasant weather for the job at hand: Clear skies, cool air. After about an hour we got to the 1^st way point - a jut of sediment that looked out over the breathtaking canyon. We stopped for a drink of water. A girl, a guide, came up to us and asked us our plan. She had 2 customers with her. We told her our plan. Then, after looking at Beccy she laughed at us - Woe betide, Beccy had attached her sleeping bag to the strap of her backpack and apparently the guide found this very amusing - as amusing as the woman who had done the very same walk in her high heels. It also revealed to her that we were rookies and our plan was completely overambitious and that we had no hope of even coming close to fulfilling it. She told us how it gets 10 degrees warmer for every 100m you descend. She said that our 2 litres of water each was a third of what we would need. She said that she couldn't tell us what to do, but that her friend had died doing the very same walk because he only had 2 litres of water. Her customers hanging on every word - her customers and Claudia, who was now looking very worried. Understandably so. The guide was saying some pretty serious stuff. So our 2 minute water break turned into an hour long session of deliberation. We weighed up the pro’s and cons of continuing, and those of returning. In the end the act of deliberating defeated the purpose of the deliberation - we were left with no option but turn back - the hour we had spent trying to decide whether or not we should continue was an hour that we would, by all accounts, need if we were going to get to the base camp before 10pm. We all agreed, turning back would be sad, but it was necessary. In our hour of deliberation we met the very nice couple Chris and Jonie Taylor. We only spoke to them for a few minutes, but they made a lasting impression. Good people. 

When we got to the top we headed back to the Park office to let them know that we wouldn't be making it to the camp that night. We told them what the guide had told us. In the nicest possible way they told us that the guide was talking rubbish and that we had planned a very doable walk and were very capable of completing it in well within the time we had given ourselves. Bitch. The ranger we spoke to was a legend, and did well to turn our moods back to cheery. He told us about a secret spot to view the sunset over the canyon. He said it was his favourite place in the park, and by losing out on the walk down we had won by gaining a truly unforgettable experience.  He was right. A short walk through the pines to a lonely rock that hangs out over the edge of the canyon’s basin. We sat on the edge of a sheer 500m drop, and for a second time we watched the sunset behind the canyon. An absolutely beautiful experience.

The ranger had also been very polite in telling us that there was no place for us to pitch our tent in the Park that night. All the camp sites were full. As some sort of compensation he gave us directions to a spot of state land that bordered the Park. We could camp anywhere in that land, free of charge. So off we went. We drove the car off into the middle of the night, in between trees, over rocks, past a dead unidentifiable animal (that I had to get out and identify), and finally to some flat ground underneath some pines. We pitched the tent, drank some wine and spoke about the day. We spoke about the rogue, and wondered amongst each other everything you probably would have wondered. Did he see Jesus? We didn’t make the trek down into the canyon because we spoke to that guide, whom we wouldn't have spoken to if we had been at the exact same spot even 2 minutes earlier. We wondered what awful fate may have awaited us had we gone on and attempted the trek. We wondered whether the time we spent with the rogue had saved us from that cruel ending. We wondered those things you would probably have wondered. It was pitch black. We were in the middle of nowhere. Beccy pointed out that there was not a drop of noise, and at that exact moment, I shit you not, a wolf started howling. We lay silence wondering. I could not help but wonder, and then mention that I was wondering, whether the rogue had followed us into the woods, and was watching us. 

 

Take a look at the PHOTOS 

 

It is a cool name for a city. It's a cool name for just about anything. 

You don’t get food on American Airline flights. For whatever reason this did come as a bit of a surprise. Unawares, expecting that foil tray of greasy yum, I had skipped lunch, and arrived at Phoenix international hungry...

We did have a plan for this road trip. Claudia was born in Phoenix, and hadn’t been back since - she wanted to go back and check it out; we had rented a car for 3 weeks (which we’d collect tomorrow); we had a spot in Vegas booked; we were flying out from LA in about a month. Oh, and I had always wanted to stay in a Taratinoesque roadside motel on a lonely, dusty road in the middle of nowhere. 

A few months back we had pitched the plan to our dear friend Becky. Attracted to its simplicity, this well travelled and awesome person from the Isle of Wight decided to join us. 

Beccy is one of those amazing people whose favourite zap is the ‘V’, who wants to see and experience as much as is humanly possible, without worrying about silly things like 3^rd wheels, one way streets or going into credit. Travelling with her was going to be awesome. She would be meeting us the following day. In the mean time Claudia and I would have to find some accommodation for the next couple of nights.

Spurred by the airports numerous, large, advertisements boasting it to be the friendliest airport IN THE WORLD we decided to start our search for accommodation right there, in the airport. And, the staff were refreshingly helpful. Turns out, a large portion of the airport staff are volunteers, ‘just doing their bit for their country’. Instead of directing us into Phoenix central, they suggested we stay in the university town of Tempe, which famously (in Phoenix at least), has been rated by FHM as the number one party university IN THE WORLD. Not having known much about, or having had any previous massive want or desire to visit the place, I was pleasantly surprised to find Phoenix number one IN THE WORLD in such important matters.

We walked outside. The air was warm. Claudia had smile on her face and pep in her walk. Coming back here meant a lot to her. 

The rookie taxi driver eventually gets us to our motel - the suburban-outskirts version of what you’d expect to see in a Tarantino flick. Perfect. Motel 6 you beauty. The elation lasted all of about 8 minutes - the time it took to check in and walk our stuff to our room. 

We got up pretty early the next morning and took a walk into town.

Come to think of it, visitng Tempe was a bit of a surreal experience. It felt like it was a direct descendent of one of those classic dusty western cowboy towns, with a barber and a grocer and a brothel or 2 (Tempe having evolved to get rid of the brothel, of course). It has that ‘happy-happy-arian–stepford–wives-type-town’ vibe to it. Girls in pumps, doused in makeup with perfect hair, or in oversized hoodies with that perfect ‘just-got-out-of-bed’ look. Boys in polo shirts, loafers, beer in hand, competitively happy. Mothers congregated around prams, and Fathers ordering paninis from one of the many cafe’s along the main strip. Chinos. All very friendly, and all with an immortal blind allegiance to the university football team - the Arizona State University Devils. It was my first experience of American fanaticism. Tempe is a 2 street town - the main street and the street leading to the university football stadium (which is about the size of Newlands).

As it Turned out, there was a big rivalry game that night. It was now only 7am and the group hysteria was mounting. It didn’t take long for it to consume Claudia and within the hour she had found and purchased her own ASU Devils hoodie (which she would be wearing to the game that night). 

After a brisk walk up a small hill, Tempe's sole topographical attempt, it was time to meet Beccy at the airport. Once the shrieks of joy had subsided we were all off to collect the rental car from the airport garage. We tried to get an upgrade from the woman at the counter. She’d heard it all before. Down in the garage the scene was different. The guy down there said, ‘sure, take whatever you want’ and basically gave us free range to choose whichever car we wanted. We opted for a massive new jeep with black tinted windows and promised each other we’d do some off-roading.

Then it was back to the motel - with the windows down and the system up we headed back to the motel, got Becky’s clobber out the car and then went back into to town to see if we could arrange tickets for the big match. Touters on every street corner. Unfortunately tickets cost about $50-60, which was about $50-60 out of our budget range. Claudia’s support for the Devils subsided quickly. So we resolved to sitting outside the massive stadium, watching the drunk and pumped passers by. 

One of the passers by didn’t pass us by. In fact, he came straight up to us and introduced himself. His name was Kirk Barton Senior and he was one of the supporters of the rival team. He loved football, would not have us miss the game, and took pride in ensuring that we wouldn't. And just as he came he left, and just like that we had tickets to the game. Thanks Kirk. The game was good. Finally, after years of ignorance, I managed to get some idea of how American Football works. After the game it was off to a lively student pub for a couple of pints, and then back to the motel to work out a more elaborate plan for the rest of the trip. 

Grand Canyon was a no-brainer: it was on the way to Vegas, less than a days drive away, and it was the grand canyon. From the grand canyon we’d go past the hoover damn. And then we’d gun for the Vegas strip. From Vegas it would be a cool few hundred to Yosemite, and from Yosemite we’d roll into San Fran, and then South-Pacific-Highway-it down to Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara (,any other Santa’s we could find along the way), and Finally LA. LETS DO THIS

  

the big apple - le grande pomme! the city that never sleeps! Massive flipping skyscrapers. 9/11. The yankees. Yellow cabs. Shopping. Rocking.

...with all the hype surrounding this place my visit to New York City was beginning to feel like some sort of modern rite of passage. a massive 18hr layover in mexico city airport and then a 5hr transfer through dallas made it feel like a rite i might not ever be afforded. but then the plane dropped through a thin layer of cloud, revealing a bizarrely familiar manhattan in all its flaming glory. Holy moses.

bussed it to Vanessa's place on broadway, upper west side. Got in late. we only had 5 days in the city. the name of this game would be trying to find some sort of mid-ground between rushing around trying to see everything, and taking the time one needs to soak it all in. A man with a plan...

Without wasting any time, or taking any to worry about the effects of jet-lag, we decide to check out time square. Let me tell you, the nyc metro is amazing. it'll take you where you want to go. and it'll be there right next to you when you want to go back. dusky corners attract optimistic buskers; jazz poets, break dancers, magicians, would-be politicians. large audiences collect and applaud, jeer. Screeching trains, wolf whistles and music shroud the perpetual hum of passing feet. A memorable vibe. We exit at Broadway, walk past ernst and young, and hit time square. Neon disco lights. Everywhere. I wasnt sure if the neon ‘New York Police Dept’ was denoting a broadway show, or the actual police department. The theatrical arrest of some bogun didn’t help unravel this mystery… 

Its no lie - this city never sleeps, nearly midnight on a Sunday and its pumping .

Up early the next morning. Its crispy cold. Autumn. we'd heard about this hot chocolate joint just off union square, and Claudia was having some crazy sort of chocolate craving. ‘providence’ - in this case - probably verging on euphemistic. So off we go! we get to the chocolate boutique (max brenner's) and then we get our socks knocked off by hot chocolate, willy wonker style. Think thick, delicious, creamy, spicy, sent-around-the-room-in-pipes, dreamy hot chocolate. And there sat claudia - in a state of total peace and happiness. Luxurious intoxication.

Apart from the odd splurge, subway sandwiches became our staple. And they were also our introduction to the monumental portions that come as standard in the US and new york in particular. I didn’t believe it was possible to fit so much stuff onto a foot-long baguette. Intrigued, I decided to find (ha!) a McDonalds and see what they had to offer in the range of hugely oversized portions. Massive massive massive huge ginormous burgers is what. I supersized and ended up with half a crop of potato fries, a processed cow and over a litre and a half of fanta. Mad. 

The nights are also huge. Lower east side is seedy sexy. Motor City and the awesome $1 beers at the Johnsons. Love this place. 

On day 3 we met up with the crazy ausie mad-dog legend, matt. Together we got onto the dave letterman show and busted some dance moves (separate events). 

I got some good advice (thanks kb!) re a thing called the ‘new york pass’. You pay a flat rate for a little card that gives you access to loads of rad new york city attractions. So we packed in as much as we could: sunrise on top of the rockefeller, sunset atop the empire state; MoMA; the Met (my favourite museum - awesome art collection and the museum allows you to get right up close to the pieces, as well as take photos); Guggenheim - Kandinsky exhibition; the Bodies Exhibition (amazing); NBC Studios; Natural history Museum… I pushed hard to check all this out. At one stage I had to run from MoMA back to the Met - Claudia still had 45 mins left in the nbc studios and I didnt have time to check out the samurai swords and armour on my 1st visit. I totally underestimated the 3.5km run. Funny thing is, I was probably one of about 8 or 10 people running up 5th avenue, alongside central park. At least 4 of those other runners had a brief case in one hand, and a tie and jacket in the other, top 3 buttons undone. Urgency: new york.

So much stuff is going on in this city. All the time. Everything all the time. And, very different to any other city I’ve visited, New York exudes this vibe, in massive large quantities.

And even though it is purely and intensely and only city, new york is beautiful.

 

Hopefully my photos do the place some justice, check em out.

 

 

 

london: collected my boards and caught a plane. 

into mexico. boom: life is good. this place is great news and good for fun times.

i had my birthday here. my number twenty five on a saturday. the celebrations were, however, postponed until monday due to some good looking swell on the sunday. still too weak to surf - not having partied with the waves for about a year - a hangover would have just complicated my situation. 

back on the early surf missions. yeah. dawn-time wake-ups are great. shaggy and tate love it too. we get the waves. barrels are strong here. get out the water. no special moves. just barrels. board has loads of creases from its own secret explorations. so sunday wins. and monday comes.

we surf the monday morning. then we go bazurk. a little buzz on the roof of views. some glass eating happened. i got too dangerous there. cabo blanca came next. they serve these blue crazys at cabo - 'farbars' i think. most potent shit ive ever had. tastes like coal and something else that burns when you drink it. so you have this weird experience of tasting fire whilst a chemical burnout is going on in your throat. its awesome when you're experiencing the high of the night and the collective. but when you take a moment to contextualise your life in terms of the night you're having, you realise that you're probably not doing too well. so you calm down and get some mescal into your system. a few of these and you're left wondering why you parted with the vodka and water combo. man, that is good stuff. lovely buzz, and good raw taste. no daisies on the russian water. you're drinking alcohol to get drunk. and thats what it tastes like. so you know where you are. and thats cool. claudia, the beautiful claudia, and i made our exit with shaggy. we walked for ages. caught a taxi for 2 seconds. i had to interpret shaggy's blabbering. he wanted pizza. felt like i did too. so we hit the pizza joint, and shaggy got wordy with a wacko local. next morning is recovery time. 

 

 

 

the surf is consistent. but then on the wednesday things got real freaky. 1st timer in the big pacific. tamed me. got a one that ripped off both fins, snapped leash, and tore rashie off my back. wow. serious. lovely. the waves had put on some extra weight in time for the evening fun. something out of a dream. barrels like i've never seen before. most amazing. 

the rest of mexico pans out in a similar manner. it is worth noting that claudia's birthday turned mine on its head. i stuck to the vodka waters, but i stuck to them too hard. needed nursing after that night. waking up at 6am the next morn to go on a deep sea fishing mission was a shock. very much still drunk. claudia too. claudia doesnt know whats cracking. man she's talking all kinds of stuff. takes a good while for her to realise we're on a boat. the realisation comes with a wave of seasickness. or something of the sort. me, i just slept on the boat. woke up in a jump to the whistling of the reel. must catch fish! that was the anchor for my hangover. then back to sleep. 7 mahi mahi (dorado) in total. the birthday girl pulled in the biggest guy. we got enough fish to feed our hotel for the next 2 nights. i think we might still have some left over.

this is how mexico went. its how its goes.  

oh shit, we went to a rodeo too.

check out the PHOTOS

 

if you love yourself in mexico stay at aqualuna. clive will take care of you and slap you in the tighty whities. coral, you are lovely.