FOLLOW THE LEADER - Chapter 44

 Chapter 44



I gassed up the Suburu and drove onto Highway 190, heading west. In the distance I could see great sand dunes reflecting the reddish hue from sunrise.

Twenty-five miles later I pulled into Stovepipe Wells, a one-horse village with an old general store that reminded me of a western movie set. It had a hitching post that ran the length of the front porch and a gas pump. A sign said “Hotel,” but I didn’t see one.

Travel trailers sat in a dusty lot in no kind of discernible arrangement. It was spring, so the campers wouldn’t burn to a crisp once they stepped out of their trailers. Were any of the wells still working? I mused.

I kept going. 

Ranger Rick told me it was one hundred miles from the Furnace Creek station, and the last leg would challenge me.

“You gotta navigate a shit road through a mountain pass just before you get there,” quoth the ranger.

Some long miles down Highway 90 I saw palm trees towering over another village. Panamint Springs. Its junction had a hotel with a restaurant and the last gas station for many miles, according to the ranger. From here I would be travelling southbound on Panamint Road, which would become dirt.
A growing sense of dread came over me, as if some kind of reckoning lay just ahead.

One hour later I was battling a rocky road inside a narrow mountain pass. After some nasty bumps I made it through and arrived at the site, which sat in a little valley. I parked the car and got out.

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