The time comes to move on. Two directions present
themselves: north through the desert highlands, into the outlands, peyote
country; or east, over the eastern spine of Mexico, the Sierra Madre Oriental,
and onto the hot and humid Gulf plain. The desire to trip out on mescaline in
the sky-high mining town of Real de Catorce is strong, but the allure of
strange new country cannot be resisted. So I head out on Highway 49, through a
military security checkpoint, the first and last of the trip. Beyond is the
central tableland, high dry and dusty, the southernmost fringe of the
Chihuahuan Desert. Cacti are everywhere, in stunning size and variety. The land
itself is, like most of Mexico, divided into large communal plots called ejidos. Some vast private ranches,
entrances gated, also occupy the gently rolling desert.
Under the dull and stultifying influence of a weed hangover,
I find a place to camp, back in the hills near the rotting shells of some old
ranch outbuildings. The highway is modern, four-lane, and nobody stops for a
pedestrian strolling the shoulder to kill time. The desert feels very lonely,
devoid of all interesting features, a true wasteland. The next day, in the
large desert city of San Luis Potosí, disillusionment grows. All these big,
bustling Mexican cities look the same, smell the same. I am weary of speaking
bad Spanish, of paying four bucks for a gallon of gasoline, of slowing to a
crawl for speed bumps, of seeing mile after mile of cinderblock houses and
shops with painted-on signs, a landscape without design or aesthetic quality,
full of naked consumerist hustling.
Picking up a free and wonderfully detailed state map from the
visitor’s bureau, I make my way to Zaragoza, a town at the base of the Sierra
Madre Oriental, quiet and plain. A road from here leads into the mountains;
after a couple false starts and dead-ends in dry washes, I find it. The land in
these foothills is a veritable cactus garden, ten feet tall, nopales and other species growing tall
as trees. Ragged barbwire fencing delineates homesteads, low-slung adobe houses
in the shade of thorn trees. Away from the dry wash, the road climbs into the
scrubby hills, bearing numerous dump trucks laden with minerals from a mountain
quarry. At the top, a wonderful sere vista awaits in the golden evening light,
range after range of mountains growing blue with distance, a wild and simple
land.
My camp is a barren clearing on the lip of a deep gorge, a
creek gurgling far below. From here, the road winds down into a mining village
in the canyon depths, well-graded gravel switchbacking through the scrub oak
and juniper and cactus. Cooking dinner, I turn to see a small pack of not-small
dogs which have circled close behind me. Alarmed, I shoo at them, but they just
duck their heads and amble closer. Picking up a rock, I lob it at the largest
of the brutes, and he tucks tail and trots off. The others follow. Stray dogs
are omnipresent in rural Mexico, but most of them lack the desperate boldness
of this pack. Because of them, wildlife sightings are extremely rare near any
village or settlement. In all these weeks of traveling, I have only seen a deer
once.