The Minuteman and the Cockroach
Two Nights in Death Valley
There are times in one’s life when you are presented with an opportunity to do something so ridiculous that you cannot pass it by, even though you know you probably should. My curious nature often means that my poor wife and I end up taking the less sensible options on some of our trips. This usually results in some kind of hardship (such as a 27 hour trip on a train in India that should have taken 13) but the outcome always makes for an interesting experience to look back upon. That’s what adventures are all about, or so I tell myself.
In 2014 we decided to visit California. Seeing as we are the sort of people who would prefer to travel more, in an economical fashion, rather than take fewer, more luxurious, trips we packed an extra bag full of camping equipment. Camping would undoubtably save us money by offering cheaper overnight accommodation, but also it would give us the chance to be closer to nature and cook our own meals. We had a tiny tent, sleeping bags and a stove that we never used because, out of the three stove models we could have brought, I picked the one for which fuel seemed impossible to find in the entire state.
We were beginning our trip in San Francisco before driving a large loop that would take us as far east as Las Vegas (I knew I’d hate it, but I needed to see it for myself) before returning via Joshua Tree, Los Angeles and along the Big Sur back to the astonishingly expensive hot chocolates of San Francisco. We had all manner of routes available to us but there was one conveniently located place on the map that seemed to jump off of the page every time I unfolded it – Death Valley.
I mean, who wouldn’t want to visit one of the hottest places in the world? I convinced my travelling companion Fiona that not only would we go there but we would camp there in our little tiny tent too; just to say we had done it. Our AirBnB hosts in SF thought we were bonkers and couldn’t understand why we didn’t just fly straight to Vegas. That would have undoubtably been the fastest way, but it would also have been the least rewarding, and the very thought of travelling 10km above such an incredibly diverse and fascinating landscape seemed like such a waste. Besides, I had a brand new Fujifilm X-Pro1 camera in my bag and I was itching to get it used.
The journey to Death Valley was wonderful. We avoided the obvious Yosemite route (far too busy for us) and instead continued further south to Lake Success on the edge of the Sequoia National Forest. If we had flown overhead we would’ve missed out on a late night in the campsite bar meeting some local folk who are a part of a fascinating club known as E Clampus Vitus. We wouldn’t have seen the sun rise over the lake the next morning, or eaten ‘California’s best’ cherry pie in a roadside cafe for breakfast whilst chatting to a couple of young guys who were out hunting and driving their pickup anywhere but the actual road. In fact, we spent so long being distracted that we ran out of time and ended up camping in another incredible place called Red Rock Canyon State Park.
The next day we bounced our way along the washed-out trail, back to the campsite entrance and north onto the Trona Wildrose Road to visit the weird sculptures at Ballarat. It was already getting hot but we were doing fine and I was starting to think that the more bearable ‘dry heat’ that everyone in California talks about really was a thing after all. We duly arrived at Death Valley and did all the things that tourists do.
We took a photograph next to the huge thermometer (52 ℃) at Furnace Creek visitor’s centre. We walked along the nature trail to see the incredible Salt Creek pupfish that survive there before visiting what is arguably the hottest place on earth – Badwater Basin. We got out of our air-conditioned car, realised that it was unspeakably awful, walked as quickly as we could to take a photograph of ourselves that doesn’t look hot at all and then bolted back to the car before we expired. Even today I still think of the mule teams that used to cross this scorched landscape carrying heavy loads of mined borax. I have no idea how they survived.
As the sun began to set and the temperature dropped to a balmy 40 ℃ we decided to head to Furnace Creek Campgrounds to spend the first of two nights in a tent in Death Valley. I won’t lie, I was quite excited at the prospect.
Our first impressions of the campsite were not good. Used to pitching a tent in the luscious grassy fields of Cumbria the idea of sleeping in what appeared to be an unfinished car park was very unappealing. I knew there wouldn’t be grass but I was at least hoping for a sandy area such as the one at Red Rock Canyon. Instead we scrabbled for a spot under one of the scrubby mesquite trees and pitched our tent on top of the sharpest and most unpleasant gravel I have ever seen. In spite of our unpleasant pitch we still managed to get into a fight over our territory with a tetchy neighbour who wanted to swap our misery for theirs. I think the relentless heat had everyone on edge.
So how do you think we slept in our little nylon envelope? When the wind whipped up around 9pm I can best describe the experience as trying to sleep inside a fan-oven. Rather than offering even a smidgen of relief the wind seemed to howl down the red-hot valley, collecting every scrap of available heat along the way, before blasting into the campground. I have clear memories of realising that the whole idea of sleeping was futile and deciding to peel myself off my cotton sheet and go and sit outside at 2am with every other camper. Nobody outside in the moonlight spoke, or even moved. We all just sat in our own sweaty bubble of misery and endured.
The next morning Fiona and I made an executive decision. We were definitely not going to do that again. Right next door to the campsite was a manmade oasis called The Ranch at Death Valley. With the kind of insane disregard for the environment that America (and other countries too to be fair) seems to struggle with, here was a large resort in a baking hot crispy desert with an outdoor swimming pool and a luscious green golf course, complete with well-watered grass and a pond. Using what little water is in the mountain springs to water a golf course just doesn’t sit well with me at all.
Having said that, we put aside our environmental concerns and we did decide to book one of their semi-detached cabins for the night. Fiona had always had a dream of sitting on the porch of a cabin in the desert, gently rolling back and forth on a wooden rocking-chair whilst drinking an ice-cold beer (I think this stems from watching too many Westerns with her father when she was growing up). The Ranch had the very thing. The Ranch also had that swimming pool I mentioned and, without a hint of exaggeration, I can say it was the best swimming pool experience I have ever had in my entire life.
Imagine spending an absolutely roasting day in the desert accumulating a crust of sweaty dust and dead flies and discovering that there was actually a pool available to us, even if it cost more than the campsite. Heaven. Showering off the grime and lowering oneself into the tepid water was simply incredible. Feeling cool and clean for the first time in several days is something I’ll never forget. I imagine none of the other ‘swimmers’ who, like us, were simply hanging stationary in the cool water like a shoal of jellyfish would forget it either. Our bodies protected by the caressing water whilst our heads were slowly being cremated.
It was that evening that things would get quite interesting. Dealing with the heat was one thing. Engaging with locals, human (barely) and non-human was remarkably challenging.
Fiona had found her cold beer and we were sat on our rocking chairs on the porch of our cabin. Next to us, with an adjoining porch, was another, empty, cabin. It wasn’t long before our neighbours arrived. The first thing that caught my eye was that their truck was emblazoned with Confederate flag stickers. The second was that the back of the truck cab had a gun rack on it, and attached to that were a wide assortment of firearms. Neither of these things had been particularly common on our journey through California although, to be fair, we did find plenty more on the rest of our trip the further inland we travelled.
They slowly unpacked their truck before acknowledging their porch buddies. After a polite exchange of greetings the man got straight down to business. “You don’t sound like you’re from around these parts”. No, I replied, we are from Scotland. “Do you have blacks in Scotland?’ were the very next words to leave his mouth. The conversation carried on awkwardly, mainly revolving around the very existence of non-white people in Scotland, how we tolerated them and even how many we thought lived there.
Now, I am quite a chatty and nosey person, but even I should’ve ended the conversation and sat in silence but before I realised I had a potential exit-point I asked him what he and his wife were doing down in Death Valley. Hunting perhaps? It turns out he was hunting, but not for rabbits or deer (unless they were Mexican). He was a self-proclaimed Minuteman. An American who had joined with other likeminded civilians in the unified belief that the border control south of us was a bit lacking and needed a bit of extra help.
He told us, without a hint of concern about what we might do with the information, that he and the other Minutemen would do anything it took to keep the Mexicans out of America. Just presumably not all the ones toiling away outside maintaining the resort he was enjoying. Luckily for us he didn’t like being outside so he and his wife went into their cabin and stayed there for the rest of the evening, leaving us to open another cold beer and digest what had been an intense conversation.
Exhausted from the previous night’s attempt to sleep like a boil-in-the-bag chicken we turned on the air-conditioning and quickly drifted off to sleep amongst the sumptuous white cotton sheets. It was bliss. Until, at some point in the night, I woke and quickly became aware that there was something trying to get into my mouth. I have a crystal-clear memory of reflexively spitting whatever it was out onto the bedding, where it crawled under the sheets. I then shook Fiona awake and told her to get out of bed because there was something in it that ought not be there.
I switched on the light and gingerly peeled back the covers and there, sitting quite happily, was the largest cockroach I have ever seen. The Minuteman next door would’ve been proud to see the two whitest of white naked people running around the room trying to capture this monster before making several failed attempts to flush it down the toilet – who knew cockroaches could climb back out of a toilet even after being washed down it? I didn’t dare fall asleep again and anyway, I had promised Fiona I would stay awake and stand guard over her until the morning.
The room was not cheap so the next day I went to complain. The staff at reception nonchalantly told me that they weren’t surprised this had happened because they had been doing some gardening earlier and that always disturbed them. We were in ‘the wild desert’ so essentially they could absolve themselves of any and every form of creature incursion. Cockroaches are, apparently, known to come inside during lengthy dry periods and look for sources of moisture (i.e. the inside of my mouth). Why it didn’t just go and sit under the sprinklers at the golf course I’ll never know. Perhaps they also spray the lawns with chemicals to keep the wildlife at bay.
In fairness to the resort I need to point out that when we returned home I wrote an angry cockroach email and sent it to the head of the company. A manager emailed back and, unlike his reception staff, was genuinely horrified that it had happened. We got a full refund and the promise that he would encourage his on-site staff to be a little more sympathetic.
To this very day whenever I see a cockroach I am always reminded of the Minuteman and that fateful night in Death Valley.
This story was made easier to write by the fact that I have my wife’s brilliant travel journals to look back through. They are full of times, dates, locations and snippets of these stories alongside beautiful illustrations. You can see some of her journals and sketchbooks on her Substack here.
