defocus·blog

It's called “Death Valley” for a reason.

If you travel a lot – road trips, RV, whatever – you'll get the question a lot: “What GPS do you have?”

I have no GPS in my car. I want no GPS in my car.

Death Valley is called that for a reason, and this story is the reason. A woman followed her GPS into the desert, and her child died, and she almost did, too. The press is quick to blame the GPS, and peoples’ willingness to blindly follow it, but I don't think that's the whole story. I meet people whenever I'm at a National Park who think that “Park” means it's like Disney: someone made it, and it's designed to be inherently safe. This couldn't be further from the truth. “National Park” more often means that you're on your own, so you'd better be prepared for what you're going to find.

All of the parks provide information to those who want to venture into the wilderness. They're not just covering their asses to avoid a lawsuit. They're trying to keep you alive. You should read all of it, and do everything they tell you to do, unless you know why you're special. Your cell phone probably isn't going to work, and it would be a mistake to assume someone will come along to find you.

I drive a sports car. It's designed to work well on pavement; not so much elsewhere. When I'm at Badlands in South Dakota, sure, I'll go on the dirt roads: they're well-maintained, they don't go far, and the environment is one where I can walk back out if necessary. At Death Valley, though, my car doesn't leave the pavement, except for parking areas just off the road. It's a different world. If you want to venture into the desert, they rent Jeeps equipped for off-road travel with beefed-up suspensions and special tires.

The Parks are becoming more popular each year – this is good, but unfortunately, a lot of people seem to think they are just a cheaper alternative to Disney World for a family vacation. They're not. A National Park is not a controlled environment designed to be safe. People die every year ignoring safety warnings, and not just at Death Valley; assume you're on your own at Yellowstone, or the Grand Canyon, if you venture off the pavement.

A few years ago, I hiked part of the way down the Grand Canyon, on the Bright Angel Trail, one summer morning. On the way back up, I met a man with his two young sons; he asked me about camping at the river. He intended to go all the way down just to check it out. He had one bottle of water for the three of them. I persuaded him that, no, he really wasn't going to the river that day. It was over 120° below the rim, according to the Park Service, and he thought he was hiking to the river and back with his kids and 16 ounces of water. No GPS led him into that.

The Park Service tells you that under no circumstances should you attempt to hike to the river and back in one day. It's on a sign at the trail head. Sure, people do it; if you're one of those people, you know why you can ignore the warnings.

“Death by GPS” is an angle a lot of reporters like to take – it's easy and straightforward to blame technology, and people like the story. But I don't think it's the whole story.

Blindly following your GPS instead of your eyes is stupid. Assuming a wilderness is safe because it's called a “park” is even more dangerous. That word may not mean what you think it means.

Abandoned America: Cuervo, NM

The town of Cuervo, New Mexico, began in 1901 when the railroad came thorough. The town started to grow when the surrounding land was opened to cattle ranching in 1910. Then Route 66 came, and the town's population peaked in the 1940s at over 300.

And then the Interstate literally came through town: right through the middle of it, ripping up roads and tearing down houses. Cuervo couldn't survive that. It's a ghost town now; a few people still live here, though it's not clear why.

If you like ghost towns at all, Cuervo is a must-stop. It's right off I-40, no side trip necessary. The “living” side of the town, if you could call it that, is on the north side of the Interstate, and on the south side is a massive photo op. There are a few people still living here in trailers, but most of the town is very old buildings in various states of decay. The dirt roads are fine for normal cars, and whatever people are about don't seem to mind you exploring. (I avoided photographing the inhabited trailers. There's no reason for that, so respect the residents' privacy if you want them to respect your privilege to explore. It is technically private property, so don't be a jerk.)

You'll find a church, a school, and many houses. You'll find an outhouse, a basketball court, and some old cars. It's possible that this is the best ghost town in the country that is both genuine and easily accessible. It's a treasure. If you mess anything up, I will personally hunt you down and kick your ass.

Googling for information about Cuervo is amusing: the search spammers provide results promising real estate agents, restaurants, shopping, clubs, banks, kitchen remodeling, lodging, and even jobs. “Community Calendar for all happenings in and around Cuervo, New Mexico!” Uh-huh. This could be used as a hint of which sites to ignore in any search results. My favorite is “Trash Dumpster rentals in Cuervo, NM.”

I have some more pictures from Cuervo on Flickr.

Geolocation Spoofing

When Facebook Places was announced, everyone other than me was all like “OMG privacy, stalkers, what are we going to do?” My first thought, of course, was, “Okay, how can I spoof this thing so I can check in from Buckingham Palace, having tea with the Queen?”

Once I figured out how to do that, my next thought was, “There should be an app for that.” So I made one. Tall Tales is my new iPad app that lets you choose your location on a Google Map, then go to any website that uses the W3C Geolocation API and have your chosen location reported instead of your actual location. Need an alibi? There's an app for that!

It works on Facebook Places, Twitter, and any other website using the new W3C geolocation standard. At the moment it's only for the iPad; I thought Apple was going to reject the app (for being abusive of social networking services), so I didn't want to put in the extra work to make it run on the iPhone and iPod Touch. Now that it's been approved, I'll be adding iPhone/iPod compatibility soon.

Tall Tales is available on the App Store for only 99¢ (or the equivalent in your local currency).

The Lure

I've been neglectful of photography for a few weeks – I was hard at work on stuff that actually makes money.

Meanwhile, this thing where I'm not out on the road is getting to me. So when I went looking for pictures to scan and process, these spoke to me. I took these this past spring on California's stretch of Route 66, in the Mojave Desert. I may not like California much, but anywhere on Route 66 is good for me.

City Center

City Center is the newest mega-project in Vegas, with several high-end hotels, retail stores so snotty and expensive that they're basically just for show, and high-rise condos of the type any Vegas fan would love to live in. It's a huge complex, literally the size of a small city.

It has two problems. First, they inexplicably decided to reinforce the size of the place by making you walk outside to get from one building to another. I mean, come on: you don't even have to walk outside to get from Luxor to Mandalay Bay. This is Vegas – don't make people walk outside when it's 110°.

Second, there doesn't seem to be any way to get to the place by car, as a guest, without actually driving on the Strip. My goal in Vegas is to avoid driving on the Strip. But the entrance from Frank Sinatra Drive is only for employees; not good.

Aria is the main hotel. I haven't stayed here yet, but it's the kind of place where just walking into the lobby or the casino is breathtaking. I have a casino-rate offer available, so I'll stay here next time; normally I don't stay at a hotel that expects me to drive on the Strip, but this one is so nice I'll make an exception at least once.

In the lobby and casino at Aria, there is actually “something in the air” – some kind of fragrance pumped through the ventilation system to make it smell nice. It's subtle but relaxing.

This is not the place to stay if you don't like to walk. It's huge. In the first picture here, the two buildings on the right are the Veer condo towers, and Aria is the one in the back. I took this picture standing on the property, and Aria is that far away.

Walking around does present lots of photo opportunities, though. These are all Kodachromes.

Ahead Stop

I actually have trouble comprehending messages when they paint them on the road in this idiotic manner. It takes me valuable seconds to decode them.

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices specifies:

If a pavement marking word message consists of more than one line of information, it should read in the direction of travel. The first word of the message should be nearest to the road user.

But it provides no justification. Maybe Yoda wrote the spec.

(Courtesy xkcd.)

USS Midway: Below Decks

And now, we go “below decks” on the USS Midway.

You don't get to explore the entire ship, just the areas they’ve prepared for tourists, but you do get to explore them on your own, assisted by a portable audio player provided as a “self-guided tour.”

On the left, a typical below-decks corridor. If you’re a tall guy, you have to duck to get through those doors.

Below, the kitchen. They actually cook food in those huge vats. Sure, I've never tried to feed a few thousand people every day, but I can't help thinking the food could be better with just a little more effort.

At bottom, a wall of gauges in the engine room.

More pictures from the Midway in this Flickr set.

USS Midway: Bridge

Some pictures from the “island” of the aircraft carrier USS Midway. On the left is Primary Flight Control, which overlooks the flight deck from the side of the island. Below, the bridge, at the front.

These interior shots are all on Portra 400nc, a film I'm coming to like quite a lot. With just enough exposure to allow hand-holding wide open, detail is actually held in the sun-lit highlights outside. Making it darker while keeping the interior bright enough looks unnatural, but the detail is there and you can see it in these images. Try that with digital.

Aircraft

On the hangar deck of the USS Midway, a World War II era training plane. I don't think it's restored to flight condition, but it sure looks good.

And on the flight deck, an assortment of more modern aircraft. Some of them have dummies in the cockpits, which is kind of cheesy, but the planes are nice.

Kodachromes all. I've mentioned what I won't miss about Kodachrome; what I will miss is the look.

Cross-Country Route Planning

It's a topic people ask me about more than perhaps any other: if you're planning a cross-country road trip, what route should you take?

It's also a topic where you'll find a lot of bad information out there. You'll hear from people who have done only one route, whose opinion of the other choices is based on hearsay or speculation. People who have done it once or twice, possibly in a hurry, whose experience is skewed by conditions that don't apply to your trip. Basically, it's an area where there are more opinions than experience.

Nowadays, some folks will simply do whatever their GPS tells them to do, like mindless zombies. I neither have nor want a GPS unit in my car. I'd rather enjoy the trip. GPS can't tell you why you should go one way rather than the other.

So, I'm going to go over your choices. Obviously all of the possible trips are well beyond the scope of a single post, so I'm starting with the most common (in my experience) topic: driving from the Northeast to either Las Vegas or Los Angeles, or vice-versa.

I have driven everything I'm writing about here, multiple times. This is first-hand reporting.

Southern Route

For the Southern Route, take the Pennsylvania Turnpike to I-70. I-70 takes you west to St Louis, where you pick up I-44 to Oklahoma City. There, get on I-40 west to Arizona. If you're going to Las Vegas, you then take US-93 the rest of the way (not the only choice, but that's a topic for another post). Or, proceed on I-40 into California and then I-15 to Los Angeles.

This is the best route. Although Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois aren't very interesting, they go by pretty quickly. From St Louis on, though, you're more or less following Historic Route 66 – you could spend your life exploring all the wonderful stuff on this route.

Toward the end of Missouri, Route 66 briefly deviates from the Interstate route. You can take a leisurely side trip by following this route through Joplin into Galena, Kansas, and then down into Oklahoma where you rejoin the main route on I-44 (which is also the Oklahoma Turnpike).

Proceed through Tulsa to Oklahoma City, either of which offer a great stopover. In Oklahoma City pick up I-40.

There are so many Route 66 sites and other stops on this route that you'll never get to them all. You'll cross from the wonderful-smelling Oklahoma into the dry plains of Texas. In Groom you'll see the “largest cross in the western hemisphere” on the side of the highway. Amarillo is your next oasis of civilization, if you're looking for a place to stop or some good food.

Then you get the beauty of the New Mexico desert. If you didn't stop in Oklahoma or Amarillo, Tucumcari (pronounced like "two come carry") is a Route 66 town, a traditional stop for explorers, offering dirt-cheap, clean, and nostalgic motels that will make you weep for the good old days.

You can explore the ghost towns of Glenrio, Texas, and Cuervo, New Mexico, if you're into that sort of thing. Both are right off the Interstate, so no side trips are necessary.

The next oasis of civilization is Albuquerque. It really is the only opportunity you'll have for anything like Starbucks or Applebee's for some time, so you'll probably want to stop here for a bit. After that, Gallup is another Route 66 town offering some amount of civilization.

After crossing into Arizona, you can take a quick car tour of Petrified Forest National Park, which you can do in a couple hours. Then it's on to Flagstaff, your next real oasis of civilization. On the way are many interesting Route 66 stops, including Two Guns, Twin Arrows, and Winslow, where you can stand on the corner from the Eagles song “Take It Easy.”

In Flagstaff, you can find civilization, overpriced hotels – and a side trip to the Grand Canyon. The South Rim is 80 miles from Flagstaff.

Kingman, Arizona is only barely an oasis of civilization, but it's the best you're going to get at this point. From here, if you're headed to Vegas, you can head up US 93 over the Hoover Dam. Or, stay on I-40 into California, through the Mohave Desert to I-15 and on to Los Angeles.

If you get the impression from how much I have to say that I love this drive, you're right. When someone says to “imagine your favorite place,” I don't think of a single place, I think of driving this route. I could write an entire book about how great this drive is, and I would love to. If you're planning your first cross-country road trip, this is the route you need to take. Provided you do it right, I promise that you will henceforth divide your life into “before” and “after” you made this trip. I do.

The Confederate Variation

Another option is to go from the Pennsylvania Turnpike onto I-81 South, picking up I-40 in Tennessee. This is the same as the Southern Route, changed in the east to head through Virginia, Tennessee, and Arkansas, in what I call the “Confederate Variation.”

This route takes longer and is less interesting than the eastern part of I-70. It doesn't make a lick of sense unless you want to stop someplace along the way.

Candidates include: Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee; Nashville, if you're into country music; and Little Rock, where you'll find the Bill Clinton Presidential Library, which is definitely worth a stop.

West Virginia's Mongahela National Forest is a quick side-trip away from this route, if you want to go camping. (The campgrounds at Lake Sherwood have hot showers!)

You'll rejoin the main Southern Route in Oklahoma City.

Middle-America Route

For the Middle-America Route, you pick up I-70 in Pennsylvania and stay on it all the way to its end in Utah, where I-15 South will take you to Las Vegas or Los Angeles.

This is the fastest route. It's not as life-changing as the Southern Route, but sometimes you need variety, and instead of the desert, you get the prairies of the Midwest and the Rocky Mountains.

When you get to Denver, Rocky Mountain National Park is less than two hours away as a side trip. If you've never had the opportunity to drive your car above the clouds, take this side trip – but only in the summer.

The mountain pass west of Denver is a marvel of civil engineering, and takes you to very high altitudes: in the winter, this is not the best route to choose. If you choose this route in winter, or even spring, check the local weather forecasts carefully before leaving Denver. You can still bail out: take I-25 south to Albuquerque and join the Southern Route. Tire chains are mandatory here in winter – if you don't have them and know how to use them, this is not where you want to be in January.

Once you cross into Utah there are several side trips to consider. Arches National Park is an easy drive from the Interstate, and Canyonlands National Park isn't far from there (but less interesting as a quick car tour). Bryce Canyon is two hours from the Interstate but well worth it. Zion National Park isn't even that far, but is less interesting as a car tour. If choosing only one, go with Bryce Canyon.

In Utah, I-70 goes though a long stretch of nothing: no gas, food, lodging, towns, cows, or anything else at all. Make sure to fuel up beforehand; there are signs to warn you (a lot of people run out of gas here). In the middle of this desert wasteland, the 75mph speed limit inexplicably drops to 60. It's not well-posted, and the highway patrol revenue agents may well be there to greet you. It's the speed trap to end all speed traps, and the out-of-staters are the targets. I have a speeding ticket as a souvenir that I wouldn't have gotten had I known the speed limit changed. Be careful here.

In the Utah desert – which is strikingly beautiful – I-70 ends, and I-15 will take you to Las Vegas and on to Los Angeles. If you enjoy scenery, you will love it. There are places to stop, to rest or sleep or take pictures, but few services, so be prepared.

The Bad Route

If you ask Google Maps to take you from New York to Las Vegas with no further instructions, the first route it will give you is I-80 to I-76 to I-70 to I-15. I'm not going to waste the time to make a map of this route, because under no circumstances should you ever consider using it. The only reason I can imagine why Google brings it up first is because someone at Google hates you, and gets a kick out of imagining you choosing this route and having a miserable trip. If your GPS also brings up this route, I can only think it's a punishment for using a GPS to plan a trip like this.

I-80 through Pennsylvania is fine, but from Ohio through Illinois, it's a miserable journey of toll roads with Nazi-like enforcement of 65mph speed limits, with nothing of interest on the way. The toll roads are turnpike-style, so casually getting off at an exit means paying the toll, then getting a new ticket on re-entry. You get to pass through Gary, Indiana, which has a great song, but is otherwise a bleeping bleephole the likes of which you have never before imagined. I've had road construction divert me onto scary-looking Chicago-area streets with no further instructions or “detour” signs telling me what to do next.

Eventually you get to Iowa, where things aren't so bad, but by that point your spirit is broken. I'm not kidding: never go this way. Trust me. The relative pleasantness of Iowa and Nebraska doesn't make up for what you just went through – or what is in store: I-76 through the Colorado prairie is even less interesting than it sounds. The I-80 Northern Route has its uses, and its good parts, but this cross-country drive is not among them.