Warning: this story contains no unicorns or rainbows; but there are horses and beams of light.
It’s been a long time since I drove cross-country. Twenty years ago, I was always driving back and forth, it seemed, between Arizona, Washington, Colorado, Michigan, and California. Since settling in California, though, only half the length of the state is my usual long-distance road sojourn. Road trips are hard: on the body, mind, and vehicle. I haven’t had the urge to drive cross-country in a very long time.
I’m not sure what prompted me to take the road trip this summer—probably much the same as many other folks—a post-vaccination desire to get out and make up for the cloistering of 2020. Wanting to see friends and family, and really spend time in a place—more time than I usually am afforded when I travel by air for a visit.
And so it started. On the heels of a work trip to Yosemite, where I led an eDNA training and participated in a mountain yellow-legged frog reintroduction, I started east on highway 6 from Lee Vining, winding through the hills and national forest, until I came to Nevada, where the land opened up in vastness and scorching heat.
The Nevada desert is always hot in summer, but with yet another Western heat wave on top of it, I was concerned about the ability of my truck and its tires to withstand the heat. Would the coolant give out? Would the hot pavement melt the tires? With no cell coverage and more than 50 miles at a stretch with no services, if you break down in the desert, you are at the mercy of whomever happens to drive by. It happens in Death Valley every year—people break down, and instead of waiting by the road for help, wander off into the desert for the last time.
Route 375 is apparently near Area 51.
I have more advantages than the average traveler, though—I have a camper (shelter) that can carry 15 gallons of water—enough to keep me alive for a few days. And some food. I’m not really afraid of the desert—we come here on camping vacations every winter to get away from it all and get some much-needed space for ourselves. We carry plenty of food and water. We have a full-sized spare. We tell family where we are going and for how long.
So on this long drive through the desert the other day, I tried to calm the low-level anxiety of the real dangers of the undertaking by taking in the landscape—noticing everything. What I noticed was death.
The desert is not a void. It is teeming with life, if you know where to look. There are living crusts perched atop the soil; and plants and creatures specially adapted to living in high temperatures and low moisture. But it’s a delicate place. “Busting the crust” by trampling it can undo millennia of the slow buildup of biodiversity. Pumping precious groundwater steals from the plants that have astronomically deep tap roots to reach it, and sucks dry the oases and springs that plants and animals rely on.
It began with the wild horse. Miles from any town, alone, it wandered across the desert. Its chestnut coat was surprising—it looked healthy. Maybe it had escaped from its well-tended pasture? Either way, it was not doing well. Its head hung low, and it sauntered on, slowly, presumably in search of water. What was going to happen to this poor creature?
Wild horses are controversial in the West—introduced by Europeans, they can denude desert vegetation and spread disease to native ungulates. Public lands agencies have conducted roundups to sell them, and even resorted to giving them birth control to try to control their populations. They have their advocates. And why not? They are picturesque symbols of the idyllic silver-screen version of the Wild West in our imaginations. Twelve inches tall at the shoulder, the native North American horses (Eohippus) went extinct in North America more than 10,000 years ago. It may be nice for some people to see horses wandering the desert when they are healthy; but when they have no water, it becomes clear how out of place they are. By keeping them around, we are causing more suffering, not alleviating it.
Miles beyond the horse, it was the cattle. Why it was decided that the fragile desert was a good place to graze a European forage- and water-guzzling ungulate is a mystery. Out on the range or locked into dense pens next to the highway, the poor creatures had no shade in the 114-degree heat. Many times, there was no water in sight. In some places, they stood, heads held low like the horse, awaiting their fate, either to die of thirst or wait it out till slaughter. Either way, it was clear they were miserable. They seemed to avoid areas around their fallen compatriots, if they could. A dead one lay by the side of the road every dozen miles or so. Is this just the price of doing business? Why, again, are we allowing grazing of animals on public lands (almost entirely Bureau of Land Management) in such a fragile ecosystem?
Before leaving Yosemite, I got some travel tips for crossing the Nevada desert into Utah from some friends who do the drive often. “Stop for gas in Tonopah,” they said, “then get the hell outta there.”
I was intrigued. What could be so bad about Tonopah? Just last week I was watching an LA-based show that involved the protagonist taking a trip to Tonopah in winter. It didn’t look so bad on TV.
Upon asking this, I got more reasons than I could count from my friends. I decided to make up my own mind on the drive through. Gassing up was easy enough, and I was happy to see Nevada prices at the pump. Driving into town, I noticed a nearby hillside had been reduced to rubble. This is an old mining town. As my friends had described, the suburban housing at the edge of town was actually built on mining tailings that had been graded flat. Is that safe? Is it legal? Once the mining boom was over, a town still needed to survive somehow.
Tonopah. The name sounded familiar, but I wasn’t sure why. It sounded familiar when I heard it on TV last week too. Tonopah. Why would I know this place?
On the approach to town, I remembered. Far out into the desert was an eerie sight—a giant tower with an extremely bright light at the top of it. Extending out from the light on either side was more light—two shimmering reflections floating in space. It looked like a dystopian future on another planet. I knew exactly what it was. This is the state of alternative energy development on present-day planet earth.
Solar energy is good, right? Sure, but what proponents neglect to tell you is the true cost. For example, solar panels are filled with heavy metals that, when burned—as when a wildfire comes to your neighborhood—turn the area into a toxic site that needs to be remediated with proper equipment and disposal.
The way plants like the one near Tonopah work is that mirrors arrayed around the tower reflect the solar energy back at the tower, where it is concentrated at a central point. Remember those two reflections I saw outside the tower? That is superheated air. When birds fly into it, it incinerates them. It’s easy to think of solar energy as free, but it’s not. Everything has a cost, and we can’t sweep the true costs under the rug, or they will catch up with us eventually.
Bejezus, Dr. Adams—I didn’t want to read the Bummer Blog! I wanted to hear about how fun your road trip was, all the cool things you saw!
I know. That is what I expected to write, too. We’ll get there. In the meantime, let me say that becoming an ecologist and natural historian—someone that can read the landscape and what happens on it and interpret its implications—is akin to taking the red pill. I don’t regret knowing what I know, because it brings me closer to reality. The closer to reality I am, the more empowered I am to create change. Ignorance can be bliss, but I am responsible for helping take care of the corner of the world I call home.
Perfectly imperfect (but clean) rest area bathroom outside Tonopah, Nevada.