Old Mojave Rd.

Here is a story about how I went on a life changing journey to the Mojave with a friend.

We decided to drive the old Mojave trail. This thing is a 140miles of off road. We had to climb down hills, up rocks and everything in between. There are no signs or cell signal 99% of the trip, so if we got stuck or broke down we were pretty screwed... The only directions we had were from a book and stacked of rocks to help us navigate.

The most profound part of the trip was the cleanse of all the things that I was worried about. We were away from all the stupid distraction we would face on a day to day basis, the phone, the internet, the news, the emails and etc. Out there, you can’t access any of it even if you wanted to. Our only goal was to survive and make sure we don’t get stuck or lost. We camped along the route and there was nothing around us for miles. Every turn, every section was more insane than the last. It was a constant over coming of fears.

After 3 days of not seeing anyone, we came up on a guy stranded in the middle of nowhere. He had got his truck stuck in the sand on the way to an outpost where he was trying to deliver some parts. We tried to dig him out for an hour but with no luck. We ended up finding a strap and pulled his F250 4x4 out with my little Tacoma. God knows where that guy would have been if we didn’t come up on him randomly. It’s an amazing feeling to have been able to help him out, yet extremely humbling to know that nature doesn’t mess around. A reminder that we are all merely guests on this earth.

After that we kept going, we explored some caves along the way and got lost for about an hr. We back tracked and tried to make sense of the instructions from the book we got, we finally found a way out and came upon the Mojave river. Like any sane person would do I proceeded to drive the truck through it... It was madness. Granted I had very good instructions on how to cross the river from a local 4x4 parts owner before hand. It is still scariest thing I have ever done in my life. I was shaking with the amount of adrenaline pumping through me.

The rest of the trial was like a Sunday drive compared to the river. We went back into town and resupplied. The plan was to drive back in and find a camp site for the night and take it easy. It was beautiful. The moon was so bright that it was like a giant night light. Never have I seen a sky like that in my life, I saw the Milky Way with my naked eye. We spent the rest of night starring at the fire while having some nice deep conversations about life.

It all seemed to be a peaceful night until about 4:30 am when I woke up to my tent smashed against my face. The wind had picked up to ~40mph and ripped my tent staked off. I got out of my tent tried to restaked them, but the wind was blowing so hard I had to hold on to my tent with my dear life. I called my friend for help, but in the midst of all the confusion he spent what seemed like 10mins opening and closing his tent window thinking it was the door. It didn’t help that I really had to pee at that time. The whole situation was so unreal I couldn’t do anything but laugh at the situation. He finally got out and we staked the tent down and went back to sleep.

The next day we checked out a cave and headed back home. We decided to have In-N-Out so we stopped at Barstow. It was packed with people, there had to be like 200 people there. It was maybe a little too much of a transition for me at the time. I remember thinking to myself, all these people are rushing to go to Vegas to do what? Gamble? Drink? Party? All I could think about was how much I would rather go back to the campsite and stare at the stars again.

I came back humbled and found myself with a new perspective on life. To say the least it had been an unforgettable adventure.

Nature is a beautiful thing, we should all spend more time in it.