We were due at Gatwick three hours earlier than our 10am flight and had left in plenty of time, wary of heavy traffic or road works, so that when we hit the usual traffic rush hour just before the airport, we weren’t inconvenienced. Eventually we stopped at the departure drop off point. Andy found a cart for our luggage and we followed him through the concourse. I was used to the moving walkway having brought mum and dad several times when they went on holiday to Spain, but going through the x-ray machine was novel, and passport control. At least it took my mind off the thought of flying-nearly! I was petrified, still trying to think of ways I could get out of it even as we went through customs and through to the departure lounge. Even walking round the shops couldn’t help the sick feeling in my stomach. The sight of the big silver American Airlines plane through the lounge window terrified me. Andy had said they were big, but to me it wasn’t. I couldn’t believe it could actually fly through the air. I tried to put a brave smile on my face, but it must have looked strained. Sarah was fascinated and really looking forward to it. We lined up when the numbers of our seats were called, walking down a long carpeted metal corridor to where the cabin crew were waiting in the doorway. As we shuffled inside, I tapped Andy on the shoulder and said, “I thought you told me it was big!” “It is,” he replied, “compared to the smaller flights to the Continent.” I felt claustrophobic. We bundled our hand luggage into the cupboards above our seats and sat down. I was shaking, trying to get interested in the bag of goodies given to us for the flight on the seat, with a blanket and a small pillow. The stewardesses gave a demonstration of how to put on life jackets, pointing to the emergency exits and toilets. As the plane was a non-smoker, they stated that smoke detectors worked in the toilets and must not be tampered with. I was thrilled by their American accents for it was almost like being in the States already. Finally, after telling people to turn off any portable phones or players and checking that everyone had their seat belts on, the plane began to move backwards. I kept wishing that I had the courage to scream let me out, but was afraid of looking a fool. I shut my eyes, too afraid to look up in case I could see out of the closest window. The plane taxied out onto the runway. Andy had already told me that once into the air, not to worry if the engines went quiet, they had to make as little noise as possible over the houses. The plane stopped, the engines began revving, and then it began to go faster and faster, finally lifting into the air. “Oh, ****.” I prayed that I hadn’t thought out loud! The motion made me feel sickly, and when I opened my eyes, everything seemed to whirl, making me feel extremely sick. I prayed that I wouldn’t be ill–how embarrassing. Eventually, as the plane stopped banking and levelled out, I felt a little less ill, but still terrified at the knowledge that there was nothing below my feet. Once permission was given, Sarah put on her headphones to listen to her CD player, while Andy was reading the magazines from the pocket in front of him. Overhead, in several places down the aisles were TV screens for the in-flight movies, and a handset in the armrest to use them also had buttons for music channels. *******************

I went back to change, then went for a swim before lazing in the sun. As I knew what time the pictures would be ready, I went across to the veranda near Andy’s room to see them. Mine was brilliant. Andy wasn’t too keen on his but I bought it for him anyway. I had to return to my room to get the ten dollars, and while crossing the trail near the corrals, I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye. I stopped dead when I realised that about ten yards away, slowly climbing the spines of a large saguaro, was a long, black snake with a bronze coloured head. Fascinated to see what it would do, I waited while it watched me, weaving its head about nervously. Suddenly, it decided it didn’t like any of this, and half slid, half fell off the plant, disappearing at an incredible speed into the undergrowth. I hadn’t even had time to be scared, I was so interested in watching it. A man and lady who’d been a little way behind me came over. What was it? he asked. I took his question the wrong way and said, a snake! What sort, he asked. I’ve no idea, I’ve never seen one like it before. It was black with a dark golden brown head! Ah, a copperhead,he informed me. Is that a type of rattlesnake? Yeh! Wow, it was climbing the saguaro, I didn’t think they could do that with all the spines. It must have been frightened because it shot off fast. I went back and paid for the photos, had a quick shower in my room, then tried to phone Andy, which took a while as his phone was continuously engaged. It turned out that he’d found a phone book and was ringing round to see if we could get onto another ranch, this one being too big for him, too many people for him to be comfortable. The White Stallion is full but a place called La Tierra Linda guest ranch has rooms, they’re out by the Marana airport, where Andy had sky dived from on our first holiday in 1999. So we booked out of the ranch and drove across town to the I-10 and from there to Silverbell Road. I thought I’d recognised the name, but it wasn’t until we passed a Wal-Mart that I realised we were heading out towards the Lazy K Bar, and then I spotted the familiar shape of Stetson Mountain. We took a left and drove up the road for half a mile, finding the sign for the ranch and heading up the drive through some lovely gardens. I couldn’t ring through to Andy as each phone had its own number rather than ringing an extension, but one day I had a flashing light to say that there was a message, and sat listening to three long winded hard sell pitches. Crumbs, just the occasional double-glazing sales pitch drove me mad back in England. But three! Going outside, I found Andy was already by the pool reading. I had a swim, then sat in the shade on a lounger reading a book, laying a towel over me as the wind got quite gusty. He had lent me another Bill Bryson book, In a Sunburnt Country, which I had been avidly reading, but when I got to his description of a cricket commentary he’d heard on the radio, I began to giggle. The more I read the funnier it got until I couldn’t see the words for laughing, tears trickled down my face. It was hysterical. Every time I got myself under control and tried to read on, I couldn’t, and finally had to give up completely.

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I had a very restless night, tossing and turning, and was finally woken at 3.40am by what I thought was Andy banging on the wall! I thought I’d misheard until he started tapping on my door. It turned out his room clock was set wrong, having gone off at 3.40 instead of 4.40am. Another person must have set it an hour out. I dressed quickly, we packed the cases into the back of the carrier, Andy paid up at reception and we drove out to join the I-15 in the dark. The road was a lot clearer of traffic at this time, which was pleasant, but not far along it began to get foggier, and I hoped the balloon trip would be called off. I didn’t fancy hanging below a balloon, it was bad enough flying. We reached the vineyard which was shrouded in thick fog, three quarters of an hour too early so we dozed in our seats on and off till 6.30am. The radio had been turned low, and I vaguely began to hear the news that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Centre in New York, about 5.45am our time here, while we were parked up. I felt sickly, we had been up there last year, and wondered how on earth the pilot hadn’t seen such tall buildings, having a rough idea from last year about where the airport was. Why was the plane so far off course? Rusty and Kevin then arrived in an open backed truck with a wicker basket standing up in the back. I thought it looked rather small and fragile looking. They introduced themselves and said that the fog shouldn’t be around by the time we reached the take off site, as it was further up into the foothills. We climbed into the back seat of the truck and set off, but then we heard on the radio that another plane had hit the second tower. Alarm bells rang. Twice, was peculiar. My stomach knotted as I felt for all the people who must have been in the building. We were all shell shocked, what was going on? I just couldn’t comprehend it was happening. I felt even sicker as I was worried about being up in a balloon basket, too. All the way to the site we kept talking about it, listening out to the radio to try and understand what had happened. Gradually we heard that it had all been done by terrorists, who had hijacked the planes, and just flown straight into both buildings. How could anyone be so sick? How could anyone be so brainwashed that they could watch themselves drive into a building at five hundred miles an hour, and to know that hundreds, perhaps thousands of people would be murdered by their own hand. They had to be drugged up to the eyeballs. Finally, we drove out of the fog and up to the take off site, where Rusty and Kevin pulled a long blue tarpaulin out of the back of the truck and began rolling it out onto the scrub grass, for the balloon to rest on, Andy told me. A huge fan was brought out and set up on the grass to begin blowing wind into the balloon while Rusty held it open, and slowly it began to inflate. When the basket was taken down from the truck, Rusty had us stand beside it for our picture to be taken with the open end of the balloon behind us. We would get our pictures and a certificate for flying at the end of the flight. It was a beautiful morning, clear where we were with the fog lying in the hollows lower down. I couldn’t believe that on such a beautiful day, thousands of people had been killed deliberately. They were saying that on a working day, up to fifty thousand people could be in there. Rusty laid the basket over, ignited the burners, and began directing the hot flame into the balloon, which began to billow and rise very slowly. Finally it was up over the basket, swaying in the breeze, and we were allowed to climb in. I clung to one of the basket’s four cables with a grip of iron. When the burners were roaring hot air into the balloon above us, it was really hot. Although I was rarely to be found without my western hat, even at home, I was so glad Andy had mentioned how bad it had been the first year he went in a balloon. I joked with him over it, especially as he had very little hair on top to protect him.

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We went back downstairs to phone for a hotel. After several attempts, we got rooms at the Ramada, $69 each plus tax. It was usually about $120 but I guess they wanted customers. Walking outside for the shuttle area, we were approached by two girls who asked where to meet the buses. We told them to follow us, and we all went down to the red neon sign above the bus shelters. Suddenly, I heard very loud music coming towards us slowly, from the far end of the road that sounded like the US anthem, and then someone shouting. To my surprise, it was a police car covered with small American flags. The driver was waving to everyone and giving a very patriotic speech. I waved and cheered back, along with most of the other people standing about. I couldn’t see any of our police doing that. The shuttle arrived and took us to the hotel. Wow, it was lovely. Andy found the spa inside, the swimming pool being outside. I went back down to the reception to ask if I could pay for a call to Britain using my card, although Andy had booked in using his. This was OK, and I made a quick call to Sue. Afterward, I made a coffee and stayed watching TV till midnight for I wasn’t at all sleepy. Monday 17th September. I was up at 7.30, showered and had a coffee, ringing through to wake Andy at 8.10am. Waiting for him, I suddenly began feeling sick and panicky, the world had gone mad. I just couldn’t bear the thought of joining the long, long queue and going all through the wait again, sitting on the floor, with no coffee and no information, trapped in the building with all those crowds. I think shock was starting to set in. We went for breakfast when Andy knocked on the door. “I rang you,” he laughed, “and got someone else, I’d rung the wrong room and woken them up.” I only had a coffee not wanting anything to eat. Back at our rooms at 10.10am he decided to try and ring Virgin again and on a whim I said I’d do the same. To my surprise, I got straight through to a recording and frantically ran to bang on the wall to Andy, rushing back to continue listening to the recording, then having to gallop back for the door as I hadn’t opened it for him. He grabbed the phone and actually got through to someone. He explained our situation after telling them that we’d phoned on the Tuesday to confirm our flight. I saw his face change. “We’re not showing on the computer system!” he whispered. Suddenly, he said furiously, “you’d better be joking or I’ll string someone up,” then looked up at me and said, “we’ve come up on the computer as a no show! We weren’t at the airport and didn’t book in!” He stated angrily down the phone that, “we’d been there all day, eight and a half hours we’d waited.” Then I quickly reminded him out loud, hoping that the person on the end of the phone line could hear me that the girl at the desk had had to re-enter us on the computer on Saturday. He glanced at me. “We’re now back on the list at number forty five.” “But the manager had said the evening before, we were at number ten!” Suddenly I said quickly, “ask about me being there!” “It’s OK, we’re booked together.” I don’t know why, but I began to panic, insisting that he ask. “I don’t care, you’ve only ever mentioned your name.” He asked, and worriedly told me that I wasn’t showing up at all, but then that they’d re-enter me. This time, he was given confirmation numbers. He put the phone down and looked at me in despair. “We’ve got to go back to the airport again, and just wait.” We checked out and took the shuttle back to the airport, re-joining the long queue out on the sidewalk. All my energy seeped away and I just became laid back and fatalist, giving up worrying. There was nothing we could do about it. It didn’t take long for my knee to get painful and swollen again, and I kept sitting down anywhere I could. At one point while sitting on my case, I had to laugh when the TV van was towed away for being parked in the wrong place.

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The cracked and bumpy road wended its way through Gila County and its red sandstone and scrub desert dotted with grey sage and green creosote bushes where I spotted a road sign: ‘State Prison–do not stop for hitchhikers.’ As the land got hillier we crossed Seven Mile Wash where the weather began to get warm and sunny, and the sky became a cloudless bright blue. I suddenly became aware of a faint tapping before discovering that the windscreen was being hit by hundreds of bugs. Goodness knows what they ate, but trying the windscreen wipers the mess just smeared, not helped by the fact that the washers were empty. At the first gas station we came to, Andy bought a container of screen wash. Whenever we stopped for gas, he also cleaned the front windscreen with the water and sponge/scraper garages provided. Slowly we drove up through two passes and out onto grasslands spotted with green trees, coming across a sign: 6%, with a picture of a lorry at a dangerous angle heading down a steep incline. The strange thing was that almost every single steep hill we came to had this sign–did they only make roads at 6% inclines? (Eventually, during our holiday, we did come across a couple bearing the legend 5% and one of 4%.) We parked up overlooking the canyon to take pictures and walking to the edge to look at the view, I spotted little lizards darting away to scurry under the rocks. Below us the road twisted and turned heading down to the Salt River. For three miles the road continued in a series of serpentines down into the green Salt River Canyon with palo verdes bearing bright yellow flowers and spiky yucca plants. Here, we left the San Carlos Indian reservation and entered the White Mountain Apache reservation. Just before a steel span bridge, we pulled off the road to take photos of the rapids, to find that the Native Americans had their beautiful jewellery laid out on low stone walls. I was tempted to buy a necklace, taking my time to choose as they were all so pretty, before spotting some scorpion models made out of twisted gold and black coloured wire. “My nine year old son makes them,” one lady told us proudly, as I bought one for a souvenir. Andy also picked one. Back in the car, we began the long, winding climb out of the canyon to a huge tree covered valley where I spotted a sign for Cibecue, a name I recognised from several Zane Grey books. All the way to the horizon were scrub covered hills and sandstone outcrops in mixtures of red, grey and black colours. We crossed Carrizo Creek, passed through Carrizo City and drove on to Navajo City. I loved that. Cities? They were no more than small towns. Cedar Canyon turned out to be a gash in the landscape, dotted with huge black rocks and boulders. Once over Corduroy Creek, we came to a forest of blackened pine tree trunks covered in new leaves, recovering after a fire. Just before Show Low, we headed north on the 260W to Payson where I wanted to see the Mogollon Rim I’d read about, also by Zane Grey. As a backwoodsman, he had hunted cougars with Buffalo Jones, not to kill them for sport, but to try to capture them with lariats to send to zoos. We crossed Cottonwood Wash into more open, flatter land, then over Decker Wash. From here, the clouds began to gather and the wind got up. Thirsty, we stopped at Overguaard, at a brand new western style town built alongside the road. Turning left towards the buildings, I could see buffalo in corrals to our right. Driving round to the front, looking out for a café or restaurant sign, I noticed a stables advertising trail rides. Wish I had time to go. Passing the green painted Wild Woman Saloon with its wooden railed verandas, we came to a stop outside the Bakery, Twinnie’s Coffee Break & Ice Cream Parlour, also painted in green. Mounting the steps and going inside, it looked a very posh sort of tourist place, and I was amazed at the rows and rows of jars holding differently blended coffees. We ordered coffee and sat at one of the dark wood tables. Just before we left, a man came round to light an imitation gas flame fire under the alcove, where three or four bear statues sat holding sticks with marshmallows in front of it. After, we went out the far side of the room to find the restrooms, stepping into a neat square of buildings and stores. I drove down the dusty track to the buffalo. There were about a dozen dusty brown shaggy creatures with black button eyes and tiny curving horns lazily chewing hay from a container. They were not at all interested in my tapping on the bars to try to get them to look round so that I could get a picture of their faces. They were smaller than I’d imagined, and I later read that bison were now just two-thirds the size that they had been before hunters decimated the herds almost to extinction in the late 1800s, due to inbreeding as they were rescued. Down the road a couple of miles, I pulled in for gas where, as Andy was filling the tank, I saw him approached by a man. Andy shook his head. When he got back in the car, he said it had been an Indian, asking for money as his car had broken down, but inside the gas station they’d told him not to take any notice. Back out on the road as we entered an area of pines and white rocky outcrops, the road improved, looking as if it had been recently laid. The clouds began to disperse, and then we were back with clear blue skies. We went through Wildcat Canyon and into more trees that looked like they’d been swept by fire, while every clearing seemed to house RV parks-they were dotted everywhere.

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I was up early, showered, and was ready to go over to the restaurant for breakfast where, to my delight, they had biscuits and gravy on the menu. When we’d finished eating, we packed our cases into the car and Andy drove out to the Canyon de Chelly. This had been a Navajo stronghold until in 1863, Kit Carson had led a brutal campaign against the Native Americans. He destroyed their cornfields, hogans and orchards, forcing them to surrender or starve, then enforced thousands to march 300 miles east across New Mexico to a barren reservation at Fort Sumner, known as Bosque Redondo, becoming known as the Long Walk by the Navajo. Although officials called this a reservation, they were basically held there as prisoners. For five years they had begged to be allowed to return to their lands, and finally in 1868, with roughly half of the original Navaho surviving, they were allowed to go back home. There’s about 80 families living in the canyon now. I picked up a leaflet about the Navaho code talkers who I hadn’t heard of before. Apparently, following the attack on Pearl Harbour and the Americans joining the war, the US Military had been having trouble keeping the Japanese from breaking all their codes and learning where troops were being sent. The Navajo Marines made up their own secret code after learning the military and field terms in English, and they created the Navajo equivalent, which was never broken throughout the course of the war. The number of American lives they saved through this work had been ‘inestimable.’ At a parking bay on the South Rim at Tunnel Overlook, looking out to the beginning of the canyon, a Navajo boy had set up paintings of petroglyphs done on slate, on his car bonnet. As I stood and looked at them, he got out and came over to tell me what they all meant and how he had started painting and selling his art after he had learnt from his grandparents all the meanings. They were beautifully done and I bought one. At the next outlook, Tseyi Overlook, we walked across swirls of rock that looked like whipped icecream to the edge of the canyon. It was a long way down to the bottom of the cliffs where the shallow water wound along the bottom of the canyon framed by lovely green cottonwood trees. Fencing mapped out the different little farms and I could see a few cattle grazing while a truck splashed through the water where the track crossed the riverbed. The whole place radiated peace and tranquillity, and I could have just sat and looked for hours. A real paradise, hidden from view until you stood on the dusty barren plateau above it. *******************