The road over the Raton Pass, by the way, was originally built by a famous character known as “Uncle” Dick Wooten. Having defrayed all the expenses out of his own pocket he established a tollgate so that he might somewhat reimburse himself. The American traders paid the toll without a murmur; the Mexicans paid only through the persuasion of a revolver, and the Indians would not pay at all. After going over the road we agreed with the Indians.
The rest of our story all the way to Santa Fé is one long wail. But in justice to the roads of New Mexico, it is necessary to go into some explanation of the wherefore of our particular difficulties. In the first place we went out there in the very early spring after the worst of the thaw, but before any repairs, which might have been made for the summer season, had been begun. As for equipment, ours could not by any possibility have been worse.
With a wheel base of one hundred and forty-four inches, our car has a center clearance of only eight inches! Furthermore, we have a big steel exhaust pipe that slants from ten inches above the ground under the engine to eight and one-half inches above the ground where it protrudes behind the left rear wheel. Therefore, where shorter, higher cars can go with perfect ease, it requires great skill and no little ingenuity for a very low and long one to keep clear of trouble. For instance, over deep-rutted roads we have to stay balanced on the ridges on either side, like walking a sort of double tight rope; if we slide down into the rut, we have to be jacked up and a bridge of stones put under to lift us out again. On many of the sharp corners of the mountain passes we have to back and fill two and often four times, but our real difficulties are all because of that troublesome exhaust pipe.
A Glimpse of the West of Yesterday
Out on the cattle ranches they build a great many queer little ditch crossings; two planks of wood with edges like troughs, and a wheel-width apart. They are our particular horror. Again, right wheels went over perfectly, but the only way we can get the left ones over is to build up the hollows with pieces of wood—some barrel staves we found by luck and that we now always carry with us.
Another particular joy to us is sliding down into and clambering out of arroyos, on the edge of which the car loves to make believe it is a seesaw. Our only good fortune seems to be in having plenty of power, and the carburetor high enough not to be flooded—as yet—by any streams we have gone through. Once, in order to find a bank that we could crawl up on, we had to wade up the stream, with the possibility of quicksand, for nearly half a mile.
After three days of this sort of experience, you can’t help wincing at the very sight of ruts or rocks or river beds, in exactly the same way that you wince at the close approach of dentist’s instruments.
Between Trinidad and Las Vegas we were overtaken by a blizzard. It rained, hailed, and finally snowed; and it all passed by us in less than an hour. But in the midst of it we lost our way and wandered for miles across the prairie. Finally, at the end of about twenty miles we saw an open wagon and two men resting under it, but they spoke only Spanish and we understood their directions so vaguely that when our road disappeared into hilly, roadless prairie, and we came to a new bridge without any tracks leading to it, and apparently uncrossable between it and us, it was snowing again, there were no shadows to tell the points of the compass by. As E. M. drove on at a snail’s pace, wondering which direction to turn, two Indians on ponies appeared over the edge of a nearby hill.
Again we had no language in common. But we repeated, “Las Vegas,” and they, gravely motioning us to follow, led us through a labyrinthian path between the hillocks to the mesa from which the bridge started. Although they helped us with greatest willingness, and accepted a coin with grave courtesy, their faces were as expressionless as wood-carvings and neither uttered a sound nor smiled.