Some really interesting people called. Here is a little sampling:
We set out on Friday afternoon, 10/22, much like our first trip. However, this time we made especially sure that everything was in order (air mattress complete, cats outside with plenty of food and water, all necessities stuffed in the Samurai.)
The excitement built as we drove through the Aiken Mine site and started down the last 5 miles of road that would lead us to the Phone. Would it still be there, and standing? Would we be the first to answer it that afternoon?
A ways down the road we spotted one of the Mojave's own (actually there were three, but I missed the 'moment'):
We rambled on for quite a while, and finally spotted a telephone pole.
Rounding a bend, we saw the Booth come into view:
Something was really weird though! Atop the Booth was a large plastic
toy tugboat. Graffiti on the Booth revealed that a Mission Viejo High School
student named Aaron had left it there. The front of the boat was adorned
with a U.S. flag and the slogan, "Thurlow Does Blow." Oh, brother.
Of course, it was ringing, so I started taking calls. (Mari is still a little paranoid about the English thing.) Many of the calls were from Germany. Apparently a big story had run the day before in German media, so they were calling in droves! Unfortunately, most knew little to no English, so we (and they) felt a little like the Frenchman in Monty Python's "...Completely Different!"
(I realize this photo is out of sequence, I just wanted
to show a better view of the boat)
The Phone has a new superhero - Miller Man! (He doesn't even need a phone booth to change clothes in!)
Everything we had seen the last time (pink flamingo, my logbook, pen and cassette, the phone books from other places, even the electrical outlet which had actually been a part of the Booth) was gone, confiscated either by park rangers or over-eager souvenir hunters. Only a large pinecone and a little mousie took their place. To mitigate further losses, we followed the wilderness credo this time: "Take only pictures, leave only footprints."
A new, welcome addition: The Booth now has an official phone book!! (The local calling area includes Baker.) Charlie said Pacific Bell installed it when they were out to fix an apparent sabotage attempt on the Phone's wiring. He was not sure who had done it but said he had "a good idea." The saboteurs struck a second time but Charlie repaired it himself that time.
Around dusk, Charlie rambled up, in great spirits. He was glad to see me out at the Booth once again, and told me a story of why his truck has only one working headlight (which he used to illuminate the Phone.) He felt quite a shaking from the M7.1 Hector Mine earthquake, but his house is constructed from old railroad ties so he didn't get too worried. His wife (girlfriend?) had quite a fright though. (She comes from someplace that doesn't have earthquakes.) The Booth is securely anchored in concrete, and rode it out in fine shape.
A beautiful moon was out, so we didn't bother hooking up the Booth's
light like we did last time. (My battery running down scared me a little
last time, too.)
A while later, a man from San Diego named Kent arrived with his 7-year old daughter and Chow dog. He was a member of a group called the "Abbey Webbers," an eclectic group of desert rats with a deep fondness for the works of the late Edward Abbey. They communicate via an Internet mailing list, and gather a few times a year for desert outings. (This outing was centered around the Booth.) His daughter was reluctant to answer at first but later wanted to take every call!
Charlie took a bunch of Polaroids to put in his ever-growing MPB scrapbook, and shared stories and his bottle of Southern Comfort.
Charlie took off around 10:30. Kent and company went off to camp in the Deer Spring area. He said there would be a lot more people there the next day. Was he ever right!
The Phone was not quite as busy as it had been on our first trip. After about 10:30, the volume of calls dropped dramatically and it only rang about once every 4-5 minutes. I used that 'cue' to finally decide to turn in. Of course, I left the Phone off-hook so we could sleep.
I got up about 6:30, and, although it was somewhat chilly, as the desert
is this time of year, the sunrise was spectacular! Lorene would be
proud to see this view of her cinder mine.
The phone began ringing about a minute after I put it back on the hook.
A while later, we were surprised to see a guy with a backpack walking down the road to the Phone! His name was Rick, and he had tried to make it up the sandy north road in a little Toyota. He got stuck, somehow got himself out, parked on safe ground and "hoofed it" about 7 miles to the Phone.
Around 9:00, a CHP patrol plane buzzed over and circled the Booth. He came back in the late afternoon and announced on his PA that he was on CB channel 19. I hooked up my CB in a hurry and talked to him. He said he comes over the area twice a day to see if anyone needs assistance. The Phone is now part of a police beat! That was weird, talking on a CB to someone in a plane. Then again, everything is a little different at the Mojave Phone Booth!
As promised, around noon the Abbey Webbers showed up.
The flag depicts a monkey wrench. It was inspired by Abbey's book "The
Monkeywrench Gang".
After a few beers, some attempts were made to scale the Booth and claim
a seat in Aaron's tug.
Finally, a guy named Jim succeeded! He is an expert spelunker (caver) and it was nothing for him. Another Abbeywebber told me that he is on 24-hour call for cave rescue emergencies in Utah.
Hey! Alcohol and boating don't mix!!
Another desert regular:
Creepy, crawly, creepy, crawly, creepycreepycrawlycrawlycreepycreepycrawlycrawly...
The Abbey Webbers took off around 3:00 to go look at the Preserve's lava tube and camp at Granite Rocks.
Some much better quality pix of their experiences can be seen here.
We found a part of Dr. Cliff's lost Astrocam! It was about 100 feet southwest of the booth. The 'business' end with the film in it was nowhere to be found, unfortunately.
Later a group of people from Oro Grande, CA (a town on Route 66) came out and had a barbecue. A guy and girl showed up also, Jerry from Riverside and Amanda from Las Vegas. They were old friends who met in Stateline and came to the Booth.
This is as real as it gets in the Mojave Desert.
We took turns taking calls till 11'ish, when the Phone fell quiet as
it had the previous night. Rick told us some great jokes and war stories.
Oh, what I would do to have a view like this from my bedroom window!
Sunday morning, I took a few calls, the remaining campers and I took
some group shots, then we headed out around 8:30. We wanted to beat
the Vegas-to-LA traffic jams, and Mari had an afternoon cosmetology conference
to attend. We did have a little time to poke around Aiken Mine some more,
though. Here are a couple more pictures.
The truck scale still works! According to it, our car weighs 2300 pounds. The 70-foot scale is so sensitive that it registers the weight of a single person.
"New York, London, Paris, Munich..." goes the song. We got calls from those cities and many more! This is far from a complete listing, as I did not log calls taken when the Abbey Webbers were at the Booth. They took quite a few.
10/22:
| Hamburg, Germany | Nova (?), Germany | Reno, NV (tel. operator!) | Windham, MN |
| Nova Scotia | Colorado | Atlanta, GA | Hamburg, Germany |
| Clyde, NC | Ohio | Cyprus | Van Nuys, CA |
| Oklahoma | Michigan | California | New Zealand |
| OKC | Gore, New Zealand | Viesbaden, Germany | Fort Worth, TX |
| Bavaria, Germany | Dover, DE | Berlin | Lansing, IL |
| Plymouth, MI | Toronto | Va. Beach, VA | Philadelphia, PA |
| Pasadena, CA | Fontana, CA | Germany | Pittsburgh |
| Pittsburgh (again) | Long Beach | Mannheim, Germany | Barcelona, Spain |
| Salt Lake City | Philadelphia, PA | Central CA | Azusa, CA |
| Massachusetts |
10/23:
| Berlin | Cincinnati OH | Belgium | Germany (big party!) |
| Germany | Ireland | Toronto | Germany |
| Austria | Finland | San Jose, CA | Austria |
| San Fran. | N.E. Georgia | France | Massachusetts |
| Germany | N. Dakota | Spain | Turkey |
| Cologne, Germany | Barstow, CA | San Diego | New York |
| Mansfield, TX | Providence, RI | Orlando, FL | Germany |
| Mississippi | Hanover, Germany | Austria | Weithausen (Munich), Germany |
| 1000 Oaks, CA | So. Dakota | Chrisham (?), Germany | Manchester, England |
| Nuremberg, Germany | Atlanta, GA | Vancouver, BC | Germany |
| Germany | Germany | Belgium | France |
| Germany | Peoria, AZ | Whistler Ski Resort, BC | SANTA CRUZ (not San Jose; Thanks for clarifying, Jean!) |
| Conway, AR | Amsterdam, NY | Long Beach, CA | Virginia |
| Missouri | Pittsburgh, PA | New Zealand | Washington State |
| Ontario, Canada | Sylmar, CA | Athens, OH | Florida |
| Iowa | St. Louis, MO | California | Ohio |
| San Jose | Seattle | Denmark | Germany |
| London | Paris |
Closing Thoughts
This trip made our Phone Booth experience complete. The phenomenon, though still very much alive, is beginning to wind down, as evidenced by the Phone's nighttime silence. It's bound to, since most of the major media has done a run on it already and people are starting to turn their attention elsewhere. That was a little discouraging to us, but we still took a very impressive number of calls during the day, and had a thoroughly enjoyable stay. We will keep calling the Phone, and see who's out there! We will definitely be back in the next couple of months to see what is going on.
We were honored to once again play a part in and experience this unique and fascinating phenomenon. Where else can you go and talk to people from all over the world, for FREE? My greatest regret is not having learned German back in high school/college, which would have made talking to many of our callers this trip much easier.
One sad note - the day after we left, we learned from Godfrey's site
that the Phone had been stolen. Later this was downgraded to just the handset
having been torn out. Still, this shows that the riff-raff can even penetrate
the far reaches of the desert. According to someone posting to the site,
the Phone will be back in business on November 1st.
UPDATE 11/00: A far sadder note: Big, bad Uncle Sam, embodied in the form of Mary Martin, MNP Superintendent, finally flexed his muscle and forced Pac Bell to remove the Booth entirely in May. Booth fans all over the world are still reeling from the shock of this. I sincerely hope that somehow the Preserve administration can be convinced to return this booth to its rightful place in the desert, or another site can be found outside the Preserve. Please visit my Post Script Page for my thoughts on this action and information on whom to write to about this tragedy.
Back to Trip #1
On to the Post Script page with my rambligns on the NPS' decision to remove the Booth.
Click here to see pix of our previous trips to this fascinating desert.
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