Southwest USA

Overview

Traveller Justine Shapiro Justine Shapiro's journey through south west United States begins in Gallup on the New Mexico border, where she visits a Native American intertribal ceremonial. The event lasts for six days and whilst there, Justine attends an Indian Rodeo, checks out Native American cuisine and watches some amazing tribal dances. From Gallup, Justine takes a spectacular train journey north east to Santa Fe, where she acquires a motorbike and cruises along to Taos. She stops in Taos to investigate the Earthships - homes constructed entirely with recycled materials. Justine heads south from Taos to Roswell, the site of a reported UFO crash in 1947. Justine investigates the incident, which has become shrouded in secrecy, and hears some convincing evidence about the case. Justine continues her journey by bike, stopping next at the small town of Deming, where she takes part in the Great American Duck Race. She then heads north west to Tucson, in the state of Arizona. Here she meets some cowboys and takes a horse ride through the desert. She also trades in the motorbike for a car and finds a fellow traveller to share costs on the way North to Sedona. When they reach the New Age capital of Sedona, Justine has a physic reading, and is told that her new car will break down in six to eight months time. The next day the car gets towed to the nearest garage, and Justine gets a lift to Peach Springs at the West rim of the Grand Canyon. She goes on a white water rafting trip, then takes to the skies in a helicopter to view this awesome natural beauty. After picking up her car again, it's an eighteen hour drive north-west via the bright lights of Vegas, to the Black Rock Desert. Here, Justine ends her journey at the Burning Man festival. All that is weird and wonderful can be found here, as Justine discovers, when she visits the smut shack, is offered frozen bugs, and joins the Pagan revellers for the burning of a forty foot neon man.