I haven’t seen it much in recent years. But not all that long ago, it was a staple of cartoons and B movies. The tale of a man, dying of thirst in a desert, who sees water and runs towards it, only to discover more dry sand under the sun that is killing him. The water, of course, is a mirage. I had never seen a mirage that was remotely convincing, and I wondered how anyone could ever be foolish, or desperate, enough to be deceived. Until Hotel Subaru descended onto the Great Salt Desert of Utah on a hot Saturday afternoon in August.

The Great Salt Desert streches from Salt Lake City uninterrupted to the Nevada border, more than 100 miles to the west, where it meets a ridge and an abrupt 1,000-foot climb to the first plateau of the Nevada high desert. From the crest of the ridge overlooking the border town [sic] of Wendover, Utah / West Wendover, Nevada, the desert looks like what it is – an ancient lake bed, white with salt, with the occasional brine pool (for mining the salt) and, at the margin of sight to the north, the Bonneville Speedway, looking like an airport runway complex, black gashes on the white surface.

Interstate 80 is the one road across the desert. As if it were weary of the twists and turns needed to navigate the mountains on either side, and desperate for a good long stretch, the highway rolls out absolutely straight and level, a drag strip longer than Rhode Island is wide. I imagine the engineers must have exulted at the prospect of drawing a straight line on a map and actually building a road to that specification. Only after it was too late did the human cost of a featureless highway across a featureless landscape occur to them.

At frequent intervals, there are signs imploring drowsy drivers to pull over, and directing them to rest stops built for the purpose. At those rest stops, the parking areas are covered with concrete awnings, an admission that, under the Utah sun, a person in an unshaded car will get either no rest, or eternal rest.

At about the road’s midpoint, there is an outlandish sculpture, half a dozen huge striped lollipops on a 90-foot-tall tree. When I first saw it, I thought it was some sort of communications device, like the ubiquitous microwave towers that relay the cell phone signals with which, the alarmists tell us, we are slowly frying our brains.

But it soon became obvious that, if that’s what it was, the design was straight out of a vision from the Caterpillar’s hookah, Alice. Or from an office of the Department of Homeland Security with a sense of humor. Nah. All of which, of course, is precisely the point of this ingenious work of art – proclaimed as such by a placard at its base. Anything to get the mind working and keep it awake on that flatline freeway.

On this occasion, however, drowsiness and boredom were not to be a problem. It was just after noontime when Hotel Subaru crested the western ridge, and I took in the long view of the Great Salt Desert. Then I pulled into Westover for food, fuel and an hour’s relaxation before tackling the crossing.

My view of the desert from the ridge crest had been awe-inspiring, but also what I expected: vast, white, and pucker-mouth dry. But on the level road I looked again, and suddenly there was water everywhere. What was this? Had I missed something earlier? Had I not been paying attention?

For to my left, all the way to the northern horizon, all was blue. Stark, shimmering, come-take-a-dip-in-the-pool blue. I wondered how come no one was sailing on that lovely expanse. To my right, the salt pans, bounded by the railroad embankment some hundreds of yards to the south, were likewise wonderfully refreshing-looking pools of blue. In every pan but the one immediately to my right. Which never contained anything but salt, sand, and saltbush. Not a drop of water. Not one …

And then I noticed that I never caught up to the water. That as I approached the inviting blueness, it shimmered away, leaving only the desert behind. The spectacle bemused and entertained me until the road at last turned, and the saltbush vistas were replaced by scenes of the Great Salt Lake and the city that bears its name.

For, of course, the water was a mirage.

And I had been fooled.

   - O Ceallaigh

Copyright © 2006 Felloffatruck Publications. All wrongs deplored.

All opinions are mine as a private citizen.

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