Morning comes quickly. Breakfast is another chocolate-flavoured Power Bar. I stop at a gas station to buy water and the attendant eyes me and my bike. "Lotta wind today, lotta dust" she says. I thank her and get back out on the road. The side road along the train tracks continues, then turns back into a dirt road.

This does not look good. I take the rutted and bumpy road for a bit. Then the dirt road ends at an I-10 overpass. There's no more road going east other than the I-10.

I remember the warnings from the border patrol yesterday about cyclists forbidden on interstates.

The wind is picking up, and out of the west the horizon is slightly rusty pink. There's a dust storm on the way.

I'm not going to make it to Deming ahead of the storm.

I cross over to the east-bound side of the I-10, take my paniers and my front wheel off and stick out my thumb.

Minutes later I am picked up by a retired widower in a beat-up van who had decided he was going to travel across the U.S. "to see America" at least once before he died. He takes me the last twenty miles to Deming and I pedal of to my motel and check in.  Then the storm hits:

I spend the rest of the day in bed watching television. My body is grateful for the opportunity to recover from yesterday's long ride and this morning's bumping around.