Nevada Days by Bernardo Atxaga

Author:Bernardo Atxaga [Atxaga, Bernardo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-55597-860-0
Publisher: Graywolf Press
Published: 2018-10-10T16:00:00+00:00

DECEMBER 23

ON THE WAY TO SAN FRANCISCO

From Reno to San Francisco is over two hundred miles, fifty of which are through the Sierra Nevada, at an altitude of over six and a half thousand feet, regardless of whether you take the I-80, passing through Truckee, or the US-50, which skirts round Lake Tahoe, or travel by train. Potentially, it’s the most dangerous stretch, because of the mists and sudden gusts of wind; then, as you approach the first Californian city, Sacramento, the journey becomes really pleasant.

Earle advised us not to bother with the train, because it came all the way from Chicago and was almost always delayed.

“I wouldn’t recommend going via Lake Tahoe either. It’s the prettiest route, but we’re in December now, and the road is quite an empty one. Best take the I-80 – that way, if it snows, some truck is sure to come along to rescue you and your fragile little Ford.”

The words “fragile” and “rescue” emerged from his lips with a certain emphasis.

In the days before the journey, I kept a close eye on the website showing the temperatures near Lake Tahoe. On December 20, the maximum was 5 degrees C, the minimum minus 9. The following day it was even colder, with a minimum of minus 12 degrees. On December 22, on the eve of our trip, the minimum was minus 7 and the maximum, at midday, was 6 degrees. The forecast for the 23rd wasn’t too bad. They predicted a rise in temperatures and clear skies. There was only a 0.5 per cent possibility of precipitation in the form of rain or snow. I told Ángela.

“Reading Scott’s diaries has marked you for life,” she said. “We’re going to San Francisco, you know, not the South Pole.”

Ángela’s sense of humour was becoming more and more like Earle’s.

We left Reno at ten o’clock in the morning. As forecast, the skies were blue, and the thermometer in our house read 35 degrees F, about 2 degrees C. When we got onto the I-80, we sat back in our seats; the girls plugged the D.V.D. player into the car’s cigarette lighter and Ángela and I began drinking the coffee we had bought at the gas station in Virginia Street. It was such a joy to feel the bright sunlight in our eyes, and to leave behind us the spider prowling around our part of town.

We drove up the first hills and reached the frontier between California and Nevada. The border patrol guards only checked vehicles carrying plants or animals, and so we went straight through, only stopping for a moment. The traffic lights indicating the risk of snow were green.

For us – although perhaps not for the inhabitants of six hundred thousand years ago – the physical world is always, or so it seems, something secondary, a mere support, the surface we need in order to sow corn or plant potatoes or to supply an industry or, seen from a very different angle, a ductile material that

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