On the Road

As I flew northeast across eastern New Mexico at 9,500 feet, a huge thunderstorm towered to the left of my track. Brilliantly illuminated by the late afternoon sun, the well-developed anvil fanning out of the top seemed to take up half the sky. Ahead and to my right was a dark, solid, brooding monster, another thunderstorm, this one the northern sentry on a cluster that began at the New Mexico-Texas border and extended eastward toward Dallas.

I was on my way to Tyler, Texas, from Santa Fe, New Mexico, where I had stopped for fuel and another chat with the folks at flight service. I had also scrutinized the radar picture in the pilot's briefing area. It seemed to me — and the flight service briefer agreed — that if I went northeast to Dalhart, then headed southeast down the Red River Valley, I might be able to circumnavigate the severe weather cluster in West Texas, which was moving southeast at 25 knots. I resolved to give it a try.

Thunderstorms are ugly splotches of red and yellow on radar presentations; this evening my flyby of the real thing was awe-inspiring. The problem was the hour. The sun was only a few degrees above the western horizon. Night was coming and I was still three hours from my destination.

As I drew abeam the storm on my left, a bolt of lightning zapped the ground. I took a hard squint at my Strikefinder. Nope, didn't register. Oh, a few stray bolts were showing here and there, but nothing from the storm on my left or the one on my right ahead.

The old weather radar was on, showing a clear path. I tried the various displays, but the scope was clear.

As I crossed Dalhart the sun set. The thunderstorm to my left was well behind, but the one on my right was an enormous inky presence blotting out half the sky, from behind me as far as I could see ahead into the haze. Finally I managed a southeast heading in the twilight. Ahead was total darkness. As they say, this is where the wise examine their hole cards. I could call center and get an IFR pickup, relying on the controller to keep me out of thunderstorms. If only the Strikefinder worked better or I trusted the weather radar! Or I could land.

I looked straight down. I could just make out a runway. The GPS said it was Pampa, Texas.

Better safe than sorry. I pulled the power, dropped 15 degrees of flaps, and started down.

No one answered my calls on unicom. I landed in the last of the twilight. There was one other airplane parked on the ramp in front of the FBO, a Texas taildragger well chained down. I parked beside it, then got out and discovered I had parked in the only tiedown that lacked chains. I got back into the plane, started the engines, and parked in another tiedown spot. And — can you believe this? — there was a man coming across the ramp toward me.

"Are you with the FBO?" I asked.

"Nope. They went home hours ago. I run the sprayer service."

"Any way I can get a ride into town to a motel?"

"Oh, yeah. They have a courtesy car." He led me to it. It was a 20-year-old Thunderbird that saw its first hundred thousand miles while George One was president. And the key was lying on the floor mat. Yes! I love general aviation at little towns across America!

The crop-duster pilot gave me directions to the best motel in town, "the only place to stay," he said, a Best Western. Soon I was on my way in the land yacht. All I lacked was a set of longhorns for a hood ornament.

I called my wife, Deborah, who was waiting for me in Tyler, and told her I wouldn't make it tonight. As I passed the sign on the edge of town, "Welcome to Pampa, the Top of Texas," we discussed my good fortune of finding wheels and a motel just down the road.

If you are a connoisseur of flat places, Pampa is a town you would like. I have been to Liberal, Kansas, the plains of Illinois, and the delta country of Mississippi, and they are indeed flat, but for perfect, ultimate flatness, nothing beats the Staked Plains of West Texas. A man in Lubbock once told me that on a clear day you can stand on a tuna fish can and see all the way to Dallas, although I have yet to try it.

In keeping with the architecture of the country thereabouts, Pampa is a one-story town, spread out and hunkered down under a huge sky.

I was still glowing over my good fortune when I walked into the Best Western. "We're full," the clerk said. "We've been full since four o'clock. Next time call ahead."

"What's happening in Pampa?" I asked, slightly stunned.

"Nothing much. People out traveling."

"Are there any other motels in town?"

"Oh, yes. Some locally owned motels on Route 60 East." He gave me directions.

In the parking lot I examined the license plates. California, Oklahoma, Colorado, Illinois, Oregon....

There were indeed other motels. I tried them one by one as I drove east on the main highway toward Oklahoma. Every one was full. "No Vacancy." The license plates were from all over the country. The people who used to fly on their summer vacations are out on the highway these days. No wonder the airlines are in trouble.

The motels got cheaper and grungier as I drove eastward in my Texas limousine. Finally, on the very edge of town I saw a ramshackle structure that reminded me of the Bates Motel. The sign said rooms were $20 a night, $80 by the week. Farther eastward along the highway there were no more lights. This was The Edge.

The alternatives were to drive to Amarillo — the motels there were probably also full — or spend the night in the old T-Bird. I whipped into the parking area. The manager wasn't in the office. After some serious lounging around, I finally wised up and rang the bell. Soon he appeared in T-shirt and bedroom slippers.

"Got one room left, little, but it's only twenty dollars. You want the telephone turned on for local calls?"

"No."

"You need a wake-up call?"

"I doubt it."

Actually the price was $21.20 with sales tax. I parted with cash, got a key, and went to inspect my lodgings.

The room was truly tiny, barely big enough for one double bed and a garage-sale dresser, and it reeked of a sweet-smelling disinfectant. I hoped the bugs hated it as much as I did. The mattress on the bed was a thin pad, the greasy sheets had cigarette burns in them. But the best part was the bed, which after many years of hard service was now U-shaped. I lay down, put my bottom in the middle of the sag. It was like a hammock. The telephone on the wall was an old desk job that once had multiple buttons — all of which were now gone, leaving only holes where they had been.

There was a small bathroom with a shower, two tiny paper-thin towels, and no hot water. The commode in the bathroom was jammed against one wall; to sit on it I had to turn sideways and put my back against the wall. I looked at the floor and carpet and decided not to take my socks off.

I once practiced law and, in my representation of folks whose lives were on the rocks, visited my share of jail cells. I never saw one worse than this. Now I recalled the sign on the manager's desk, "Absolutely no refunds."

Ten o'clock in Pampa, Texas. Should I go looking for food and drink? Naw. I took off my jeans and lay on the bed listening to the sounds of vehicles on the highway and my fellow lodgers visiting on the veranda — the gravel parking lot. There was a rusty air conditioner mounted high in the wall, but I didn't try it. I left the window open. The noise of the air conditioner, if it worked, would spoil the ambiance.

I began itching. I turned the light back on, pulled back the cover and top sheet, and inspected for critters. Nothing. My overactive imagination perhaps.

Adventurers, soldiers, and Third World travelers have stayed in worse places, lots worse. The low point of my travel adventures was a hotel in Chinhae, Korea, where I spent 10 lovely days one April, 20 years ago. The only furniture was a sleeping pad. The room was heated by a balky hot water heater that would have stymied an engineer, although it did throw out welcome heat for an hour every afternoon. The toilet was a hole in the floor in a room down the hall. Every night about eleven o'clock the mama-san would knock on the door and ask the three obligatory questions: "You want a woman?" No. "You want a girl?" No. "You want a boy?" No.

Tonight in scenic, flat Pampa, I managed to relax enough to drop off somewhere about one in the morning. After three hours of fitful sleep, I was wide awake. At five o'clock I gave up and rolled out, put my jeans back on, washed my face in cold water, decided to risk the water and brush my teeth, and was soon on my way in my courtesy ride. Rain misted down from a coal-black sky.

I filled up the car with gas and added a quart of oil at a filling station that was doing a thriving breakfast business. A guy in ratty jeans fried eggs and microwaved sausage patties, then put them together between two slices of untoasted white bread. There was a line of oil field and farm workers waiting. I passed on the eats and drove on.

What I found was a Spudnut joint. Ahh.... Spudnuts are doughnuts made from potato dough. There was a small Spudnut franchisee across the road from the high school I attended back before the Earth cooled, and I loved those things. Nearly overcome by nostalgia, I piloted the boaty Ford into the lot and purchased six right out of the oven: two maple-iced, two cherry, and two glazed. Sipping coffee and munching Spudnuts, I drove to the airport to await the FBO gang.

I remember Spudnuts as heavenly light, delicious, round sugar pills. These were heavy, sugared gut bombs. I forced three down and lost interest.

Dawn arrived slowly, revealing thick clouds and two or three miles visibility in light rain. When the FBO guys arrived to open their establishment at 7:30, I was dozing in the T-Bird. They filled my flying machine with gas while I munched a Rolaids, filed an IFR flight plan, and got a weather brief. I was still on the phone when the transaction was completed, but they untied the taildragger and taxied away, leaving me in sole possession of their business. As the airport dudes did touch and goes in the rain under the cloud deck, I left the uneaten Spudnuts on the counter as a thank you gift.

Flying southeast in the soup, I discovered that the weather radar worked fine when the precip was within 20 miles, but not so well farther away. After one deviation and an hour of flying, I popped out of the clouds over Wichita Falls.

Deborah was waiting when I landed in Tyler. "How was Pampa?" she asked.

"Oh, you know, so-so. I found a Spudnut shop, though."

She refused to believe me. There aren't many Spudnut joints left in the age of Krispy Kremes. The only other one I know of still extant is in Charlottesville, Virginia. The odds of finding one in Pampa, Texas, must be a million to one.

I'm just lucky, I guess.

Novelist Stephen Coonts, AOPA 1056593, enjoys flying around the country in a Cessna 310 when life grants him the time. His latest book is titled Liberty.