Danger Doyle

Mojave, August 2024

Many years ago I was a rock climber. I was pretty good, but always knew the most dangerous time while climbing was once you finished the accent. After a climb when you literally feel on top of the world, you drop your guard, and that’s when accidents tend to happen, and you fall to your death..

For the past month I have been heading out once a week early A.M to shoot the sunrise in the desert. As I have been going through a junk yard phase, I headed for another one I remembered from my Fridays Rainshadow project. (I should point out that you really need to know where you are going in the desert if its dark.) After a two hour drive I pulled up on the side of the road, mounted the camera on a tripod, and made my way across the desert towards the junkyard, confident I knew where I was going. I had not been out of the car more than a few minutes when I heard a rustle in the brittle bush and a low growl in the distance. At first I thought it might be a coyote, which would have been fine (a lone coyote is harmless), but then I realized it must be a guard dog, or should I say guard dogs. Rather than soil myself or try and make friends, I basically ran faster than the wind, the two dogs now barking and chasing me through the desert. Thankfully I had left the truck door unlocked (for such events) and managed to get inside with my camera. The barking stopped, but I could see the eyes of the beasts waiting for their breakfast, and they were not poodles..

I have been to the desert enough times to know that if somewhere doesn’t have a fence, it most likely has dogs on the premises, especially at night. But I got too cocky, just like the climber that fell off the cliff. But all was not lost and I managed to grab a few shots later of a gas station, the irony being that last time I photographed one at sunrise I was bitten by a dog.