Back twenty years to... Sunday, April 23rd, 2006. Day 15. Monument Valley, pioneers and Mormons. Tricky rules concerning alcohol. An unscheduled trip to the Emergency Room, a shop-girl Beauty Queen, karaoke at the KOA Kampground – and ‘Metaphor:’

"Monument Valley'. Gigantic buttes of layered red sandstone, some in really wide blocks, others formed as high, single round pillars – seemingly pushing-up, right through the scorched and dusty desert floor. All imperceptibly crumbling – creating mighty, craggy slopes of rock. Most certainly is the stuff of the 'Western Movies'. The evocative backdrop for all of the 'lonesome drifters' – riding-off into endlessly recurring, perfect red sunsets.

I cross into Utah at around eleven-thirty – and now here’s a crossroads, and just a wee bit confused, I pull-over. To my left is a really large, gaudy sign for: 'Gouldings – Movie Location and Trading-Post Museum' – one mile west. It elaborates: Full services: lodging, gift-shop, tours, meals, RV park, propane, store, ATM, deli, gas, laundry, car-wash, and last-of-all – and get this – 'John Wayne’s actual cabin'. Oh pleeze – I ask you!

To my right is a thoroughly sober brown sign, saying simply: 'Monument Valley Visitors Center'. My level-headed, studious side rules my super-consumer, thrill-seeking streak, and I turn east. But now my dear Mother’s thriftiness kicks-in, as I learn that I'll have to pay ten dollars to see things I've only just seen from the main highway. So I U-turn back to the intersection, park-up and 'dismount' – allowing a swirling red sandstorm into the RV, plastering everything inside with an exquisitely fine layer of sandy mineral deposit. Shit. I take my shots fast, and get back into the now contaminated sanctuary that is – 'Sweet Home Caroline'. That’s my Mercedes-Benz Sprinter – SHC-2500.

Later, I try to get a cold beer, prior to some food at the steakhouse, but I’m told that I have to eat first. Oh dear God. What fresh hell, is this place. So I get just a tad 'lippy' and 'English', and acerbically ask if I can slug-back my beer concurrently – while scoffing-down my steak and fries. Well, what the frick? It’s madness! It goes without saying that hard-liquor 'round here is a total 'no-no' and so – justifiably sick of the petty rules, I get back to the van – where I can sip on my whiskey with impunity."

In Search of Small-Town America: Volume 1 is a free-of-charge Pdf digital download – available from our shop. A table of contents, the introduction, the route-map – and featuring content on the first two States travelled: New Mexico and Arizona.

Jeremy Hammond I am a British writer and photographer, and have travelled through India, China, Southeast Asia and Australia, but most extensively in North America. In the late seventies and early eighties, I worked as lighting crew, and later designer, for many top-named British bands, on tours through Europe, Japan, and the USA. I’ve worked as a cruise-ship photographer, in office and store design, database design, visual arts book publishing and as a London-based freelance photographer, specialising in interiors and architecture.