Riding the Dog: Cross-Country by Greyhound

Since our motel is on the city's outskirts, there's only one solution -- Bob's Cab. The plan is this: Bob will come to our motel in the morning and drive us to the downtown border bridge. We'll walk across with the commuters, eat a fresh corn tamale in Juarez and, an hour later, cross back over. There, Bob will be waiting to drive us back to the motel. Then, we'll grab our bags and floor it to the bus station.

Amazingly, this works pretty much as planned. It costs 30 cents (or three pesos) to enter Mexico, and suddenly we're in a world of hand-painted signs for cerveza, music surging out of grocery stores and small cafes, and vendors yelling at us to take a look at hats and leather wallets and limes stuffed fat with shredded coconut.

It isn't easy to just get a bite of all this and go back. Judy keeps fingering woven tote bags and stretchy, beaded belts as if they will help her hang on here for just a few seconds longer. I buy a Mexican soda, and when the can of papaya fizz runs low, I know we have to go fast to the passport line on the Mexican side of the bridge and across to our idling cab.

We make the bus just as the driver is ripping tickets and are surprised to find that a fellow passenger, Ralph Gomez, has saved us a place in line. "All that I own is in this," he chuckles, hefting a string bag that is layered with expertly folded white T-shirts and a Bible on top. Gomez is on his way home from a year in the Colorado state penitentiary. As we drive into New Mexico, he's one of the few on board who is impressed with the red and purple, Road Runner-style scenery.

"Mesas," he keeps telling Judy. "Wait until you see the mesas."

Day 5: Flagstaff, Ariz., To Los Angeles

After we get off in Flagstaff, Judy and I talk to cab drivers about getting a ride to the Grand Canyon, about 80 miles from here. One guy just shakes his head; another tells us he wants $250 up front.

Since seeing the Grand Canyon is one of the biggest goals for our trip, we're on the verge of agreeing when I happen to spot a van with Keyah Hozhoni Tours painted on the side. The driver, a Navajo Indian named Vince, will take us there and back for $50 apiece, and fill us in on local history and geography as we ride.

It's a deal -- and as it turns out, Vince is loaded with information on what we pass, including a police car that he says has a cardboard decoy cop inside. When we get close to the canyon, I ask him what kind of animals we should watch out for. "Scorpions, rattlesnakes and kingsnakes," he says, letting us out near the Rim Trail at Bright Angel Lodge. "Almost forgot," he adds. "You might also catch a coral snake or a tarantula."

Judy and I keep one eye on our shoes as we walk to the edge, and suddenly there it is: a horizon-swallowing jagged copper bowl that is too wide to be photographed, too intricate for art. At this second, every knee-crunching minute of our trip feels worthwhile. You could ride a year's worth of buses to get here, I think, and drive them all over the edge so you wouldn't have to go back.

We're getting near the end of our trip, riding that same night and changing buses in Phoenix at 5 a.m. for the final leg to L.A. I doze on and off until around 8 o'clock, when we pull into a last-gas McDonald's buffeted by blowing dust and desert sand. "Blythe, California," announces the driver, and although it's a rest stop and Judy gets off for coffee, I don't want any and slump back to sleep.

Next thing I know, I'm woken up by a revving engine. The bus is heeling around a curve and roaring toward a highway ramp. Something feels wrong -- I've got much too much room, for one thing -- and then it hits me. Judy's not on board.

"Hey, wait," I yell to the driver. "We're leaving someone behind!"