23 Oct Rio Verde: The sea of tranquillity

The great acceptance of my previous publication, with a final tally of up to 10 votes!!!! has submerged me in a state of permanent ecstasy and encourages me to threaten you with the publication of new entries with the same scientific rigour, agile prose and photographic beauty that characterises me and is becoming my unmistakable hallmark.

Don't worry, I will publish the results of the draw in the next post, once I have managed to finish counting the votes and the draw has been made. In the meantime, we will continue to travel the far west.

Every weekend I desperately search for something to make me forget that I'm not in Africa, and although I don't always succeed, the landscapes of the United States are usually a good placebo to palliate my craving for adventure. This is the story of one of those times.

My muses tell me not to go to wikipedia tonight and tell you the story as it happened, so here goes, no frills.

This time I'm not alone, I'm travelling with a Czech. Well, the truth is that I'm confused, because he says he's Czech, Czech, come on, a lifelong Czech, but I've noticed that when it comes to handing over the money, he plays the Swede. What is he hiding...

Well, the Czech was driving while I was meditating (always alert) in the passenger seat, when we had to go through a space-time tunnel that teleported us far away from earth. And I don't remember any more, only that when I finally opened my eyes this was the landscape that stretched before me.

And I, who am beginning to travel, immediately realised that what was opening before our eyes could not be anything other than the Moon's Sea of Tranquility, or the Planet Ganymede, and that we had therefore been abducted.

either that, or that we had arrived at Goblin Valley State Park, Utah, but I'd be fooled, I'm more inclined to go with the former.

So just in case, I sought out potential locals to talk to them about the Alliance of Civilisations,

and then I climbed the highest peak to take possession of the planet in the name of humanity, while improvising a little speech: "It's a small step for man..." (well, this is mine, not mine).

I had in my hands the discovery of the century, the planet Ganymede seems to be made of plasteline, so I took some rock samples to study them in the lab.

Meanwhile, the Czech insisted that we were not on the moon and that this was not the sea of tranquillity. I live in Norfolk, which is a very peaceful place (not to say a word that begins with a joke and ends with a zo).

The truth is that I don't know what to think anymore, but I almost don't care if this is the Moon, Ganymede or the Goblin Valley State Park, the fact is that this place is amazing and as much as I want to come back here in the future....

...I can't, because I don't know where the door of the space-time tunnel that brought me here was!

If you find it, come and see this place, it is one of the most impressive I have ever seen. And don't bring your oxygen equipment with you, the air there is very similar to the air on Earth, perhaps a little denser.

That's all, don't worry, next day I'll go back to wikipedia and to the scientific rigour I used to be known for. It was the fault of this German beer they gave me for dinner.