One Horse Town

There are only a handful of things to do in Tonopah. And it's Tone-o-pah by the way. On a free night we'll scour the road side for diamondbacks, Mojaves, and sidewinders. I'm hoping to score a serious set of rattles to send home instead of the traditional magnet and postcard. Every now and then we try to catch a sunset out near Saddle Mountain. This weekend while on our rattlesnake hunt, my precision spider radar alerted me to something blurry on the white line. I can spot ANY kind of spider from almost 200 miles away. Driving at least 50 mph down Vulture Mine road, I noticed an "extra" reflector on the white line. My brain, working much faster than my eyes, clearly delineated the legs and body of one most extraordinary and colossal arachnid. I did my best to vocalize my discovery, and we turned around expecting the creature to have crawled away to safety.
No. No, my friends, he was there waiting. I witnessed what only Hollywood can capture as the biggest nightmare alive. The mammoth desert TARANTULA. Capitalization is fitting for this behemoth monstrosity. I regret to say we were without camera. The old man described it as "a monster truck spider". I didn't want to hear anymore. Add another to our growing list of desert devils.

In only two short months of living in the Sonoran, we've encountered:
-coyotes
-fox
-great horned owls
-road runners
-Colorado toads
-chipmunks
-diamond back rattlers
-sidewinder rattlers
-javalinas
-bats
-jack rabbits
-mountain lion (dead, but a well preserved corpse)
-tarantula
-scorpions

Most native Arizonans claim they've only spotted coyote dead on the freeway or heard stories about snakes from their crazy cousins who live out in the country. We decide to move here and see the entire list (with the exception of one elusive chupacabra) within two months. Maybe it's luck, not sure what kind of luck, but I hope it runs out soon.