USA Independence Day Special: Grand tours

Hunter S Thompson on the road to Las Vegas 'Man, this is the way to travel

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American Beauty

Wine,whales and song in Washington state

In search of Scarlett O'Hara

I"ll take Manhattan

When the cart ain't the star

Shopping in New England

Sleepover: A bed for the night in Arizona

Notorious for his penchant for shooting anyone he took exception to, Hunter S Thompson (born in 1939 in Louisville, Kentucky) was the founder of the 'New Journalism', where the reporter takes centre stage, taking him 'into the middle of whatever I'm writing about'. This led to many bizarre incidents and idiosyncratic reportage on such subjects as the Hell's Angels, shark-hunting and political campaign trails. 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas', from which the excerpt below was taken, was first published in installments in 'Rolling Stone' magazine in 1971 and was an immediate success as a book. Now reportedly living in a shack in the Arizona desert with a dwarf manservant, Thompson is said to have his various commissions delivered to him on a silver tray

We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like "I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive ...". And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas. And a voice was screaming: "Holy Jesus? What are these goddamn animals?"

Then it was quiet again. My attorney had taken his shirt off and was pouring beer on his chest, to facilitate the tanning process. "What the hell are you yelling about?" he muttered, staring up at the sun with his eyes closed and covered with wraparound Spanish sunglasses. "Never mind," I said. "It's your turn to drive." I hit the brakes and aimed the Great Red Shark toward the shoulder of the highway. No point mentioning those bats, I thought. The poor bastard will see them soon enough.

It was almost noon, and we still had more than a hundred miles to go... Very soon, I knew, we would both be completely twisted. But there was no going back, and no time to rest. We would have to ride it out. Press registration for the fabulous Mint 400 was already underway, and we had to get there by four to claim our sound-proof suite. A fashionable sporting magazine in New York had taken care of the reservations, along with this huge red Chevy convertible we'd just rented off a lot on the Sunset Strip ... and I was, after all, a professional journalist; so I had an obligation to cover the story, for good or ill.

The sporting editors had also given me $300 in cash, most of which was already spent on extremely dangerous drugs. The trunk of the car looked like a mobile police narcotics lab. We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers ... and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.

All this had been rounded up the night before, in a frenzy of high-speed driving all over Los Angeles County – from Topanga to Watts, we picked up everything we could get our hands on. Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can.

"Man, this is the way to travel," said my attorney. He leaned over to turn the volume up on the radio, humming along with the rhythm section and kind of moaning the words: "One toke over the line, Sweet Jesus ... One toke over the line."

One toke? You poor fool! Wait till you see those goddamn bats. I could barely hear the radio ... slumped over on the far side of the seat, grappling with a tape recorder turned all the way up on "Sympathy for the Devil".

That was the only tape we had, so we played it constantly, over and over, as a kind of demented counterpoint to the radio. And also to maintain our rhythm on the road. A constant speed is good for gas mileage – and for some reason that seemed important at the time. Indeed. On a trip like this one must be careful about gas consumption. Avoid those quick bursts of acceleration that drag blood to the back of the brain.

My attorney saw the hitchhiker long before I did. "Let's give this boy a lift," he said, and before I could mount any argument he was stopped and this poor Okie kid was running up to the car with a big grin on his face, saying, "Hot damn! I never rode in a convertible before!"

"Is that right?" I said. "Well, I guess you're about ready, eh?"

He nodded eagerly as we roared off.

"We're your friends," said my attorney. "We're not like the others."

O Christ, I thought, he's gone around the bend. "No more of that talk," I said sharply. "Or I'll put the leeches on you." He grinned, seeming to understand. Luckily, the noise in the car was so awful – between the wind and the radio and the tape machine – that the kid in the back seat couldn't hear a word we were saying. Or could he?

How long can we maintain? I wondered. How long before one of us starts raving and jabbering at this boy? What will he think then? This same lonely desert was the last known home of the Manson family. Will he make that grim connection when my attorney starts screaming about bats and huge manta rays coming down on the car? If so – well, we'll just have to cut his head off and bury him somewhere. Because it goes without saying that we can't turn him loose. He'll report us at once to some kind of outback nazi law enforcement agency, and they'll run us down like dogs.

Jesus! Did I say that? Or just think it? Was I talking? Did they hear me? I glanced over at my attorney, but he seemed oblivious – watching the road, driving our Great Red Shark along at a hundred and ten or so. There was no sound from the back seat.

Maybe I'd better have a chat with this boy, I thought ... I leaned around in the seat and gave him a fine, big smile ... admiring the shape of his skull.

"By the way," I said. "There's one thing you should probably understand."

He stared at me, not blinking. Was he gritting his teeth?

"Can you hear me?" I yelled.

He nodded.

"That's good," I said. "Because I want you to know that we're on our way to Las Vegas to find the American Dream." I smiled. "That's why we rented this car. It was the only way to do it. Can you grasp that?"

Extracted from 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' published by Flamingo at £6.99. 'Independent on Sunday' readers can order copies at the special price of £5.99, p&p inc. Call 0870 900 2050, quoting reference 836G

Follow in the footsteps

Hotels and casinos

Not all of the Las Vegas hotels are keen to be associated with Mr Thompson and his hedonistic ways. The owners of Circus Circus, the hotel into which Duke and Gonzo stumble after a manic cocktail of adrenochrome and devil's ether, refused to allow Terry Gilliam near their property when he was making his 1998 film adaptation of the book. But better-behaved guests can stay in one of the enormous hotel's 3,774 rooms for anything from a very reasonable $34 (£23) a night – prices vary enormously according to season (001 877 224 7287; www.circuscircus. com). Another of the hotels featured in the book, the Mint, has since been demolished. (High-profile explosive demolitions constantly change the Las Vegas skyline and are now a popular attraction in themselves.) Instead of the Mint, try the Binions Horseshoe (001 800 622 646): Gilliam reckoned it the closest thing to the Mint and used it in his film.

Into the desert

Duke and Gonzo ripped through the desert in their Great Red Shark, a hired Chevy convertible. Chevys and other vintage classics are available for hire from www.dreamcarrentals.com (001 877 373 2601) starting at $259 a day. As Thompson says, a little of Las Vegas can go a long way and, for a more sedate appreciation of Nevada's breathtaking deserts, the South Nevada Zoo offers several different day tours of the landscape, exploring its ancient geology and lakes. The tours, all listed as eco-friendly, start at $129 for a half-day (001 702 647 4658).

By Tom Watkins