Ranchos de Taos

In 1969 the cult film and iconic road movie Easy Rider was released staring, producing and probably financed by Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper.
Jack Nicholson had a start to his career with this movie as did Dennis Hopper because previously I think the only thing he had was a small role in Giant with James Dean.

Wikipedia would probably go me over the accuracy of this but it’s the best I can do now off the top of my head as we have no internet connection here at a Arizona truck stop on Intestate 40 (part of old Route 66), probably one of the busiest highways in the country.
It was either stay here or in a Casino or Walmart car park but we were being pushed along the highway at over 80 miles per hour, it was either do that speed or get run into, as we saw earlier had happened so by the time we spotted Walmarts or the Casinos they were just a blur as we sped by.

Anyway back to Easy Rider.
Peter had the looks plus his old man Henry and sister Jane’s famous name so he was a natural to play the character Captain America.
Dennis was far less known and without the college football looks but I reckon far more interesting and a much better actor as well. He went on to play roles in movies like Blue Velvet and Apocalypse Now, what Peter went on to do, I don’t know.

Dennis was, after being a drunk and drug addict, a very good artist and art collector too and had a love of native culture and their spiritual beliefs so moved to Taos in New Mexico.
He died in 2010 and requested a native burial in Taos.
It just so happens that the graveyard was about a kilometre from where we were staying.

The movie Easy Rider had a huge lifestyle influence because of a love of bikes, especially choppers and road trips since I was old enough to hold out my thumb.
At the moment where we are staying it could be said that it was a bad influence but the whine of truck tyres and engines screaming down the highway makes you a little itchy to get out there again and be pushed down that road... as one of the songs from the brilliant movie soundtrack goes... “to some other town”.

So though we aren’t celebrity sluts and we were so close to Dennis Hopper’s grave we had to see after his brilliant career just where he lay.
It was surprising, no Marilyn Munro splendour or Jim Morrison’s Paris grave. It’s in amongst old houses, crappy fences and someone living in a derelict caravan with rubbish blowing around.
There are no signs to the cemetery and the whole place is pretty run down.
Seeing the film that launched his career is about searching for the real America it seems like the perfect setting for him to be buried in.Read more