34°09′31.7″ N  115°54′06.3″ W

WONDER VALLEY, USA

Five acres of the Mojave Desert, past the last paved road.

Interviews are being conducted.

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A dirt road running into dust haze under storm clouds, creosote flats on either side Field Note 001
The road in is dirt, and the county has no plans for it. This suits everyone involved. Pavement attracts the impatient, and the impatient are not what anyone out here is waiting for.
Blue hour over the valley floor, the last light going down behind the ridge Field Note 014
After sundown the ground gives back the day's heat for hours — lie down on it and you can feel the transaction. Visitors mistake this for welcome. It is closer to bookkeeping. The desert returns exactly what it was given. Most places you have been do not.
A shard of white china with a hand-drawn pink unicorn, lying in desert gravel beside a dry creosote branch Recovered Object A-7
Porcelain fragment, hand-inked. Found in the gravel forty meters from the east marker. A previous visitor drew a unicorn on a piece of a broken plate and left it for whoever came next. Recorded, catalogued, and left exactly where it was. The parties we work for found it encouraging.
The dark ridge line at night under a grey-blue sky, a single thin antenna standing against the last light Field Note 031
There is excellent signal here — a tower by the community center, which belongs to the neighbors, who were here long before us and know this valley in ways we are still cataloguing. The valley is theirs. The five acres are our responsibility. We only listen.
Intake

The Resident conducts preliminary interviews for encounters on the land. It asks real questions and it listens to the answers. It is not a person, and it will not pretend to be one.

Most arrivals are nearly ready.

Speak with the Resident

Or write to butler@wondervalleyprojects.com with the word ENCOUNTER.