Dusty, yes ... but as Charlie said, far from empty. There's a great deal of plant life in evidence -- mostly low shrubs and small gnarled trees, sage and juniper and piñon pine -- and, to the sharp enough eye, a great deal of wary animal life as well.

Something small and rusty brown (probably a rabbit, Charlie thinks) bounds away as she pulls the car to a halt, some fifteen minutes from the complex.