If he sincerely thinks that he’s on a mission and there’s a horse that will carry him, I do not see him stopping, no matter how he’s feeling himself.
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Maybe he’ll step in a nest of rattlesnakes during a nighttime pee excursion.
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I was looking for images to see the terrain around Big Spring, TX, where he seems to be headed. I looked for Forsan, TX, a rural community on his side of Big Spring – all that came up was high school football.
But anyway, I did find this for the area around Big Spring. This is true legendary Texas Hill Country.
Notice there is a highway barely visible in some of the photos. So he can ride near the road, or off the road … big, big difference in the effort and time to navigate the choices.
in the state park (there is a lake there)
Yep, this is getting more real with every mile.
And this terrain is nothing compared to where he may be going. Honestly this is the easy part.
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Ooh, there are LOTS of Texas desert things to step in during a night time excursion. 
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I agree. I do believe that he is thinking delusionally, and that he is showing a consistent pattern of blatantly irrational decisions. If he is in the mental state that I think he’s in, he can’t assess his own physical condition and will ignore it just as he is ignoring the horse’s. He seems not to be acknowledging anything beyond the current moment. People in such a mindset will often forego nutrition and ignore injuries and illnesses, and seem to be unaware of the needs of their bodies.
I wonder if there is a way to intervene on a psychological basis, that this is a person who may unintentionally do themselves serious harm. Unfortunately he is increasingly in areas where intervention on any grounds is less likely.
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I have driven through that general area many times, going from the Texas Hill Country to Albuquerque. He’s headed into some pretty desolate and unforgiving country. Water is going to be his biggest problem.
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If he wants to do this the “old west” way, that was extremely slow. You didn’t go the most direct route. You went from water to water, and hopefully not too many miles between them. And of course to do that you have to know ahead of time where the water is.
And if you don’t know where water can be found, then you take a LOT of supplies with water. There is a lot of searching and backtracking to find the next water. There is no going forward until the water is refilled again.
Back then there were no fences. When fencing was introduced, the old west essentially went away. Water had to be provided to cattle. There was no more wandering here & everywhere.
I’m not sure if it is even possible to do that any more. And I am not sure Knucklehead acknowledges that. He may be relying on help throughout the journey, but that’s a hit-or-miss proposition that also adds time and indirect routes.
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He may think he can rely on help… but the problem is that there just really isn’t a whole heck of a lot of help out that way, especially once you get into New Mexico and away from the cities. There are long stretches between water. Long stretches between houses. Long stretches between stock tanks. Extremely limited natural water available. I am curious what on earth he’s thinking, not having a support system to haul water. And the wind is typically miserable this time of year.
Again, poor horse.
It’s beautiful country though - vast stretches of nothing with the occasional herd of cattle, or pronghorn. I miss it.
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And relying on help means making contacts, really behaving well around them, and accepting their help, whether material or information, with good grace and gratitude. Whether you keep/use that help is optional, of course; but the plan is to build bridges, not burn them.
I don’t see him making it through the desert. At least the first time. The horse will go down and, because I expect Knucklehead to stick to the roads as he’s a creature of civilization and reliance on electronics to tell him where to go, someone will drive by, bring the horse water, and revive him. Knucklehead will probably be sitting nearby, passively. Waiting for someone to take care of him. I suppose they probably will. Sigh.
Another problem – I don’t know about Texas or New Mexico, but in the more rural parts of Wyoming there were cattle guards on the roads, with fencing on either side up to the cattle guard, so that cattle couldn’t cross. If neither horse or rider knows about cattle guards, that could be an abrupt ending right there.
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I don’t think he’ll make it through the desert once he starts to get into areas where there’s very little water, very few houses. Even herds of livestock are few and far between. You can only go so far without water.
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I have seen this in both NM and TX, but usually only on smaller roads that are not well-trafficked. I wouldn’t say it’s common. Surely he isn’t stupid enough to try and ride across a cattle guard! Then again he’s stupid enough to head out into the high desert seemingly without a solid plan for water…
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People do kill horses riding into cattle guards
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That is just wild. I guess since I have ridden in a lot of rural ranch-y areas where cattle guards are common, it’s just common sense to me to not ride over a cattle guard. I literally never considered that this is something a person would try to do. 
I brought it up because I was riding my range-bred horse along a dirt road just outside of town and came upon a cattle guard right across the road. The horse was ready to continue walking right across it, but I knew better and stopped that abruptly. If I didn’t know, wasn’t clever enough to realize a horse’s hoof could go through the bars, or just plain wasn’t paying attention, or even if my horse didn’t have a very good “whoa,” I can see how a very bad thing could happen.
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I have never seen a cattle guard in real life.
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They are these grid things that are set into the road. Easy for a person to walk over deadly for an animal. They are however deliberately placed so that you cannot get from hear to there whatsoever. I guess you could toss some planks over them but that’s not something you have on hand.
Are cattle smart enough to not go over them?
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Some cattle guards may have gates next to them, but can you see Knucklehead trying to handle a barbed wire gate? (Or even recognizing that they are gates…)
The cattle guards I’ve seen are metal bars set into the road with a ditch under them. The bars are spaced so that a cow’s hoof will easily slip between them and down into the dug out area underneath the bars.
The cattle guards are at the same level as the road surface; cars can drive right across them. I’ve even seen cattle guards on the entrance ramps of interstate highways.
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I used to live in Big Spring years ago, it’s a pretty interesting place geographically and historically. The existence of that spring is pretty much the only reason the town is there; until Captain Marcy mapped its location, only the Comanche and Native People really knew where it was so the area remained fairly unsettled vs other parts of Texas.
The terrain in that area is also far nastier than it appears. It looks kind of like flat scrub land from afar, but it’s rocky and cut through with gullies that often have vertical banks.
Once you leave BS on 87 there’s a whole lot of nothing until LaMesa, and assuming he’s cutting northwest-ish from there it’s more or less desolate until near Carlsbad. The elevation change is subtle when you’re driving, but after leaving town you’re on the Caprock and its legitimately one of the most impressively empty places I’ve ever seen.
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If he were strictly on his own resources, IMO he has zero change of making it out of Texas. In fact he might not make it to Big Spring, although I’m guessing he’s 20-40 miles away.
BUT rural back-country Texans will see him, see the horse, and help. And help and help. One Texan after another. It is baked into the culture that older people especially will look after a younger person who is clearly in need. He will get a lecture to go with it, but his ears don’t seem to be working properly.
The help will keep the horse from being rescued by seizure or by unable to travel, because the horse will get just enough recovery to set out again when otherwise it would not be able to go on.
It is true that he will very soon be in one of the least populated areas of Texas. But people are driving the highways and a few will see him and decide to help. Some may have seen his story on the internet, some not.
Anyway … Texas will assist the guy to the NM border … but after that … no kidding, it’s true that there are probably few expanses left in the U.S. that are that as uninhabited as NE NM. Except for some large portions of Nevada that look like the other side of the moon.
Although rural people there may also be willing to help. In the remote regions of the U.S. there can be an ethic that you don’t leave behind a struggling traveler. You may be the last person to see them alive.
The NE corner of NM is indeed stunningly beautiful, there is nothing like it anywhere. But people have died out there from inadequate resources from the beginning of humans wandering on to the place.
Even driving through it in a car, know how to get where you are going, with or without cell signal. Top up gas at every chance. Etc. Have a plan.
And … very little cell phone signal out there. Where there is a signal, not all carriers are present. That will be true through CO as well, and I assume the same continuing north.
Not that he will get that far … unless people keep helping him. And – they will. 
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