"Breaking Bad" - Season 5, Episode 5 "Dead Freight"

The opening scenes were filmed in the chaotic off-road motorcycle area not far from “Q” Studios. They seem to start on the north side of Tijeras Arroyo, heading SW, and jump, ending up – not sure – but possibly not far from I-25, below Los Picaros Rd.

On one of my Breaking Bad forays to ABQ, I noticed they left a gate open off of Los Picaros Rd., so I took my econo rent-a-car on a very sketchy dirt road in this very area (I think). I wonder if I took any photos?

In any event, it’s Albuquerque. Ironically, the landscape around Albuquerque is too tough to support tarantulas. (But you probably CAN find tarantulas near Lamy, near the railroad location – more rain; more supportive to large spiders.)

That basement location looks great. I wonder where it is?

Regarding the trestle, I think "OldeSaultie" is correct: that’s the spot! (35.498826, -105.916656)

I was wondering; is “Breaking Bad” going to get all mystical on us? When Lydia points to the place in McKinley County where the radio dead zone is, she points very close to Pueblo Pintado, an important outlier of the Chaco Canyon archaeological site. There are other important sites to the Navajo nearby too, like Red Mountain. And La Fajada Butte isn’t very far away either: probably the most notable archaeo-astronomical site in the American West! I visited there once, when it was still open to the public.

I was flipping out. Are we going to get all quasi-spiritual as we approach the end of the TV series? Are we going to mash up our tribal, Mexican, and Anglo criminal roots into some kind of sky-blue spiritual mush? Will Spider Woman lead us all out of the Fifth World at the end of the 16th episode? Is Lydia, Spider Woman? How can that be? Who is Lydia, anyway? Or, for that matter, who is anyone else in the TV series?

It would be so out-of-character for “Breaking Bad” to get mystical (or is it?), and it makes my head hurt. I better go back to figuring out locations....


Railroad trestle & crossing, Spur Ranch Rd. at NM Southern Railway crossing, near Lamy, NM, south of Santa Fe (Season 5, episode 5, "Dead Freight). In the radio dead zone. (35.498826ø, -105.916656ø)

Santa Fe Southern Railway is a private company that only runs a single, 18-mile-long rail line, from Lamy to Santa Fe.

Working with trains....