Day 100: Wow!

This day deserves a post of its own just because its a hundred days. It's Sunday and for some unknown reason, I've decided to find a church. The nearest Unitarians are in Los Alamos, so that's where I head. Los Alamos has a familiar ring to it, but I'm actually in the church before one of the greeters tells me that he's sorry he can't give me a tour of the labs because of the new regulations.

Oh, yeah. There's a big nuclear and bio lab here. That's why there's a town of close to 20,000 people isolated up here in the mountains. And it is isolated on a couple ridge fingers that are nine miles apart.

It was a nice service on the tao of difference. The church is also working on a building campaign and seems to be well on their way to a new building.

One thing that was different today was that I saw snow on the upper slopes of the mountains for the first time. I knew it was getting colder up here, but I expect to be long gone before severe weather sets in. This was the view from Los Alamos.

On the way back to camp, I stopped at one of the local landmarks, Camel Rock. Usually when a rock formation has a name it's like a constellation. You squint your eyes, cock your head, and say "Yeah. I see it. Sort of." I can't imagine anyone looking at this rock and seeing anything other than a camel. It's uncanny. I thought it was fake at first.

Well, after 100 days on the road, I don't feel at all tired of this life. I certainly see the draw of not traveling as much or as fast. I think I'd still like to travel fewer miles and stay longer in places. NaNoWriMo has given me a great opportunity to meet other people in New Mexico. I'm wondering what I can use for an excuse to meet people when November is over. I've had a more lively two weeks and met more people both IRL and online than I had in the previous three months.

At the same time, I miss the people from back in Bellevue and especially Quinne. She'll fly to Amarillo on the 25th and we'll have Thanksgiving at sister Sharon's. Other sisters Kim and Lael will also fly in and there will be at least a few nephews, nieces, and grand nephews and nieces. That will be fun.

100 days. Am I ready for another 100? Yes. A thousand? I think so. We'll see.

Days 94-99: Reaching "The End"

UpAll this month, I've been in a double race. First off, there's NaNoWriMo. I reached the 50,000 word goal on the 8th, which is the fastest I've ever made it there. But my focus has always been on "finishing the book" when I do NaNo. This week, I did. Part two of my challenge is getting Mark Sawyer's new book, Master, Swami, Nun, Sinner, Swinger, ONE, laid out and back to Mark for final edits. I managed both this week.

I left Roswell on Monday morning and headed for Albuquerque. My target was to camp at a little campground near Tijeras. GPS routinely screws up. I fed it the coordinates and it tried to land me about ten miles away. I made it in and camped, then headed into Albuquerque to take a look around and get some groceries. That was the first success of the day. I found a Trader Joe's and stocked up with two big cans of coffee. It was right across the street from ABQ Uptown a whole bunch of chic shops and a Starbuck's. Managed to grab a cup of coffee and while I was wandering around I thought, "Gee this is just like a shopping center only there's no roof." Then I realized it was a shopping center and I'd just lived up north for way too long.

I did manage to get an inverter to plug into the truck so I can charge my computer in the truck. It cost almost $40. I figure that just saved me $1,000 for a generator since that seemed to be the only thing I need one for. My next outing was for a write-in on Tuesday evening at a burger place near the University. There were eight people there which made it my biggest write-in during the month. They were really nice and friendly and we all got a lot written. I ended the evening with 4,000 words for a total of 79,000.

The next day, I headed into Albuquerque again to explore. For years, I've heard about the Sandia Tramway. About two-and-a-half miles long, you ride a gondola up to the peak. I'm not wild about rides like this. Even Disneyland gives me a little jolt when you ride that Swiss gondola thing. Do they even have that anymore? I'd talked myself out of going to the tramway a dozen times and finally got disgusted and said "This is what I came on this trip for. To do things that I used to pass up." So I went. Driving the fifteen miles out to the base of Sandia peak and pulled up to the guardhouse. It was closed for fall maintenance. I don't know whether to be upset or relieved. Both, I guess.

So I headed for Old Town. It was pretty cool. The anchor of Old Town in Albuquerque is San Felipe de Neri church, in continuous operation since 1704. It's a beautiful old church.

 

I drove on out to Petroglyphs National Monument--once again over the objections of my GPS. I only try to get close with the GPS now. Then I screw around hunting things up online and following their directions. Regardless, it was getting pretty late and the ranger asked how rigorous a walk I wanted. I said only moderate and she pointed me to Boca Negra Canyon where it was a nice paved path. I'm glad I didn't ask for anything rigorous! It was a steep trail around many rocks in order to get near the top of the mesa where a number of very good petroglyphs were visible. I took the side trail all the way to the top of the mesa as well and it showed a beautiful view of the entire city.

 



I stayed in Tijeras one more night before decamping for Santa Fe and in the process managed to write "The End" on my manuscript. 89,653 words. Of course, I already knew that I needed to go back and fill in a bunch of other stuff, but I had a finished work and it wasn't bad. The next day I left for Santa Fe.

I traveled the Turquoise Trail east of the Sandia Mountains. I really love the New Mexico Mountains. they are beautiful and this fall weather has been glorious. I love it out here.

My next campground was in Espanola, NM, about 25 miles north of Santa Fe. It is a small and pretty crappy campground. Gravel sites are not particularly level. There was power and water and sewer connections, but I already knew the forecasts were to be too cold for me to connect the water and leave it. One of the reasons I chose this site was that it's website talked about its newly remodeled restrooms and showers. Yes they were. But there was no heat in them. Brrrr.

I went to one of the local casinos, the Ohkay Casino and discovered they had a $15 special on their all you can eat crab buffet. Of course, one order was all I could eat, especially when you combine it with the oysters, salad, shrimp, and slab of roast beef that would have been a meal in itself. Still, it was good and I won enough at my first sit-down at a blackjack machine to pay for dinner and take five bucks extra home with me.

Saturday I went into Santa Fe and tried to follow the signs to the Plaza. I ended up several blocks away and walked a lot more than I intended. Hiking around at 7,200 feet is still a little tiring to me. I had a nice lunch, though and headed to the write-in.

 

The first thing I did at the write-in was delete a little over a thousand words and start filling in the places that I needed to set things up that occurred later in the book.  It was good and I started getting into the swing of my characters again. Also met a couple dozen other writers and agreed to get together again on Tuesday. When I got back to the trailer, I managed to get the layout finished for Mark's book and got it off to him so he'd have it when he got to Thailand.

Days 86-93: The High Point and the Low Point

I had another write-in (2-person) in Alamogordo on Sunday afternoon but only camped overnight there. However, just across the street from my camp was one of the region's big pistachio ranches and home of the world's largest pistachio.

Mentone, Indiana has a much-maligned ten-foot statue of an egg in the middle of town, declaring it the "Eggbasket of the World." It would be dwarfed by this pistachio. Well, it's quite a nice tribute to the area's number one cash-crop. And they are good!

I headed south on U.S. 54 from Alamogordo to El Paso, Texas. My first trip through Texas was short as I simply crossed the Transmountain Drive to I-25 and went back north into New Mexico to camp a couple of nights in Vado as my base for visiting El Paso.

The Transmountain Drive figured prominently in the novel I'd read and it was pretty spectacular. There lies El Paso and then Mexico. Found that border again.

I had another two-person write-in at Fort Bliss in El Paso. That was interesting as I didn't know I was actually invited to a shopping center that was on the base. I was stopped and asked for ID before I could go on. That was the extent of the check, though. I was waved on. It was very pleasant. Met a writer who writes very slowly by my standard. I was pushing 60,000 words by the time we met and she was a little over a thousand. Her last book took her three years to write, but it is in the hands of an agent who is having some success getting her a contract. More power to her.

Remembering the admonishment of the couple I met at Canyon de Chelly, I made my next stop Guadalupe Mountains National Park. From El Paso, U.S. 180 heads east through the Salt Flats to the Guadalupe Mountains before turning northward past Carlsbad Caverns. It was an easy choice. Guadalupe Peak is the highest point in Texas at well over 8,000 feet. You can see it for many miles before you reach it.

I camped in the National Park at the foot of the mountain. That little hill in front of me is only a small false summit. I decided that at this altitude, I wasn't prepared for what was described as a rigorous eight mile hike to the summit.

Instead, I took a separate trail into McKittrick Canyon with more modest elevation gain and an incredible change of terrain as the trail follows a creek into what Wallis Pratt described as the most beautiful place on earth. Wallis was a geologist surveying the land for oil back at the turn of the century. As it happened, I met a geologist along the walk who pointed out the various rock formations and what they looked for when surveying for oil. It was pretty fascinating, but most of what I took from it was that this whole canyon area was once the reef of a vast inland ocean. Cool.

After I finished the hike, I headed for Carlsbad. I spent more for less in a campsite at the gates to the National Park than anyplace else I've camped on this trip. On the way up to the caverns (the entrance is on top of a ridge) I passed this one-time dwelling place in a cave. There was a convenient water supply and shelter.

I don't really get on well with being underground. I had to calm myself before is could get on the elevator that dropped 750 feet into the caverns. It was stunning. My camera was not adequate to capture the various formations, but I wandered around the trail for an hour of more before I finally took the elevator back to the surface. After lunch, I continued my journey north

There was a nice spot to look back down into the canyon where the cliff dwelling was. I figure that if you simply drilled straight into the rock there about a mile, you'd end up in the cavern. Instead you have to drive to the top and take one of the routes down.

I spent the weekend with the aliens in Roswell, New Mexico. They really make a big deal about the crashed flying saucer back in the 40s. Pretty much every store has a sign that says some variation of "aliens welcome." The UFO museum was pretty interesting. It did a pretty good timeline of the events, who saw what, and what happened to the evidence.

Well, I've been high up, deep down, and far out this week. Next it's on to Albuquerque.

Days 78-86: Hot water

Every so often I take a break for a week and check into a condo timeshare. The purpose: Unlimited hot water for showers and hot tub. Pinecliff in Ruidoso was a great example. It's an older timeshare development and the rooms show a little wear, but the rustic atmosphere is perfect for the area. And whatever the facility lacks, the staff makes up for. I've never had such a pleasant orientation breakfast or a staff that offered to lead tours (at no charge) for those of us who wanted a little more education on the places nearby.

The first stop on our tour was St. Joseph's Church on the Mescalero Apache lands. This church has been in continuous operation for nearly 400 years and is full every Sunday even though the Franciscans no longer staff it with a full time priest. It has and continues to undergo extensive restoration and is quite beautiful. I was impressed with the images in the church.

I loved the artwork, like the Jesus over the altar and this image of Mary in one of the stained glass windows. They all depict Jesus and the saints as members of their tribe. Very personal.

After lunch with my host at a New Mexico buffet in Tularosa, I continued out to the White Sands National Monument. I hadn't intended to take a hike, but there was a trail (sort of) with markers every so often to indicate where to go next. The sands truly are white and the clouds were, too.

The next tour was to the Spencer Theater in Ruidoso. This very expensive and very modern theater sits in the middle of about 70 acres out in the mountains. It has a 505 seat capacity and books traveling productions between LA and points east. A great selection of shows brought to this remote location. They don't do their own productions, so have a permanent full-time staff of only half a dozen plus contract help that come as needed. Before each production, they serve a buffet dinner, usually themed to go with the performance. The theater is filled with Chihouly glass sculptures.

I realized that the timing of my stay in Ruidoso was awkward. I would be spending the first day of November traveling. If you are not aware of it, November is a special month for me. For ten years, I have written a novel (or two) in each month of November. It wasn't going to work out well for me to have to pull up stakes first thing on Friday and move to a new unknown camp. Fortunately, the staff came through again and invited me to spend a couple extra days without charge. As a result, I started writing Thursday night at midnight and kept going until Sunday morning when I broke camp with over 20,000 words in by new novel completed.

Note that this is a Devon Layne novel as it contains explicit adult content. At the same time, I'm pretty damned pleased with the way it's progressing. I even managed to arrange a write-in at Viva! coffee shop in Ruidoso where two of us sat in front of a nice fire and drank our coffee while meeting more than our daily quota of words.

Since the new story is an Erotic Paranormal Romance Western Mystery, I donned my Stetson and saluted all the NaNoWriMo writers pounding out words this month.