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.
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