A Little New Mex while staying in Tex

Just getting back from dinner at the Bad Rabbit Café conveniently located on the ranch that I’m staying on in Texas.  More on that experience in a bit, but before I get on the road again tomorrow for what will be my first really long stretch of driving (Darn you, Texas for being so big) I wanted to get some of all the thoughts swirling around in my head from the last four days.

After dropping Court off in Flagstaff, I began my trek east to New Mexico.  I’ve never been one who knows the real direction of places, so you best believe I had to look at the map before I wrote that sentence.  Without peeking I most likely would have told you I was heading south.  Someday maybe, I will be the person that gives directions like “Go South East on such and such” instead of the one who says, “Okay so you’re going to pass McDonald’s on your right, after you’ve gone about 3 miles take a left, if you got to the Dairy Queen, you’ve gone too far.” For now, I will use that handy dandy thing called google to make sure.

Before I go into too much detail about New Mexico and I come across as a hater, know that my time in New Mexico was mostly driving, drive-by lunching, and taking care of business and not so much adventuring to new heights and sites.  I got to New Mexico rather late and had made plans to stop in to see my Neighbor boy’s brother who just bought a home there. He and the sunset were kind enough to leave a light on for me.  It had been years since I’ve seen Tony and had only heard about his adventures from his brother so it was nice to sit back and listen to someone else telling a story.  He was able to give me his story and a quick history of his new home.  As it got later, he was kind to offer for me to stay, but since I thought it was just him being nice and the last thing he wanted was me there, I declined.  Besides, I had already booked a room for the night.  Oh, Hindsight is an elusive thing now isn’t?  Had I known what type of place and room were waiting for me in Alburqueque, I would have slept on his back porch with the mosquitos if he’d let me.  In all fairness, I kept bragging how I found this room for only $34 dollars. That, my friends, should have been my first clue.  The second was when I went up to the desk to check in and there was a sign saying, “We apologize, we are no longer able to offer refunds after 20 minutes in the room.”  Ewww.  I got to my room, tried to convince myself that it was just a place I needed to lay my head for a few hours and then I was out.  The convincing did not go as planned and for a good portion of the night, I relived my 13 year old’s self fear of all the bad things that can happen in the dark and left the light on.  I know you’re all thinking, 13?  Don’t you mean like 3? Or maybe 7? Even 9?… Nope, afraid of the dark and all the things that go bump in the night and slept with a nightlight until I was 13 and maybe even the whole light on if I managed to sneak it passed Paul and Gail.  Needless to say, no sleep was happening that night, so when the sun came up, I went for my first run in over a week and clearly we’ve forgotten how that works.  I spent my morning getting all the errands done, laundry, auto zone to get one of those fancy window shield covers, post office, and Walgreens.  Don’t worry, not all moments spent in ABQ were terrible.  Another SF friend has since moved to Albuquerque and was able to meet me for lunch.  We picked up like no time had passed and when we had to part he pointed me in the direction of the cutest Farm Shop.  If you are into that whole HGTV bit and fans of Chip and Joanna, this is apparently one of her favorite places in New Mexico.  I didn’t think those folks ever left Waco unless it is to build JLo’s dream lake house, but I stand corrected.  Next stop, the exciting alien town of Roswell, New Mexico.

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Actually, if they coined it as more of a ghost town and not an alien town, maybe then it’d be exciting. I was fully warned that it would not be what I was expecting and to go in with the lowest of expectations.  But I’m sure this friend had never watched Roswell back in the late 90’s early 2000’s and know how cool it was going to be and my expectations remained relatively high.  I got there and noticed that for one it was a fast food lovers dreams come true and not really this cute old town I was envisioning.  Also of note, I was one of the only few people actually walking around the town. It was not that late and it was not that hot.  I peeked my head in stores and took pictures of little green men, but I started to feel as if I was the alien and people were staring, wondering why is she out there walking around.  If anyone remembers the old show (I hear there is a remake), there was a sheriff on it and before getting back on the road the next morning I walked into Starbucks and there was a Sherrif sitting there giving me a look like, “well at the very least, I showed up for you.”  My friend John owes me a giant, “I told you so.” when I see him in August.

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To make up for my lackluster experience in Roswell, John recommended I make a trip out to the Carlsbad Caverns on my way down to Big Bend.  I’d be transitioning from heights and sites to depths and drops.  John also told me to make sure I checked out the bat flight.  John and I are clearly new friends because as you get to know me and sit or stand anywhere with me that a bird or something bird-like comes near, you’d be able to smell my fear and witness my cat-like moves to avoid any and all paths being crossed.  The Bat Flight would be skipped. Let someone else have my spot!  The Caverns without the bat cave would be plenty to see.  You can get into the caverns two ways, one, you take the long way around and walk or two take the elevator where it drops you 750 below the ground.  While the whole theme of this trip is taking the long way home, I decided to opt for the elevator.  In my mind, I had successfully avoided the fear of the bats and was excited to explore.  Once I started walking into the caves, my fear of the dark was right there with me.  Once again, I thought, we’re you actually expecting a cavern to be light.  Sometimes, my thoughts I tell ya.  Usually, I try my best to avoid crowds in these types of places as I want the experience all to myself, but I found myself “rushing” in between groups of people to look at the different structures along the self-guided path.  At one point, I caught up to a big group of teenage boys, who were too polite for my liking…they kept telling their friends in front,  “Move to the side, share the path, someone coming.”  Listen, boys, while I loved the manners, I was actually looking to tag along for a few if you didn’t mind.  The next group I came across was a family of five and thank goodness they were a little less in tune to me being there and made no efforts to let me pass.  I started listening (borderline eavesdropping) on the stories the young girl would make up about the things she was seeing.  I especially liked the one about it being a giant wedding. Not like a big wedding, but a wedding for giants and the bride left because of some family feud.  All irrational fears aside, the Caverns were amazing.  To think that over the years nature created all these breathtaking structures. Even if you afraid of bats or the dark, I’d highly recommend a visit.

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Wow, for a place that I really didn’t do much, I sure had a lot to say.  I’ve been working on being brief and concise my whole life and still, it eludes me.  Oh Well.  I was going to combine New Mexico with my time in West Texas, but that would just be too much.  Had fun sharing legs 7, 7.5 and 8 with you, Leg 9 to get its own post in the near future.  Right now, I need to pack up the car and also check the weather.  I think in the battle of “One of us is going to have to change their path” Barry is going to win and I’m going to need to adjust some travel plans. Wish me luck!