Travelling South into New Mexico 17-19 Nov

Tues 17th
We basically spent 5 hours driving south and east (with various stops along the way) into New Mexico. Of course there were fabulous views along the way, some huge red cliffs that, from a distance, looked like a huge city with sky scrapers towering up out of the desert with the sun behind them. Then, as you got closer, they turned that deep shade of red that is now so familiar to us and the intricate carving that only nature's erosion could do becomes visible. So beautiful, and yet we are all big rocked out so we hardly took any photos. We also stopped at several roadside Navajo stalls to admire their weaving, pottery and jewellery. Tristan and Celso bought a pair of earrings with dangly Kokopeli statues so that they can turn them into necklaces, should be good if Celso's other creations are anything to go by.
As we passed into New Mexico through Navajo land the poverty all around was evident. The roads were badly maintained, the houses seemed to have their rooves held on by the addition of several car tyres, dogs roamed the litter strewn streets and the cars on the roads were more battered than any we have seen so far. We got to Gallop in New Mexico as the sun went down and found a campsite with lovely indigenous statues all the way down the drive. Such a contrast to the poverty that we had just driven through.
Wed 18th
We drove south from Gallop to go to Zuni, a pueblo that still uses the houses, or parts of the houses, built around a mission in the 1600s. The Ashiwi (or Zuni) people call this place the Middle Place of the World. As it is still very much a residential area you need to have a photo permit to even wander around with a camera, so we stopped and paid $10 then walked along the streets to the tiny museum. There are bread ovens everywhere and in the museum we watched an old black and white silent film showing two Ashiwi women first making an oven and then baking in one. As we stepped out of the museum again there was one of the ovens with flames streaming out of its front; first they burn wood in the stone and adobe covered, half spherical structure; then they sweep out all the ashes; put the bread in and seal the door with wood and cloth. Further along the street we could smell bread being baked and we saw two or three other ovens in use and one being built.
We visited several stalls with locally produced crafts, some beautiful carvings in stone and antler (beyond our price range), pottery (too fragile) and jewelery and rugs. We bought some more pinyons (should have a Spanish ny letter there but I can't find one!), the cooked and salted pine nuts (Yum) and tried some sunflower seeds soaked in lime and salt (Yuk!). We then went to visit the bakery but only found a large number of dogs with several tiny puppies amongst their number. And so we left Zuni, very disappointed at not being able to try their bread.
We drove west along route 53 to visit a wolf sanctuary. We were taken around to visit all the rescued wolves and wolf dogs that they have. The cages are good and large and most of the animals are kept in pairs. There are some really awful stories as to how some of them arrived at the place but they seem to be well cared for here. A few facts we learnt:- wolves have amber eyes; they only have black noses (never with pink bits); they have scent glands in their paws (apparently that is why dogs often scratch the ground as a hang over from leaving the scent, but dogs don't have these glands anymore). Whilst we were there a couple of the wolves had a small fight, they had just been put together the day before and were still sorting out the pecking order, this caused a whole load of howling around the park as the gossip spread. It was fantastic to see the wolves sitting with their throats extended to the sky and singing their hearts out. According to the guy who took us round he can recognise many different types of howl and this was definitely a gossip howl, rather than a ' I am here and this is my plot' howl or a 'keep out' howl.
Soon we were on our way again and we stopped in Grants for the night.
Thu 19th
Today was another travelling day through more desert, (it is quite beautiful when I think about it, but during driving it just seems like one endless expanse of dry nothingness). This time we passed a famous bit of desert where the first ever atomic bomb was exploded which is now a missile range! We were heading for the centre of New Mexico to Billy the Kid Country and we will be visiting 'his' museum tomorrow.
We stopped in a shopping mall to alleviate the monotony of the drive and Celso went in search of a video that he would like to take to Ecuador. It is called 'The Gods must be crazy', and he asked the women near the videos to look in the computer to see if they had it in stock. First she wrote 'The Goats must be Crazy',
'No, no', said Celso, 'not goats - God'.
So this time she wrote 'The gold must be crazy',
'No,' says Celso again, 'Not gold, - God.'
Her next attempt was 'The Good must be Crazy'.
Celso was getting a bit anxious by now. 'No', he said, 'Not good, God. You know, Jesus!'
The woman turned to him and said 'Jesus is good?'.
Celso, by now very frustrated, pointed to the heavens and said 'Jesus, God, you know the almighty!'.
'Oh!' says the woman, 'you mean Gad!'
The problem was solved but Celso had a very difficult time keeping a straight face through the rest of their dealings!

This encounter kept us giggling for the rest of the day.
We are now holed up in a town called Alamogordo and it is warm, warm, beautifully warm. I think we shall sleep well tonight.