Wed 25th
Today we got up and drove a few miles to a Hertz rental place to pick up our hire car, then with me and Tris in the van and Celso following in the car we went to drop off the van. We had only done 1700 miles more than we had originally guesstimated we would do!! So in total we have covered 9800 miles of the United States, it has been great but I'm quite looking forward to moving on now. (It will be over 10,000 by the time we have gone south to Houston)
We drove the hire car down to Galveston, on the Gulf of Mexico about 30 miles South of Houston. It was strange to be in a car, nippy and manouverable, but no loo or fridge full of food and drink!!
In Galveston we checked into a motel and watched telly which is quite a novelty for us, but there is a whole load of rubbish on the TV here.
26th Nov - Thanksgiving
We slept in until around 10am and then went to a place called Moody Gardens in Galveston. We visited an excellent small aquarium which had above ground and underwater viewing areas for seals and penguins, and excellent walk through tunnel with an amazing variety of fish, sharks and a huge sea turtle. We watched Scrooge in 3D which is a really fun film and then learnt a bit about the history of Galveston. It was a major immigration point in the late 1800's when Texas wanted 1,000,000 immigrants per year to populate and develop the state, it was also a place where 1000s of slaves were shipped from the East Coast. But then with segregation and the start of large scale immigration from Eastern Europe there started to be a lot of racial tension and the port was closed.
Celso and Tristan had a Thanksgiving Buffet lunch with roast turkey and beef, mashed potato, pumpkin and artichokes followed by cheesecake and chocolate nut cake, then we drove around to try and find a couple of last minute things (some new shoes for Tris, a fishing rod container etc) but found that all the shops were closed, so it was into another motel close to a fishing shop.
27th November
Today is known as Black Friday (I don't know why) and apparently it is the busiest shopping day of the year. The sales are on and the bargain hunters have been out since the early hours. Last year there was at least one fatality in the crush. We again slept quite late (for us) until 9am and then we went out to join the shoppers. We didn't find many, a few more in Walmart than we have ever seen before and a few irate customers who couldn't find the things they had seen in the ads, but not nearly as many as we had been expecting after what we had seen on the TV. We got all that we needed and then drove to the airport to return our hire car. On the way we were stopped at one set of traffic lights next to a small canal in which we saw several water rats, a couple swimming another sitting, chewing on something, oblivious to the traffic whizzing by. Afterwards we went to our hotel via a mall to have another look around, we could walk back to our motel but there were absolutely no pavements (sidewalks) to walk on making it all quite dangerous; it just shows how little the people around here walk.
In the hotel we spent a couple of hours ironing all our patches (from all the places we have been) onto our Tshirts in preparation for wearing them tomorrow on the next leg of our journey. And having repacked our bags a couple of times we now have our luggage sorted with the correct weight in each bag and no items that might get confiscated in our hand luggage.
Friday, 27 November 2009
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Carlsbad and into Texas 22-24 Nov
Sunday 22
Up early we drove 20 miles or so south through more desert to Carlsbad Caverns. This is not the largest nor the deepest nor the longest cave in the world but it is certainly one of the most amazing places I have ever been. The caves were not formed by water but by acidic erosion. Water leaching through the rocks met the Hydrogen Sulphide gas that was formed from petroleum deposits in the area. The water and Hydrogen Sulphide formed Sulphuric Acid which then dissolved the limestone forming huge chambers. Uplift then pushed the caves up above the water table and then the creative processes began where water, carbon dioxide and dissolved limestone slowly, drop by drop, caused the formation of the amazing features of the cave.
It is home to several hundred thousand bats and another several tens of thousand swallows, both of which have now, unfortunately, flown south for the winter. We walked down through the natural entrance to the cave (which was once a steep drop only accessible by ladder) down a steep switchback path, past the twilight zone and into the darkness. Small dim lights lit the path and some of the features of the cave. Amazing formations, stalagmites; stalactites; soda straws; popcorn; slimy flowstones and grand pillars; mirror surfaced cave pools that occasionally are disturbed by a drip from overhead; cave pearls and crystals; brought out oohs and ahs from all of us as we wandered for 2.5 miles through and around the entrance and through another cave called 'the big room'. Our photos could not do the incredible features justice and so we have bought a book to remind ourselves of what we have seen when we get back to the UK.
The first man known to come down into the cave was a teenager called Jim White back in the late 1890s and then in the early 1900s bat guano was collected here and sent to California as fertilizer for the fruit orchards that were set up there. In 1915, after the first photos of some of the formations were shown in the local town, many people wanted to see inside the cave and so they were lowered over 170ft in a bucket used to haul bat guano from the cave! In 1923 the cave was declared a National Monument, it was explored by members of the National Geographic Society and then declared a National Park in 1930. In 1995 the cave was declared a World Heritage Site and now the park has expanded to include 100 other local caves.
One of the most amazing things that we learnt in the cave is that in some of the cave pools there is more biodiversity than in the rain forest. Scientists have also discovered some bacteria that produce an enzyme to kill competitors in the pools, one of these enzymes is being studied because in tests it kills cancer cells whilst appearing to leave healthy cells alone!
Our caving hours at an end we started our journey to Dallas to return the van, we passed masses of mini oil rigs (but have so far failed to take any photos of them) and horizon to horizon wind turbines (the most I have ever seen in one place). The landscape slowly became more lush, from wispy, dry, yellowish brown grasses and desert shrubs to green grass, oak trees and rivers with a decent flow of water in them. More natural water than we have seen since the Hoover Dam clogged the Colorado river! So we spent the rest of Sunday and then Monday driving over 500 miles. Tuesday was spent cleaning, washing clothes and bedding and packing. Not very interesting!!!
Up early we drove 20 miles or so south through more desert to Carlsbad Caverns. This is not the largest nor the deepest nor the longest cave in the world but it is certainly one of the most amazing places I have ever been. The caves were not formed by water but by acidic erosion. Water leaching through the rocks met the Hydrogen Sulphide gas that was formed from petroleum deposits in the area. The water and Hydrogen Sulphide formed Sulphuric Acid which then dissolved the limestone forming huge chambers. Uplift then pushed the caves up above the water table and then the creative processes began where water, carbon dioxide and dissolved limestone slowly, drop by drop, caused the formation of the amazing features of the cave.
It is home to several hundred thousand bats and another several tens of thousand swallows, both of which have now, unfortunately, flown south for the winter. We walked down through the natural entrance to the cave (which was once a steep drop only accessible by ladder) down a steep switchback path, past the twilight zone and into the darkness. Small dim lights lit the path and some of the features of the cave. Amazing formations, stalagmites; stalactites; soda straws; popcorn; slimy flowstones and grand pillars; mirror surfaced cave pools that occasionally are disturbed by a drip from overhead; cave pearls and crystals; brought out oohs and ahs from all of us as we wandered for 2.5 miles through and around the entrance and through another cave called 'the big room'. Our photos could not do the incredible features justice and so we have bought a book to remind ourselves of what we have seen when we get back to the UK.
The first man known to come down into the cave was a teenager called Jim White back in the late 1890s and then in the early 1900s bat guano was collected here and sent to California as fertilizer for the fruit orchards that were set up there. In 1915, after the first photos of some of the formations were shown in the local town, many people wanted to see inside the cave and so they were lowered over 170ft in a bucket used to haul bat guano from the cave! In 1923 the cave was declared a National Monument, it was explored by members of the National Geographic Society and then declared a National Park in 1930. In 1995 the cave was declared a World Heritage Site and now the park has expanded to include 100 other local caves.
One of the most amazing things that we learnt in the cave is that in some of the cave pools there is more biodiversity than in the rain forest. Scientists have also discovered some bacteria that produce an enzyme to kill competitors in the pools, one of these enzymes is being studied because in tests it kills cancer cells whilst appearing to leave healthy cells alone!
Our caving hours at an end we started our journey to Dallas to return the van, we passed masses of mini oil rigs (but have so far failed to take any photos of them) and horizon to horizon wind turbines (the most I have ever seen in one place). The landscape slowly became more lush, from wispy, dry, yellowish brown grasses and desert shrubs to green grass, oak trees and rivers with a decent flow of water in them. More natural water than we have seen since the Hoover Dam clogged the Colorado river! So we spent the rest of Sunday and then Monday driving over 500 miles. Tuesday was spent cleaning, washing clothes and bedding and packing. Not very interesting!!!
Saturday, 21 November 2009
East through New Mexico 20-21 Nov
Friday 20th
From Alamagordo we drove South West about 13 miles to visit White Sands National Monument, it is a part of the Chihuahuan desert which is the largest desert in North America (incl Mexico) and also the highest. That means that we have visited the lowest (Death Valley) and the highest deserts (White Sands) in the US!
The place well deserves its name, it looks just like there has been a heavy snowfall. The sand was so white and felt really cold! At the entrance we hired a couple of circular sledges and went in search of a large steep sand dune.
We found a perfect place with the sun on our backs (or our fronts when we fell off at the bottom of the slope usually gong backwards!) and no huge bumps to force us to 'take air'; we had been warned at the hire place that this can be very painful.
We could hear jet planes in the distance (we had passed an AFB on the way) and also just to the south of us is the White Sands Missile Range where they tested captured Nazi rockets after the war and still test new inventions now. Apparently the road south through the missile range is closed a couple of times a week for a few hours as new machines are tested. (Bits of both Transformers films were filmed here in the white sands (if you're interested, I'm not!))
After a couple of hours in which we established that Tristan was the champion sledger; that sand can get everywhere; that Celso was getting a mark where his Tshirt was (horror of horrors, he likes to have 'the perfect tan) and that we were all extremely hungry; we returned to the van and ate sandwiches and drank cold ginger ale. Then we set of North Eastwards to the centre of Lincoln County where Billy the Kid had made his name.
On our journey Tristan and I spotted a road runner on the side of the road, it was tiny, not at all what I had expected from the Loony Tunes road runner! We also passed through Apache land which was completely different from both the Navajo and Ashiwi lands we have passed through. There was no rubbish, no stray dogs, there was beautiful graffiti along the roads saying things like 'Honour your people', 'Respect' and beautifully intricate native designs. I wonder why there is such a difference?
At the small town of Lincoln, that used to be the county seat and was once described as the most dangerous place in America by one of the presidents (whose name escapes me as I have never heard of him before!), we stopped to see what the Billy the Kid story was all about. The town is said to be the best preserved town in America, of course the road has been tarmacked and some modernisation was done to the buildings in the early 1900s when electricity and water arrived in the town, but the shops, some houses and the courthouse at the centre of the story are still standing and you are able to go in and have a look around. If you're not interested in the story then skip the next paragraph.
'The company', (Murphy, Dolan and Co) had a monopoly on the government contracts in Lincoln county to supply Beef to Fort Sumner, they were squeezing all the other ranchers out of business, buying up their lands and had the local lawmen and politicians in their pocket. Tunstall, a young, rich Englishman, came to Lincoln and set up a new business in direct competition to 'The Company'. Dolan trumped up charges of an unpaid debt by Tunstall and then sent a group of men with the sheriff to collect... Tunstall was murdered. The teenager Billy the kid worked for Tunstall (Tunstall was kind of the father he had never known) and he vowed revenge. The whole area took sides either with the company or with Tunstall and The Lincoln County War started, the year was 1876. Billy and co set up a group of vigilantes (spelling) called The Regulators and killed several of The Company's men including the Sheriff. It all got out of hand until the Governor of New Mexico sent in the cavalry to sort things out. They burnt a house that the Regulators were hiding in and shot them as they came out surrendering but Billy escaped. Pat Garret was made the new sheriff and all went quiet for a while, but Garret was determined to get Billy and he hunted him down. He was tried by a jury selected by The Company, found guilty of the murder of the sheriff and sentenced to hang. Whilst awaiting sentence in the courthouse in Lincoln, he managed to shoot a guard whilst on a trip to the privy, shot another that came to find out what the noise was all about and then escaped. His leg irons were removed by one of the many friends who supported The Regulators. But Billy didn't leave the area and after a couple of months Garret hunted him down again and this time he shot him dead.
We drove East to Roswell with another of those colourful sunsets behind us and our eyes open for any UFOs. (For those of you that don't know, Roswell is the place where a UFO is supposed to have crashed in 1947 and has been followed by a series of cover ups by the military and government.)
Sat 21st
We were not abducted in the night, or I think we weren't, but after visiting the UFO museum and research centre this morning I am a believer. There are so many convincing testimonies from so many different people giving such similar stories and descriptions of events. We spent a couple of hours in the museum looking at documents and photos of the 'Roswell incident' and other sightings and encounters.
We drove south towards Carlsbad and went to the Living Desert State Park in the afternoon where there were hundreds of desert plants and a small zoo with desert animals; Prairie dogs; Javelina (collared Peccary, like a wild boar); rattlesnakes; deer; mountain lions; a bobcat; a grey fox; horned owls; golden and bald eagles; tortoises; scorpions and tarantulas; centipedes and lots of birds. It was a fabulous place.
We are camped just south of Carlsbad ready to go to the caverns tomorrow. We have had a swim and a shower and are feeling warm and cosy.
From Alamagordo we drove South West about 13 miles to visit White Sands National Monument, it is a part of the Chihuahuan desert which is the largest desert in North America (incl Mexico) and also the highest. That means that we have visited the lowest (Death Valley) and the highest deserts (White Sands) in the US!
The place well deserves its name, it looks just like there has been a heavy snowfall. The sand was so white and felt really cold! At the entrance we hired a couple of circular sledges and went in search of a large steep sand dune.
We found a perfect place with the sun on our backs (or our fronts when we fell off at the bottom of the slope usually gong backwards!) and no huge bumps to force us to 'take air'; we had been warned at the hire place that this can be very painful.
We could hear jet planes in the distance (we had passed an AFB on the way) and also just to the south of us is the White Sands Missile Range where they tested captured Nazi rockets after the war and still test new inventions now. Apparently the road south through the missile range is closed a couple of times a week for a few hours as new machines are tested. (Bits of both Transformers films were filmed here in the white sands (if you're interested, I'm not!))
After a couple of hours in which we established that Tristan was the champion sledger; that sand can get everywhere; that Celso was getting a mark where his Tshirt was (horror of horrors, he likes to have 'the perfect tan) and that we were all extremely hungry; we returned to the van and ate sandwiches and drank cold ginger ale. Then we set of North Eastwards to the centre of Lincoln County where Billy the Kid had made his name.
On our journey Tristan and I spotted a road runner on the side of the road, it was tiny, not at all what I had expected from the Loony Tunes road runner! We also passed through Apache land which was completely different from both the Navajo and Ashiwi lands we have passed through. There was no rubbish, no stray dogs, there was beautiful graffiti along the roads saying things like 'Honour your people', 'Respect' and beautifully intricate native designs. I wonder why there is such a difference?
At the small town of Lincoln, that used to be the county seat and was once described as the most dangerous place in America by one of the presidents (whose name escapes me as I have never heard of him before!), we stopped to see what the Billy the Kid story was all about. The town is said to be the best preserved town in America, of course the road has been tarmacked and some modernisation was done to the buildings in the early 1900s when electricity and water arrived in the town, but the shops, some houses and the courthouse at the centre of the story are still standing and you are able to go in and have a look around. If you're not interested in the story then skip the next paragraph.
'The company', (Murphy, Dolan and Co) had a monopoly on the government contracts in Lincoln county to supply Beef to Fort Sumner, they were squeezing all the other ranchers out of business, buying up their lands and had the local lawmen and politicians in their pocket. Tunstall, a young, rich Englishman, came to Lincoln and set up a new business in direct competition to 'The Company'. Dolan trumped up charges of an unpaid debt by Tunstall and then sent a group of men with the sheriff to collect... Tunstall was murdered. The teenager Billy the kid worked for Tunstall (Tunstall was kind of the father he had never known) and he vowed revenge. The whole area took sides either with the company or with Tunstall and The Lincoln County War started, the year was 1876. Billy and co set up a group of vigilantes (spelling) called The Regulators and killed several of The Company's men including the Sheriff. It all got out of hand until the Governor of New Mexico sent in the cavalry to sort things out. They burnt a house that the Regulators were hiding in and shot them as they came out surrendering but Billy escaped. Pat Garret was made the new sheriff and all went quiet for a while, but Garret was determined to get Billy and he hunted him down. He was tried by a jury selected by The Company, found guilty of the murder of the sheriff and sentenced to hang. Whilst awaiting sentence in the courthouse in Lincoln, he managed to shoot a guard whilst on a trip to the privy, shot another that came to find out what the noise was all about and then escaped. His leg irons were removed by one of the many friends who supported The Regulators. But Billy didn't leave the area and after a couple of months Garret hunted him down again and this time he shot him dead.
We drove East to Roswell with another of those colourful sunsets behind us and our eyes open for any UFOs. (For those of you that don't know, Roswell is the place where a UFO is supposed to have crashed in 1947 and has been followed by a series of cover ups by the military and government.)
Sat 21st
We were not abducted in the night, or I think we weren't, but after visiting the UFO museum and research centre this morning I am a believer. There are so many convincing testimonies from so many different people giving such similar stories and descriptions of events. We spent a couple of hours in the museum looking at documents and photos of the 'Roswell incident' and other sightings and encounters.
We drove south towards Carlsbad and went to the Living Desert State Park in the afternoon where there were hundreds of desert plants and a small zoo with desert animals; Prairie dogs; Javelina (collared Peccary, like a wild boar); rattlesnakes; deer; mountain lions; a bobcat; a grey fox; horned owls; golden and bald eagles; tortoises; scorpions and tarantulas; centipedes and lots of birds. It was a fabulous place.
We are camped just south of Carlsbad ready to go to the caverns tomorrow. We have had a swim and a shower and are feeling warm and cosy.
Thursday, 19 November 2009
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.
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.
Monday, 16 November 2009
Arches National Park 16 Nov
We awoke in our warm, cozy motel room and got up in comfort! After breakfast we went out to the cold van and started the short journey south to Arches National Park. There was snow on the ground in all the shaded parts and more incredible views through extraordinary red rock formations. We took a walk to try to climb on top of Skyline Arch which looked like quite a low arch from the road; only to find the climb impossible with the slippery snow on the rocks below it. Then a walk up to Landscape Arch took us through many shaded areas where the snow was lying quite deep and the desert shrubs and twisted trees looked glorious with their sprinkling of icing on top. Tristan collected enough snow to make a very solid palm sized snowball and to repay Celso for the couple of snowballs that had been lobbed in his direction!
It was so cold when we weren't in the sun and we finally made the decision to miss out on some of the places we had planned to see in Colorado and to whizz southwards to the sun. After a brief stop in Moab, which had an amazing variety of Kokapelli statues around its streets, we sped 100 miles south to a little town called Bliss that was about 2000ft lower in altitude and hopefully not sooooo cold! We arrived after a sunset that seemed to last for over an hour with the western sky glowing; I assume that it lasted so long as we came out from behind mountains.
It was so cold when we weren't in the sun and we finally made the decision to miss out on some of the places we had planned to see in Colorado and to whizz southwards to the sun. After a brief stop in Moab, which had an amazing variety of Kokapelli statues around its streets, we sped 100 miles south to a little town called Bliss that was about 2000ft lower in altitude and hopefully not sooooo cold! We arrived after a sunset that seemed to last for over an hour with the western sky glowing; I assume that it lasted so long as we came out from behind mountains.
Sunday, 15 November 2009
Bryce, Kodachrome and Route 12 through Capitol Reef 14 & 15 Nov
Sat 14
We woke up this morning to ice on the inside of the windows! We were snug in bed and so the blinds (and the towels we had put up over the top to stop the dawn waking us up) had done their job at keeping out the cold. We got up slowly to allow the sun to melt any ice on the road before starting off to travel about 20 miles to Bryce Canyon. Even before we got to the canyon the sights were amazing, salmon pink sandstone had been carved into a series of pinnacles and we even had to drive through two tunnels carved through the sandstone. Then on into the park itself and amazing views over a huge valley full of these multi-layered strawberry cheesecake pinnacles. We went for a hike down through some of the formations and it began to snow, great big, dry, dollops of white. It was breathtakingly beautiful down there and quite extraordinary that some trees had managed to take route in this incredibly dry place. After a fabulous walk, we drove on down the park to have a look at some more views always keeping one eye on the weather just in case in turned really nasty. We met a very disabled Spanish guy who had come over on his own and was driving around but he didn't want to make the effort of getting out of the car if the view was covered in the clouds that kept rolling in. He had an amazing pair of cameras that Celso took photos with and became very jealous and convinced that we need to buy a better camera. I think our camera is doing a good job!
As the snow came down again we left the park and moved further east. We saw a sign for Kodachrome Park 9 miles off our road so we decided to go and take a look. We found a little state park with amazing sandstone formations in reds, pinks and cream; tall sedimentary pipes (formed when ancient springs clogged with silt which formed more erosion resistant rock); and a large number of enormous hares! We also found that the campsite was open so we decided to stay the night and see if the park looked as good and colourful in the morning.
Sunday 15
Again we woke to ice on the windows and also to 3 large hares and a bunny nibbling at the grass around the van. Again we took our time getting up to allow any ice on the roads to thaw and then we had another look around the park before setting out to drive the nearly 100 miles along Scenic Route 12 that winds through the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument (a 91,000 acre piece of public land that protects the main watershed of the Colorado River) and ends after passing through Capitol Reef National Park. It was the most glorious drive with towering cliffs sometimes in the salmon pink; sometimes looking like huge piles of dried up concrete; some with multi coloured stripes like brown mint humbugs; and some with amazing sculpted shapes. On parts of the drive we were up above 8000 ft with snow on the ground and the view of snow topped mountains in the distance, at one point the whole mountainside was covered in silver birch trees, then fir trees covered in a sprinkling of snow with a frozen stream tumbling over rocks next to the road. At one high point the road passed along a ridge that was no wider than the road itself so there were huge drops on both sides. At many of the high points the ground was covered in football sized volcanic rock like it had just been sprinkled onto the land from the sky - perhaps it did right after an eruption though I don't know where the volcano is!?
When we were at the lower levels (below 6000 ft) the terrain was mainly desertlike but at times, when we were alongside a river, there were trees in amazing autumn browns, yellows and golds.
Every corner we turned there was yet another amazing view, so much so that we got a little blazee (how do you spell that?), it was a big case of senses overload!
In Capitol Reef National Park there is a beautiful valley that was inhabited by an early indigenous community that have been called the Fremont people after the river in the valley. They have left petroglyphs on the walls of the canyon, strange human figures plus deer and some beetles. More recently in the early 1800s a Mormon community settled here starting a town they called Fruita for fruit they grew (apples, peaches and pears) as the valley has a milder climate than the surrounding area and year round water. After the 1940s when the paved road came through the community scattered and the park was made.
Finally we turned north through the pink sanded San Rafael Desert that was punctuated with huge pink pinnacled cliffs and as the sun went down red cliffs were glowing in the distance. Wow.
We have given in to the cold weather and checked in to a motel. After a steak in a local restaurant we are now washed and warm in our room. However we wouldn't have missed all these amazing panoramas for anything... I think we can put up with a bit of cold for this, any day.
We woke up this morning to ice on the inside of the windows! We were snug in bed and so the blinds (and the towels we had put up over the top to stop the dawn waking us up) had done their job at keeping out the cold. We got up slowly to allow the sun to melt any ice on the road before starting off to travel about 20 miles to Bryce Canyon. Even before we got to the canyon the sights were amazing, salmon pink sandstone had been carved into a series of pinnacles and we even had to drive through two tunnels carved through the sandstone. Then on into the park itself and amazing views over a huge valley full of these multi-layered strawberry cheesecake pinnacles. We went for a hike down through some of the formations and it began to snow, great big, dry, dollops of white. It was breathtakingly beautiful down there and quite extraordinary that some trees had managed to take route in this incredibly dry place. After a fabulous walk, we drove on down the park to have a look at some more views always keeping one eye on the weather just in case in turned really nasty. We met a very disabled Spanish guy who had come over on his own and was driving around but he didn't want to make the effort of getting out of the car if the view was covered in the clouds that kept rolling in. He had an amazing pair of cameras that Celso took photos with and became very jealous and convinced that we need to buy a better camera. I think our camera is doing a good job!
As the snow came down again we left the park and moved further east. We saw a sign for Kodachrome Park 9 miles off our road so we decided to go and take a look. We found a little state park with amazing sandstone formations in reds, pinks and cream; tall sedimentary pipes (formed when ancient springs clogged with silt which formed more erosion resistant rock); and a large number of enormous hares! We also found that the campsite was open so we decided to stay the night and see if the park looked as good and colourful in the morning.
Sunday 15
Again we woke to ice on the windows and also to 3 large hares and a bunny nibbling at the grass around the van. Again we took our time getting up to allow any ice on the roads to thaw and then we had another look around the park before setting out to drive the nearly 100 miles along Scenic Route 12 that winds through the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument (a 91,000 acre piece of public land that protects the main watershed of the Colorado River) and ends after passing through Capitol Reef National Park. It was the most glorious drive with towering cliffs sometimes in the salmon pink; sometimes looking like huge piles of dried up concrete; some with multi coloured stripes like brown mint humbugs; and some with amazing sculpted shapes. On parts of the drive we were up above 8000 ft with snow on the ground and the view of snow topped mountains in the distance, at one point the whole mountainside was covered in silver birch trees, then fir trees covered in a sprinkling of snow with a frozen stream tumbling over rocks next to the road. At one high point the road passed along a ridge that was no wider than the road itself so there were huge drops on both sides. At many of the high points the ground was covered in football sized volcanic rock like it had just been sprinkled onto the land from the sky - perhaps it did right after an eruption though I don't know where the volcano is!?
When we were at the lower levels (below 6000 ft) the terrain was mainly desertlike but at times, when we were alongside a river, there were trees in amazing autumn browns, yellows and golds.
Every corner we turned there was yet another amazing view, so much so that we got a little blazee (how do you spell that?), it was a big case of senses overload!
In Capitol Reef National Park there is a beautiful valley that was inhabited by an early indigenous community that have been called the Fremont people after the river in the valley. They have left petroglyphs on the walls of the canyon, strange human figures plus deer and some beetles. More recently in the early 1800s a Mormon community settled here starting a town they called Fruita for fruit they grew (apples, peaches and pears) as the valley has a milder climate than the surrounding area and year round water. After the 1940s when the paved road came through the community scattered and the park was made.
Finally we turned north through the pink sanded San Rafael Desert that was punctuated with huge pink pinnacled cliffs and as the sun went down red cliffs were glowing in the distance. Wow.
We have given in to the cold weather and checked in to a motel. After a steak in a local restaurant we are now washed and warm in our room. However we wouldn't have missed all these amazing panoramas for anything... I think we can put up with a bit of cold for this, any day.
Saturday, 14 November 2009
Zion Park 13 Nov
What can I say, amazing, beautiful, breathtaking. You can see it all in the photos.
The first few photos were taken before a tunnel that takes you 1 mile through a mountain to get into the valley. These are all old sand dunes that were covered in a deposit of wet mud and then buried for millions of years in which time they turned to stone. Down in the valley most of the sandstone and limestone was formed under an ancient sea.
It rained in the morning for the first time in months so we were lucky enough to see waterfalls in the park as we hiked up to the lower and middle emerald pools, but the dry, desert land soon sucked up all the water and the streams and waterfalls that we saw in the morning were gone.
Absolutely incredible, I can't say more.
We camped on a high plateau on the way to Bryce Canyon with the threat of snow all around, we will have to check the conditions in the morning to see if we can continue or have to wait a day for the snow to pass.
The first few photos were taken before a tunnel that takes you 1 mile through a mountain to get into the valley. These are all old sand dunes that were covered in a deposit of wet mud and then buried for millions of years in which time they turned to stone. Down in the valley most of the sandstone and limestone was formed under an ancient sea.
It rained in the morning for the first time in months so we were lucky enough to see waterfalls in the park as we hiked up to the lower and middle emerald pools, but the dry, desert land soon sucked up all the water and the streams and waterfalls that we saw in the morning were gone.
Absolutely incredible, I can't say more.
We camped on a high plateau on the way to Bryce Canyon with the threat of snow all around, we will have to check the conditions in the morning to see if we can continue or have to wait a day for the snow to pass.
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