New Mexico

We just had three awesome days in northern New Mexico. We only visited two cities, but three days really wasn't enough.

Our first day was in Taos. Taos is a small town of less than 5,000 people but it's a popular skiing and shopping destination. Most of the buildings are adobe (or are made to look like adobe, in the case of McDonald's and other chains encroaching on the area.) Taos is also the location of the famous Taos Pueblo, pictured below. This is sort of a Native American condo complex and is believed to be between 1,000 and 1,500 years old. People still live here, making it the oldest continually inhabited structure at least in North America. About 150 people live in the structure, but there are many other detached adobe dwellings around it which are nearly as old and are also inhabited. Electricity and running water are forbidden, and the village's water supply comes from a creek than runs through it. The Tiwa Indians call this village home and it's the first Indian village I've ever been to.

You have to pay a fee to get in. You also have to pay a separate fee to get your camera in, and you can't take pictures of Indians unless you get their permission first. And probably you have to pay them to do it too. I didn't try. The Indians were actually pretty shy and secretive, though one little old raisin of an Indian woman shouted at me, "Are you a real cowboy!?" to which I replied, "Are you a real Indian!?" She laughed heartily and asked, "Can you ride?" "Of course," I said. She dismissively waved her hand and said, "You need to move here to Taos!" as she turned and walked away.

These people are really poor. Most of them have set up shop and sell little trinkets, and every shop sells the exact same stuff. It was such a strange experience. You get a definite impression that they resent us (Americans) for their current state, though you can't blame them. We destroyed their culture and now they're reduced to letting us pay to walk around peeking in their windows for amusement and selling us worthless trinkets. Imagine if we were conquered and ultimately confined to living our lives out of our suburban tract homes, and the only way to make a living was to allow our conquerors to pay us a few darseks to walk around our streets and lawns taking pictures and asking stupid questions about the tattered remains of our culture. I have a lot to say about this but there's still a lot of vacation to cover.

We also got a glimpse of what the Great Plains once looked like before the arrival of the white man: literally thousands of bison grazing on a ranch that was so big we couldn't see the borders.

Perhaps you've heard of Earthship? They build (or sell plans for) completely sustainable, off-the-grid homes. They're made of local materials (usually dirt and rocks right from the ground) as well as recycled materials (mostly old tires to build the wall structures). They generate their own power from solar and wind, harvest their own water, are passively heated and cooled, and even clean their own waste water. One of their communities is right outside of Taos. One of the homes is open for tours.

To get to the Earthship community, you have to cross the mighty Rio Grande, which isn't so mighty this far north as it's still pretty young. It has, however, carved a mighty gorge. The bridge that spans it is 650 feet above the river, making it the fifth highest in the US. There was no good vantage point from which to get a photo of the bridge and I was standing on it to get the picture below.
We encountered portions of the old Route 66 several times, which was just cool. I always pictured James Dean cruising with the top down across the gorgeous desert landscape right at sundown.

We normally camp when we take a road trip, but since our destinations weren't National Parks or other necessarily outdoorsy locales, we decided to stay at bed and breakfast inns. Those are always preferable to corporate chains. We stayed right downtown in both Taos and Santa Fe, so we were always walking distance from everything. In Taos, the first inn we went to was (as nearly all are) an adobe. This one was particularly interesting because it was originally a fort and was something like 400 years old. It had also been haunted, but the owner told us in all seriousness how they'd brought in a woman who sent the troublesome apparition packing. Unfortunately there was no room at the inn. Fortunately the one next door had a vacancy. I highly recommend that if you're ever in Taos, you stay at Casa Benavides. It's close to everything, it's beautiful, the rooms are huge, and we met some really fun people at the community breakfast. And the food was delicious. Oh, and right next door to The Casa is Kit Carson's house. Kit Carson, as you may recall from high school history, was the most famous mountain man of the old west. He played a tremendous role in "settling" the west (ie. bringing about the destruction of the culture he admired and who now sell trinkets to their conquerors.) He's buried right around the corner and nearly everything in town is named after him.

In Santa Fe we stayed at Pueblo Bonito, which I also recommend. The food wasn't anything special, but everything else about it was wonderful - especially the free margaritas. We checked in and the lady behind the desk said, "Are you a real cowboy?" I sighed and smiled but didn't say anything. I think she understood I was getting tired of that question. "Can you ride?" she asked, right on cue. "Of course," I said. She smiled and said, "Put on your hat." I put it on. She looked at me for a moment, mouth slightly agape, and said, much to my surprise, "Yum!" For a second there the way she was looking at me made me wonder if she was going to pounce from across the desk. Gerard stepped up and told her she needed to lay off the margaritas. Turned out she was a "real" cowgirl and lives in a 400 year old adobe on her New Mexico ranch. She was also a "bull whisperer." We learned this over margaritas with her and a really gorgeous couple from Denver who also happened to be staying there. You just don't get that kind of experience at a chain motel.

Aside from Pueblo Bonito's offerings, the food in New Mexico really was quite good. If you're ever in Santa Fe and you want some truly delicious, authentic Northern New Mexico cuisine, you need to try La Fonda. It's the second best Mexican/Southwestern food I've ever had, right after Fonda San Miguel in Austin.

Other Santa Fe notable attractions include the San Miguel Mission Church, which is said to be the oldest church in the United States and was built around 1600 out of, you guessed it, adobe. It's right next door to what is said to be the oldest house in the US, an 800 year old adobe which is not inhabited and is closed to the public. Another famous old church, The Loretto, is not made of adobe. It's a lot fancier, and it's now privately owned and isn't really a functioning church anymore. Instead it's a money maker for the owners who wasted no time in putting in a well-stocked gift shop. What's all the excitement about a church? It has a miraculous staircase. I don't know that I'd call it miraculous, but it is quite beautiful and certainly is a work of art. The story goes that the church was built but the designer "forgot" to design in a staircase to access the balcony. No one apparently noticed until after the church was finished. Then some guy shows up in the 1870's, builds this amazing spiral staircase with no nails, no glue, no pillars or columns, and disappears. The builder remains anonymous and the staircase truly was a work of art. Churchy people said it was a miracle from God and claim that even today engineers can't figure out how the staircase stands, but that of course is BS. The bishop, shortly after the staircase was built, decided it needed to have a banister so that was added after the fact. I guess he felt the miracle only extended far enough to keep the staircase standing, but not far enough to keep is geriatric butt from falling off. Geez, you'd think God would at least have had the foresight to know the old man needed a hand rail.

Anyway, we loved New Mexico. It's really beautiful, and I just love walking around all the adobes and the roasting foods, the bright red ristras which are abundant, to say the very least, and the intense presence of a hybrid Indian-Mexican culture. Gerard, having grown up on the border with Mexico, was like a kid running around as memories came flooding back. Agua fresca, roasting corn on the cob, the nostril burning aroma of roasting chiles, dark skinned people lining the sidewalks selling jewelry and trinkets - it all reminded him of his roots. He said the market area was a lot like Mexico, but without the trash and crime. I'd say that's a pretty fair observation.

Searching

Last week/weekend was our annual backpacking trip to Capitol Peak. We (there were eight people in our party) were gone 5 days, and returned last night around midnight.

Base camp was just below 12,000 feet, in the wooded area in the photo above. It's literally on the edge of the alpine tundra, just meters from the limit of where trees can grow. It takes the better part of a day to hike in.

The weather is always unpredictable in the mountains, and the higher you go the more extreme it can get in a hurry. We experienced baking sun, a hail storm, violent winds and freezing temperatures. And that was just the first day. The second day started with sunshine and blue skies, so after breakfast we hiked up above the tree line to the saddle to make trail repairs. At noon, black clouds sprang up from the far side of Capitol Peak and within ten minutes we were running back down a 40 degree incline through a vicious lightning storm, complete with hail and pouring rain, to the relative safety of base camp. We counted 35 lightning strikes around us in the time it took to run down. In an hour it was sunny again, but then the wind started. We had sustained winds of over 40 mph, punctuated by regular gusts much more powerful, which lasted day and night for two days. The last couple of days were gorgeous and sunny, with daytime temps in the 60's and nights below freezing.

Despite this, we had a good time. The company was great, and camp was, all things considered, comfortable. We had great food, a nice warm camp fire, and clear mountain streams running on all sides of us. Deer, marmots, chipmunks and gray jays were our constant companions. And the scenery, well, it's really indescribable, like something from a dream. You can't imagine the world can really be so beautiful.

I'm leaving out so many details, but there are a few interesting or quirky things worth mentioning. For instance, we found a dead cow on the way up. Ranchers lease the land (it's owned by the forest service) and they unleash their cows to get fat by trampling and destroying pristine alpine meadows. We don't know how that particular cow died, but the next day hikers told us they had seen a bear munching on the carcass. When we saw it it didn't have a mark on it. It's highly unlikely the bear had anything to do with the cow's death, but they are opportunistic feeders and are roaming the area looking for an easy meal. We were extra careful to hang all of our food and trash high in the trees at night and while away from camp during the day.

Had I seen the bear it would certainly have been the highlight of the trip. But the best part for me is always the cowboys. Every year we hire an outfitter to pack tools in for us. We backpack our own clothes, tents, food, etc., but the sledgehammers, picks and other tools and a few common base camp necessities are packed in on a string of mules lead by a cowboy on a horse.

This year our cowboy was Aaron. He was a taut twenty-something with a slow western accent, piercing glance, cowboy hat, boots, chaps, the whole nine yards. He was born on a Pennsylvania farm but moved out west when he came of age to learn how to be a packer. I'm sure there are a lot of dirty details I don't know about the job, but the fantasy of living on a mountain ranch and having city folk pay you good money to pack them into the woods is kinda nice. I mean, he only has to see us twice per visit: once to get our money and put all our stuff on the mules, and once again as he passes us on his way down. Five days later it's just the reverse. In between he's riding alone through a gorgeous wilderness and never even has to break a sweat. A horse with two stubborn mules loaded with gear can get up and back in the time it takes us just to get up. I'm not suggesting his job is easy, not in the least. Last year, for example, one of the horses slipped on an unusually snowy slope and rolled down to the switchback below with all our tools and gear on its back. Fortunately neither man nor beast was injured. I'm aware that the job comes with certain hazards and isn't all romance. No job is. But sometimes I wonder which is really the less desirable prospect: being crushed by your horse on a mountain slope or crushed in a car accident on the interstate. Somehow the car accident just seems like the more wasteful tragedy.

I've been reading the blog of this old packer in the Idaho Rockies. His accounts are beautiful, terrifying, alluring. They're full of his adventures, decades of them. They're heavily peppered with tips too: what can happen and what to do or what not to do, what others have done and the consequences of their actions or inactions. It's easy to imagine him writing in a leather bound journal next to a camp fire in the forested mountains of frontier America.

Anyhow, today I was back at work - back at my desk clicking away on the glowing box that puts virtual green in my checking account so that I can spend a couple weeks a year getting out into the world.

I really don't mean to rag on civilization or technology. I freely admit it was very nice taking a hot shower last night and sleeping in my big, soft bed with fresh cotton sheets instead of lying on cold hard ground. Instead of a freezing, howling wind there was just a cool breeze through open windows. Instead of bears sniffing me through ten microns of nylon sheeting in the wee hours of the morning, there was just the predictable stillness of home. Good things, to be sure. Yet all I could think about all day was being back out there, somewhere in the wilderness with my horses, a warm campfire, and a hot meal bubbling in a cast iron dutch oven. Somewhere in the mountains is my cabin; simple, warm and comfortable. It bridges the gap between the soft civilized world and raw nature. It allows me to live deliberately, carefully walking the line between two extremes.

I wonder what Aaron did today.

Moab: Part I

I have been to Moab. It is good.

I came home early last Thursday undecided about going to Moab for a four day weekend because the forecast called for rain. Every single day. In the desert. But Gerard insisted we go anyway, and I'm glad he did. I'm going to break the trip up into multiple blog posts, partly because I have a lot to say, partly because each leg of the trip had its own feel, and partly because I just now have enough time to start writing about the trip.

So Thursday night we packed up and Friday morning we set out early. We had four full days ahead of us and no real agenda aside from making it to Moab at some point. One of the great things about road trips, especially unhurried ones, are the things you stumble across along the way. Around lunchtime on Thursday we found ourselves in the city of Glenwood Springs, Colorado. It was a cool, drippy day and we were in search of a bathroom, lunch and some hot coffee. The Summit Coffee Shop served us very well. It was as funky a coffee shop as you might find in Austin, but with that particularly mountain feel that only coffee shops above 5,000 feet seem to have. Maybe it was the wall of books and maps on whitewater rafting, hiking and Rocky Mountain field guides and everyone dressed in flannel, I don't know. I do know the coffee and muffins were fantastic, the service was friendly, and the atmosphere cozy enough to entice us to stay awhile. A few blocks away were the famous hot springs, believed by both Native Americans and present day citizens to be a source of healing. Of course these days it looks pretty much like a swimming pool you'd find in any suburban community center, only much bigger. We walked around town a bit and stayed just long enough to get a sense of the place, but it wasn't until we started to leave that I found a real treat. I saw a small sign that said, "Doc Holliday's Grave" and an arrow pointing into a quaint neighborhood.

"THE Doc Holliday!?" I gasped aloud.

"What's that?" Gerard asked. I explained as I made a hasty u-turn. A few minutes later we were at an unassuming and completely unremarkable trailhead at the back of the neighborhood at the base of a mountain. We climbed.

The trail was rocky and not maintained and it wound its way around the mountain, up and up, until we reached a small cemetery overgrown with weeds and juniper. We wandered through reading badly weathered tombstones dated as far back as the 1880's. Some were completely illegible and others had been toppled, but by weather or vandals I couldn't discern. And there, way in the back nestled between a large juniper and the edge of a precipice, stood a tall marble column bearing that old gunslinging dentist's name.

"Well I'll be damned," I said. A small plaque next to the marker explained that this was, in fact, not Holliday's exact resting place. Rather it was a memorial, since his exact resting place isn't known. It turns out he is indeed buried in the cemetery but in the early 20th century the cemetery records were lost and anyone buried prior to that time whose grave marker hadn't adequately withstood the test of time was now lost somewhere six feet beneath the juniper.

You may remember from high school history, or perhaps from the movie Tombstone, that Doc was involved in the legendary "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral," arguably the most famous gunfight of the American West. It all went down in Tombstone, Arizona where Doc, Wyatt Earp and others had their famous shootout with some of "The Cowboys," a band of outlaws. In fact, Earp later said of Holliday, "he was the most skillful gambler, and the nerviest, speediest, deadliest man with a gun I ever knew."

Doc suffered from tuberculosis, and five years later ended up in Glenwood Springs hoping the waters would ease his suffering. He died quietly in a hotel near there in 1887 at the age of 35. The hotel is now gone.

I stood up there on that mountain a long while, listening to the wind blow and looking out over that sleepy town. Somewhere just below my feet lay a true Legend of the American West. Doc Holliday. Wow. He was my age when he died. How times have changed.

It seemed so strange to me that such a legendary figure would not only be buried in an all but forgotten, neglected cemetery, but that even his grave site would be lost. In fact the only reason the memorial is there, as the plaque pointed out, was that the city thought they could make some tourism dollars by promoting his final resting place. But after thinking on it, I suppose it's a fitting end. He was a loner in life. He lived fast and hard and died a young legend. And now he's finally getting his long rest up there on that lonely mountain.

Lazy Saturday

I don't think I could ever live in the Pacific Northwest. When the weather is cold and wet I'm useless. The trend the last few weeks has tended toward gorgeous sunny weekdays followed invariably by cold wet weekends. Today is no exception. I've got just enough motivation to curl up on the sofa and take a nap. Don't get me wrong, I love days like this. We get precious few here on the Front Range. But I think if we had them all the time I'd spend most of my life sleeping.

What I really need is a good dose of hot, humid weather. I need one of those scorching August days in Texas when the sun is blinding and the heat takes your breath away. And just when I think I can't stand it any longer, to jump into Barton Springs or the San Marcos River.

Or maybe what I need is a stretch of white sandy beach, azure water and a warm salty breeze.

I've been yearning to travel lately. Someplace warm. I'm always like this in the spring. Even in Texas the weather often couldn't get warm fast enough for me in the spring. But the temperature isn't the only reason I long to roam. Spring in general makes me restless. Sometimes I just get the urge to strike out for a change of scenery and a little adventure.

I don't have any major vacation or travel plans (yet) for the summer but there are a few things on the schedule. I'm going to DC again for work this week, and I've got short recreational trips or work travel scheduled for Houston, Austin and San Diego in the next few months. I'm also going on our annual week-long backpacking trip in Colorado later in the summer. What I don't have on the list is a serious vacation. In my mind at this moment, that means two weeks lying on a tropical beach somewhere drinking pina coladas.

In other news, I'm going back to grad school this fall to finish up my MS in GIS. I've been in Colorado two and a half years and I feel like it's time to finish what I started. I'm excited about the program here. Right now I'm enrolled in a certificate program in Digital Design, which the lab is paying for. I've got so much cartography work these days I felt it would help me create higher quality, professional maps and other visuals to showcase my team's analytical work. It's also giving me a taste of being back in school while working and helping me ramp up for the workload coming this fall.

Maybe I need to treat myself to that tropical vacation this summer before things get crazy in the fall. Flights to Hawaii are pretty cheap right now.