5/22/11- White Sands National Monument, White Sands, AZ.

 

 

Leaving Carlsbad was nearly as exciting as entering it- flat dusty roads surrounded by expanses of dry dusty earth so vast that the wind would try to drive the Jeep for me. Eventually, though, we wound our way up through the canyon and exited a pass on the other side of the mountains only to be faced with yet another vast expanse of desert. On the distant horizon, you could barely make out the thin dark ridge of another looming mountain range, and beyond it, a third. Like parallel cut canals, the ridges seemed like fences keeping wild herds of dust devils separated from one another.

The last of these mountain ranges we climbed through brought us our first taste of the high alpine environment. Before we knew what hit us, we were over 7,000 feet above sea level, and were noticing the first few Aspen trees mixed into the tall pines around us. The nearby construction of new ski lifts and signs for an ice rink seemed strangely out of place so close to such a hot dry place as White Sands Arizona.

As we emerged from the pine trees, we could see another desolate basin before us, and in the distance, the thin white line of the pure white sand-dunes in the park. This valley (very similar to Roswell) was loaded with outer space/ alien themed gas stations and “museums” as this particular stretch of desert was home to a couple of U.S. Air Force bases  and the majority of the U.S. missile testing & firing ranges. At the entrance of White Sands National Monument as we paid for our campsite for the night, the ranger reviewed a number of potentially dangerous pieces of missile shrapnel that we should be careful not to disturb should we encounter them.

White Sands Monument deserves all the attention it gets for being one of the most truly alien environments on earth. Mile after square mile of pure white gypsum sand  with so little to differentiate one dune from the next that even with a compass, backcountry enthusiasts need be wary of becoming disoriented and lost. Since there was no available car camping (or water) inside the park, we were happy to break out the backpacks and light weight camping gear for the 1mile+ hike to our campsite. Unfortunately, the hard packed sandy patch at the base of a nearly 70 foot tall sand dune felt like concrete to those of us using only thin foam sleeping pads.

5/21/11- Miami, AZ

We made it to Carlsbad Caverns with little trouble- after discovering that much of Texas lives up to my father’s descriptions of roads so flat and straight that you could almost tie the steering wheel in place and go take a nap. The visitor’s center for the main caverns is built on the top of the Guadalupe mountain range which juts up out of the barren landscape of the New Mexico desert. To reach the visitors center the park road winds you through a steep and rocky gorge that goes up for miles. The main visitor’s entrance to the caves is via an elevator shaft that was carved straight through the rock- 756 feet straight down. It was completed in the 1930’s as a part of the “New Deal” and is still in use today. The main caverns were enormous with hundreds of formations illuminated by electric lights. Similar to the Lauray caverns in Pennsylvania, but at another scale entirely- the damp, handrail-lined path winds through the main caverns for miles!

Once we arrived and found out where we would have to go to camp for the night, we caught the last elevator trip down into the caverns and proceeded to wind our way through the stunning darkness. After returning to the surface, we made our way over to the ampitheater where the bat-flight show usually takes place at the natural entrance to the cave. Typically, twice daily over 10,000 Mexican Free-Tailed Bats would depart from the cave in a dense cloud to gorge themselves on insects- consuming as much as half their body weight before dawn. To our great disappointment, the mighty swarm of bats was barely perceptible. The area surrounding the caverns that typically supplies the insects for the bat population had been devoid of rain since last September, and resident bat population had moved on. Very tired, we left the park and found our pull-off on the side of a service road on the nearby Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands.

Fortunately, we were able to secure tickets on the next day’s special guided tour of the Slaughter Canyon Cave. As we woke up and began making breakfast on the dusty dry ground, I pointed out that a Javelina (a native type of wild pigboar) had emerged from the scrub about 100 yards downwind of us to enjoy the first rays of sunshine. As Sam saw him, she promptly jumped into the car and closed the door fearing that similarly to recent television shows that he would charge directly at us- while I tried to capture a picture of him. He left us alone, however, and continued his trip into taller brush. We were also visited by tiny armored train- a millipede decided to make his way through our camp as we were packing up. We drove to the nearby canyon and booked it to the cave entrance and were the last people to arrive.  As we descended into the cave, everyone in the group noticed immediately how much more exciting and mysterious it could be when all you could see was the part of the cave illuminated by your flashlight.

Thankfully we were well prepared having both a headlamp and a powerfull flashlight each. My new dive-light proved to be more of a light cannon than a flashlight, allowing us to see parts of the cave far into the gloom. As we wound our way deeper into the caverns, we took a break near the feature known as “The Monarch,” which is the third largest column formation in the world- extending from floor to ceiling over 93 feet tall. While we rested we took a moment to turn out all the lights and allow our eyes to adjust completely to the darkness. After a few minutes the ranger showed us what it was like for the first cave explorers who saw the cave by candle light. We were also shown how calcite- the material that most all of the cave formations were made of- would glow for a while after being “charged up” by a bright light.

                Our caving adventures completed, it was time to move on to the next stop- White Sands National Monument, another 5 hour drive away.

5/20/11- Fort Worth, Texas

Over the next 2 days, we spent our time in Fort Worth, gaping at the Kimbell art museum and the Fort Worth Modern Museum of Art, paying homage to their architects- Lois Kahn and Tadao Ando. Although both buildings are wonderful, Ando’s ‘museum on the water,’ was no match for the Kimbell. The Kimbell possessed such refined details in its design, its simple parti, legible rhythms, and most strikingly, its modest sale. Perhaps the most interesting thing I found there aside from the building was the original- The Torment of Saint Anthony, believed to be the first known painting from Michelangelo dating back to 1487-88. The content of the painting seemed to differ so wildly from the early portraits and landscapes that told the story of Europe so many many years ago. It's colors and detail left a lasting impression on me even though the painting itself wasn't much bigger than a sheet of printer paper. 
In stark contrast to the intimate corridors at the Kimbell, the size of the Modern seemed almost excessive and vault-like. Modern art has always pushed its boundaries, leaving most people arguing that an entire canvas painted white is not art. In such a place, keeping an open mind is key and I still feel that- like in design- the value lies in the impact it has on the viewer. The building itself was an impressive mass of concrete, glass, and steel that all seemed to float on its pond; an oasis in the bustling urban center of Fort Worth.
That night we stayed with some distant relatives of mine- my Great Aunt Mildred and Great Uncle Frank and their children and grandchildren whom I had never met. Excited to see us, we were welcomed with an unusual dish known as "Eggs Aspic" and some welcome time to relax before the big family dinner.

On the second day in town, we chanced into a tourist information center with a very outgoing clerk who managed to point us to a place in downtown Fort Worth where the main drag had maintained its wild west legacy to a theme park degree. We parked and changed into our cowboy/cowgirl finest (hiking boots and straw hats had to suffice, and ogled all of the beautifully wrought leather cowboy boots. Unfortunately all of which were well out of our price range- ($150 to $10,000.) Although the daily cattle drive through the streets was cancelled due to a wild thunderstorm, we had tickets to see the Friday night rodeo at the Stockyards, the oldest indoor rodeo in the world!

The rodeo was relatively small, but we didn’t know the difference, as it was our first one. Sam had seen barrel racing before, but the bull riding and roping competitions were new to both of us. The horses were beautiful in their purpose; strong, smart, and sturdy-not like the thoroughbred racing horses that we see on TV. The bulls were enormous and powerful, not to mention angry and confused. The combined smells of dirt, beer, and shit were a potent reminder that we were on the edge of cattle country. The rodeo was informal, loud, and clearly a community-based event. It was easy to imagine many high school teens taking their girlfriends to the rodeo as tickets were cheap and there was one held every Friday and Saturday night. Along with the bull riding, barrel racing, and roping, intermission events invited young children in the crowd to enter the arena for some friendly competition. A small calf was released into the arena with a ribbon tied to its tail when the screaming herd of children was unleashed on the terrified animal, trying to capture its ribbon.

As if that wasn’t funny enough, during the next break, the invitation came for ladies 18 and over to volunteer for some unknown competition. Thankfully, I was able to convince Sam to volunteer by force, and she was quickly chosen to join the festivities in front of a few hundred strangers.  Having no idea what the competition involved, I was confident that she would out compete anybody else in the arena as she usually did. This was the beginning of trouble, but I didn’t know just how much. When she entered the arena, the announcer told the ladies that there was to be a dance off. At this point, I could feel the hole being burned into my head from my seat in the front row. When the music started, she danced to win-playing air guitar with her leg and doing the sprinkler all the while tripping over dirt clods. Then, claiming that the girls were all being too self-conscious, they blindfolded them and had them dance again. As she danced, they pulled the other girls out of the arena one by one until she was the only one left. Then, a “tie” was announced between her and another girl. Blindfolded and unaware that she was the only one left, she proceeded to dance through the tie breaker round AND the “sudden-death” tie breaker round that followed. When it was announced that she had won and she pulled the blindfold off to realize that she was the only one, I received a polite tap on the shoulder and the friendly advice that I had better start running.  While she made her way back to her seat, I was halfway to the door trying to think of what I could bring her back to make up for the prize she didn’t receive for the dance-off.  The giant beer I bought her managed to reduce my sentence to a swiftly bruised shoulder- but the fact remains that as in all things, my baby has no business in second place and I have the video to prove it!

We leave at 6 am tomorrow for Carlsbad caverns- a 9 hour drive. Here comes the desert…

5/18/11- Charlotte NC to Fort Worth TX

Finally, after months of preparation, the great American road trip has begun!

After starting with a page of destinations made up of places my girlfriend and I have always wanted to see, and places suggested by friends, family, and complete strangers, we plotted them all onto a map of the United States. Then we played road-trip connect the dots until we could decide on a line through them narrowing down our endless list of destinations to a manageable little track through about 17 states about 7500 miles long, focusing mainly on about 7 states in the southwest and Rockies.

Crossing the Mississippi River in Vicksburg

Kicking off the trip at 5am on May 18^th, we drove from Woodleaf NC where my girlfriend’s parents live, through South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and stopping in Dallas, Texas at 1am on the 19th. Our hope was to reach the meat and potatoes of our trip as quickly as possible- giving us more time to spend in whatever we deemed as the coolest places on the trip.

Not surprisingly to those who have done a large amount of driving, but most of the interstate looked the same from Charlotte all the way until we crossed the Mississippi where the terrain began to flatten out. Nearly the entire road could be summed up as a wall of trees on either side of the road, a green median, and the occasional unfortunate flat critter.
Crossing the mighty Mississippi was the first moment when I truly felt like I was leaving my home- the South, and she had pulled out all the stops for the occasion. We were crossing the river near the town of Vicksburg, on I-20 and I found myself in awe that a river so wide could still rage underneath the bridge as if it were a mountain stream tumbling downhill at a breakneck pace. Because of the recent flooding, tree tops on what we could only assume were her banks looked like bushes, telephone poles were barely visible above the water on either bank, and for nearly a mile on the far side, the “elevated” highway looked more like a “floating” highway.

Some of the flooded farmlands west of the Mississippi

From the Mississippi to Dallas, there was little help in the way of exciting landscapes to keep us alert. Loud music, frequent breaks, and snacking sustained us the rest of the way to Dallas. A car is a car and I would stack my Jeep among the best of them, but no human was meant to sit in one comfortably for 19 hours. Thankfully somewhere in the midst of the spaghetti tangled interchanges that make up Dallas and Fort Worth, we found my cousins house where we had a comfortable bed to stretch out on for the night. Needless to say, sleep came easily tonight.