We Revisit Our National Park Crusade

A Texas Panhandle Panorama

So, after a year and a half of dealing with COVID and the massive cleanup after the Hurricane Ida, we are traveling again. But nothing overseas, it’s all stateside.There are just too many hoops to jump through to do travel abroad! Fortunately, former President Trump gave us a reason to continue our crusade of visiting all the national parks. We had visited all of the national parks prior to his presidency. But he elevated three park service units to national park status towards the end of his term.We had visited two of these parks, New River Gorge National Park in West Virginia and Indiana Dunes National Park on the shores of Lake Michigan, after a visit to Capt. Larry’s aunt in New Hampshire to celebrate her 100^th birthday. Unfortunately, we didn’t blog the visits to these national parks. But now we’e on #62, the final national park, and the former White Sands National Monument in New Mexico.

A Texan Welcome Sign!

We left our home in Killian, Louisiana, and drove the long and boring Louisiana I-49 corridor to Texarkana, TX, where we spent the night. An early start the next morning, we headed for Amarillo, TX, another full day’s drive.

A Beaut of a Butte

Following a route that took us along the Red River and through “Texoma,” we found this drive really interesting as Texans in this part of the state are really into cattle, horses, oil/gas wells and cotton fields. The changes in landscape from hilly country to Texas flatlands was really interesting, but the thing that impressed us the most was the incessant and strong blowing of the wind.

Got Tires? Need a Windbreak?

In this part of the country, we quickly learned that you only open one car door at a time! We saw several windfarms and windmills harness this wind power to generate electricity and pump water for cattle. We found a motel in Amarillo, but were unable to secure reservations for Taos, New Mexico where we had hoped to spend the weekend.

Another National Monument

We finally did find a weekend room in nearby Eagle’s Nest, about 31 miles of mountain driving away. Following back roads through the Texas Panhandle and heavily irrigated farmland country, we crossed over into New Mexico at Texline, TX. We got lost in Clayton (how you get lost in a 3-stoplight town is definitely concerning!) and continued on through the New Mexican low lands. As we were driving, we saw a National Park Service sign that we were approaching the Capulin Volcano National Monument. Not knowing anything about this monument, we decided to stop. This monument is a well-preserved, relatively young (55,000 to 62,000 years old), symmetrical cinder cone rising steeply from the surrounding grassland plains to an elevation of 8,182 feet above sea level.

The Palisades

The irregular rim of the crater is about a mile in circumference and the crater is about 400 feet deep. It is part of the 8,000 mi.² Clayton-Raton volcanic field.

Continuing on, we met the Rocky Mountains and Cimarron, NM. From here, the 30-odd mile drive through the windblown canyons became our next driving challenge. It was early afternoon when we arrived in Eagles Nest, so we checked into our motel and decided to do another 30+ mile canyon ride to Taos.

Colorful Aspens from Our Motel

Upon entering Taos, we immediately started to get bad vibes about this tourist attraction. Starting with the traffic, (which explains why we couldn’t find any motel rooms here) we crawled through the streets and finally spotted some parking spaces next to a restaurant that was highly recommended by our Eagles Nest motel manager.

¡No Hay Comida Hoy!

We got parked and as we approached the restaurant an employee was locking the door and said “Sorry, we’re closed.” It was 2 PM! We decided to walk around a square looking for another restaurant and shops for Jane. We were hungry and found the Alley Cantina after passing two other restaurants that were also closed. The Alley Cantina proffered a menu of Tex-Mex offerings which we enjoy. Capt. Larry ordered a beer that turned out costing $8.50 with a $5 beer for Jane. The Carne Avodado that we each ordered along with a Caesar salad (never had Tex-Mex with a Caesar salad which should have been a warning!) arrived on the same plate, and we quickly learned that Carne Avodado was Spanish for "Mexican gristle-meat" in a red chili sauce. We were so disappointed.

The Village Square

We paid our bill and went looking for some shops for Jane, but she was disappointed in that she was looking for shops with handmade arts and crafts and not factory-produced-in-China goods. And neither of us are into Mexican/New Mexican/Indian art and decor. We were also disappointed in the overdone Adobe architecture that pervades the town. It just had a certain degree of “fakeness” to it. So, we found our minivan and headed back to Eagles Nest, hoping that we could find some other fun things to do tomorrow. We went to bed disappointed that the overcast skies would not let us stargaze in this dimly lit place, but were thrilled at the howling of several packs of coyotes in the nearby hills.

 

¡Están Muy Calientes!