LAS CRUCES, NM 9-22-2017 PART II

Somebody turned 70 years old today and it wasn’t me!  Birthday Boy wanted to travel out to White Sands.  We have been there before but it is a phenomenon that it is worth seeing again.  And again.

Birthday Boy

It looks like snow and it is blinding white.  But it isn’t snow, it is gypsum, that chalky stuff in drywall.  And it isn’t cold outside, it is actually hot in the sun!  They sell saucers in the gift shop and you can go sledding on the white hills.    Or you can stop at one of the picnic areas and have a cold brew.  This is how Birthday Boy wanted to spend his day.  Who am I to argue?

Yay!  I'm SEVENTY!

I can do this!

Birthday Boy!

Lindy and a saucer can do it, too!

Is this beautiful or what?!

White stuff up my shorts!  Oh yikes!  Does it itch?!

Have a beer at a shaded picnic table!

La Posta is a very old establishment and there were many of these a few hundred years ago.  They were built originally as “rest stops” for the King as he traveled about his kingdom and some of them also acted as mail drops.  The one in Mesilla, a small historic district in Las Cruces, has been a restaurant for decades.  They specialize in Spanish and Mexican food and in the lobby there are aquariums with colorful fish and cages where parrots entertain clientele.  The parrots imitated Rob’s chatter and laughter and danced when we sang rock and roll to them.  It was really funny.

C'mon, Polly!  "Rock and roll is here to stay!"

One of the aquariums at La Posta

On Saturday, we went to the center of town and walked many blocks where the farmers’ market is set up under shady canopies.  The artisans display their crops of vegetables (including pecans!) and many different kinds of art including photography, jewelry, basket making, music and the making of soaps, honey and oils.  There were vegetables that I didn’t recognize like different kinds of squash and maybe beans, and some I did recognize but I don’t know how to cook.  Rob was very happy to find that a chef had brought a wood fired pizza oven to the affair!  Naturally, he had to order one of these, what else?!  There was even a cattle man who was hawking his beef, pork and lamb.  “We would like two grass-fed rib eyes, please.”  “Oh no!  I am fresh out of rib eyes.”  “That’s OK.  We’ll have a bunch of lamb chops.”  “Gosh, I am sold out of lamb chops.”  “That’s OK, then.  How about a pound of hamburger?”  Well, bingo, we acquired a pound of hamburger right off the hoof, the best we could do and as lean as can be.  (I hope it wasn’t a chunk of Bessie.)

This is our fifth night in Las Cruces and I will feel sad to leave in the morning.  We will enjoy one last night on the cliff overlooking the city lights sitting under the twinkling stars.  Next stop:  Tucson.

LAS CRUCES, NM 9-21-2017 PART I

First, we are at about 4,400 feet elevation so we can sleep with all the windows open.  Second, this is the place to pick up lots of pecans for the Christmas season.  Third, dinner at La Posta.  We love it here.  Our longest stay so far, five nights!

Our favorite KOA on the cliff

We are camped at our favorite, quiet KOA way up high on the edge of a cliff that overlooks the city, which is framed by mountains on the horizon.  During the day, bunnies, squirrels, roadrunners and hummingbirds are busy, busy, busy.  In the evening, after el sol dips behind the horizon, the city lights illuminate and sparkle like glitter and a bazillion stars twinkle over head.  It is like sitting on the branch of a God-size Christmas tree.  It is tranquilizing and hypnotic.

View of the city framed by
the Organ Peak Mountains

Five years ago, we stopped here for a few very hot August days because they have a swimming pool.  Unfortunately, the pool was closed for renovation.  At that point, the government stepped in.  “You can’t do this, you can’t do that, we can’t grandfather you.”  Then, the inspectors were “too busy” and couldn’t keep their appointments to stamp things off.  This went on all summer.  Unanswered phone calls.  Canceled appointments.  The sign on the gate to the pool said, “Please help us.  Call the Governor.”  That was all I needed.  Call the governor, indeed.  Leave a message and they’ll hit “delete.”  I’ll WRITE to the governor (who, by the way, was conservative Susannah Martinez).  She wrote back!  She said she would help and I should hear something from someone “in the near future.”  I wrote back to her.  “Not only did I not hear from anyone in the near future, I didn’t even hear from anyone in the FAR future.  A small business is trying to make a living and feed a family and they have had no income for an entire season thanks to government red tape.”  Then, heads rolled.  The Governor got the parties involved off of their government asses and the pool was once again open for business.  The elated KOA owners, Chris and Tony, sent me a tin of pecans and offered me a free night if I were ever back in town.  I sent Governor Susannah a thank you note (she is still the governor, by the way).  Five years later, we are closing the loop on the last day of the summer season!

Victory lap for Lindy!  Yay, the
citizens won one!

As you may recall, Col. Edward Hatch was the commander of the 9^th Regiment, the Buffalo Soldiers, at Fort Stockton.  The town of Hatch, NM is named for him.  We drove there today to investigate the haps.  Mostly, they specialize in every kind of pepper imaginable.  Red, yellow, green, mild to hotter than hell!  Nothing has changed and you can’t get a beer or a margarita anywhere in Hatch, fyi.  Along the 25 miles of road were endless pecan orchards and they are often flooded.  The trees look like they are growing in lakes.  (I didn’t see any alligators.) 

So far, no alligators in the
pecan orchards.... 

The government, once again not one to keep its nose out of things, has begun regulating water in NM.  The pecan farmers are allowed so many acre-feet of water per month.  They flood the trees when they can and the thirsty trees drink it quickly.  Harvest season is late in the fall but I will try to get my hands on a few pounds of pecans at the farmer’s market while we are in pecan country.

Poor Bessie... she doesn't know how painfully
fatal it would be if she DIDN'T get milked!

Admittedly, we are getting a little museum’d out but it was suggested that we visit the New Mexico Farm and Ranch Heritage Museum.  Successful farming and ranching in this area involved the building of Elephant Butte Dam.  It took 4 years to build during the FDR days and created an enormous reservoir on the Rio Grande.  The museum is interactive in many ways and you can visit a lot of livestock.  Rob and I were there in time to watch the stockman milk Bessie using the most modern equipment.  Bessie was cool because she got treats while all of this was going on.  I think she felt sheepish. 

You think BESSIE feels sheepish!

There are a lot of interesting exhibits on the animal farm and it was fun!  (Speaking of animals, the larger roadrunner by a few inches is here up on the cliff.)

Las Cruces roadrunner

FORT STOCKTON, TX 9-19-2017

We are camped at Hilltop RV Park overlooking our kingdom from 3,100 feet.  When we first checked in, the sky to the west was evil-looking, like a black atom bomb was going off.  Jim, the proprietor, told us not to worry, those storms never hit his park.  And indeed, it did not.  Leaving ten raindrops behind, the storm said, “Adios” and continued on its way south and east.  Instead, a refreshing, cool breeze swept across our camp offering relief from the heat and humidity of recent weeks.

Don't fly into this.

Sculpture up on the hill in
Fort Stockton

Settlers traveling west to Mexico and California in the transportation-du-jour, horses, wagons and stage coaches, came upon two things here:  hostile Indians and a refreshing water supply at Comanche Springs.  A line of defense to protect pioneers from Indian violence was established and Fort Stockton was one of these.  This was in 1858.  However, this original post slightly south of the current town, was abandoned at the onset of the Civil War.  Two years after the Civil War was ended, Col. Edward Hatch re-established Fort Stockton at its current location and it was occupied by the 9^th Cavalry regiment.  Col. Hatch was a white guy but his soldiers were black, those were the rules back then.  Newly-freed black men were searching for security and stable jobs and the military was one way to obtain both.  The Indians were bemused by the appearance of the black soldiers and called them, “Buffalo Soldiers,” because their dark skin color and tight curly hair was, in their minds, reminiscent of the head of the buffalo.  The Buffalo Soldiers proved themselves with discipline, courage and bravery and made their mark upon history.  By the 1880s, the threat from the Comanche Indians had faded and Fort Stockton was abandoned in 1886.  Three of the original officers’ quarters and the original guard house still stand and some other buildings have been reconstructed on the original foundations, including the kitchen and a barracks.

Guard house - Fort Stockton

Rob in the barracks at Ft. Stockton

Annie Riggs and her piano

Limestone quarried from the nearby hills and adobe bricks (baked grass and mud) were the primary construction materials in the 1800s.  The historic buildings in Fort Stockton that were built from these two materials have withstood the tests of weather and time.  One of these is the Riggs Hotel.  Eight year old Annie Frazier, her dad and mom and six siblings traveled west, arrived and settled in this area in the mid-1800s.  Annie was an independent little wench.  She married a guy named James Johnson and had six kids with him but that union didn’t suit her.  She divorced him, something that was almost unheard of in those days, a pioneer in more ways than one.  Later, she married Barney Riggs and had four kids with him.  That marriage and relationship didn’t go so well, either and Annie divorced him, too.  He was a troublesome person and got himself shot and died without a will so Annie got the estate.  With it, she purchased and fixed up the Koehler Hotel (the cost was $4,750) and opened for business.  She was a shrewd businesswoman and ran a tight ship and they said if you got out of line, she just happened to be packing under her pretty apron.  Don’t piss the lady off, that’s what I’m sayin!’  The 13-room hotel was a big success because it was safe and comfortable.  Cooler than most buildings, it had two-foot thick adobe walls, 14-foot high ceilings and had been built on a piece of higher ground.  The screen doors to the rooms opened out onto a porch of wood planks that surrounded a pretty interior courtyard.  Annie did a lot of the work around the hotel and most of the cooking.  Many of the furnishings (her piano, for example, and an iron bed frame she had purchased in 1900) and the kitchen utensils and implements on display were hers:  the wood stove, a clothes iron, a waffle iron, toaster, butter churn and ice cream maker, among other things.

Reception desk at the Riggs Hotel

Annie bought this electric stove
in 1922.  It still works.

Courtyard at the Riggs Hotel

Rob at the Riggs Hotel

You may want to have your picture taken beside the (second) biggest roadrunner in the world in Fort Stockton.  It used to be the biggest but somebody built one a few inches taller just recently in Las Cruces, NM.  Some people have too much time on their hands.  Anyway, I’ve learned as much as I can about Fort Stockton.  Wednesday, September 20, we move along to Las Cruces.

Lindy likes roadrunners!

Roadrunners like Roberto!

FREDERICKSBURG, TX 9-16-2016

People hunger to be free.  “Don’t fence me in!  Leave me alone!”  Thousands of freedom-starved folks arrived in the United States in the 1800s, many of them scattering from the gulf shore by oxen- and horse-drawn wagons, some on foot pulling two-wheel carts, some traveling up the rivers by boat.  They found wide open land on which to farm, raise crops and raise their families and they would know just the right place when they saw it.  Fredericksburg is such a place.  German immigrants settled here and created a tight-knit community and it is still thick with German influence.  If you can’t find it here, German bread and pastries, lederhosen, Christmas decorations, wine, beer, wienerschnitzel or anything else Deutsch, you are going to have to fly to Germany.

The new settlers weren’t the only ones yearning to be free.  The Indians sought freedom of a different kind:  they wanted their land to be free of invading settlers.  Encouraged by government bureaucrats out east who wanted folks to move out to the wild woolies and establish settlements, a long string of military forts were built and populated by soldiers to protect the newcomers. 

Fort Martin Scott entry

Post Commander's quarters (replica)

Ft. Martin Scott jailhouse (original building)

A few artifacts that were part of Fort Martin Scott still stand just east of Fredericksburg.  The lone original building is the jail house.  Soldiers with not much to do our in the middle of nowhere were bound to dig up a little mischief and get in trouble.  Punishments were brutal for enlisted men and included lashes with a leather whip, branding (a 2” letter “D” on the hip for drunkenness), hard labor in iron shackles, court martial and dishonorable discharge.

In the future, if someone says, “Fredericksburg,” white limestone buildings will spring to my mind.  The supply of this particular stone was apparently boundless and the immigrants of the early 1800s employed it and mortar to construct every building in town.  Thick walls kept the heat out in the blazing summer heat and maintained the warmth of the fire in the cold months.  John Tatsch, a cabinetmaker, built his home with 2-feet thick walls and a massive fireplace, 13 feet wide.  Other homes in the town are called “Sunday houses.”  Farmers and ranchers worked the land far from town but on Saturday, they came in to trade and buy supplies.  Rather than return to the farm and come in again on Sunday to attend church services, they built tiny “Sunday houses” and spent Saturday night in town.  Saturday nights could probably get a little rowdy, and so of course, no town would be complete without a jail.  The old limestone buildings are so sturdy that many of them are still in use today.  What a beautiful town thick with history.

Fredericksburg library

Bank of Fredericksburg

Jailhouse

North of town by about 20 miles, a geological phenomenon, “Enchanted Rock,” rises from the earth.  The surfaces continue to evolve, shift and erode over time leaving some areas bald and other areas sere and cracked.  Chunks slide downhill.  We tried to make it to the top, from which you can see much of Texas, they say, but the heat and humidity were overwhelming.  The younger ones were running up and down against the clock and packing repelling gear.  For us, that ship sailed a long time ago.  We learned that Enchanted Rock is all one piece and only the tip of it is showing.  (How do they know this?)  Beneath the earth’s crust lies the rest of this one rock, probably the size of Pluto (not the dog).  How much does it weigh?  Rob’s running the numbers, stand by.

Enchanted Rock

Sliding downhill - won't be long, now!

Sliding and scraping

That little brown spot is what we see,
above ground.  The green area is below.

Admiral Chester Nimitz, who signed the WWII Japanese surrender documents aboard the SS Missouri, was born and raised in Fredericksburg.  The building where he was born is an historic landmark.  His grandpa owned a hotel which is now the National Museum of the Pacific War, also the Home of the Adm. Nimitz Museum.  The Japanese used two-man subs before the Pearl Harbor attack intending to distract our military from the air raid.  We blew up several of these subs, one at the entry to our shipyard.  The one on display at the Nimitz Museum was captured when it ran aground due to a malfunctioning navigation system, no doubt made in Japan.

Grampa and Chester Nimitz

Chester and me

Two-man Japanese sub recovered
at Pearl Harbor

Well, no visit to an authentic German town would be complete without wienerschnitzel, rouladen, spätzle and cold brews.  And an order of apfelkuchen to go with tomorrow’s morning coffee.  Auf wiedersehn! 

At the Old German Bakery,
Rob gets his wienerschnitzel fix!

At the Old German Bakery-auf wiedersehn for now!

WACO, TX 9-14-2017

 Bee is running ahead of the storms and keeping us high and dry.  The love bugs welcomed us into Shreveport and waved good-bye as we left.  Good bye love bugs, just like that.  Apparently, they like hanging around in Shreveport, LA.  Chiggers hang around in Texas and they like to nip at your ankles.

Hi to Lindy and Rob from Mark!

Bee among the old beautiful trees
at North Crest RV Park

It is cooling down and there is a wonderful cool breeze.  Fall is in the air.  The sky is blue from one edge to the other over North Crest RV Park, an older park with lots of big elm and oak trees.  They are dropping their yellow leaves and the breeze swirls them around my feet.  Acorns plink onto our rooftop, tick tock, like an old grandfather clock keeping time.  Then the squirrels get into the act and play a little basketball with the acorns.  Thump, thump, thump.  And he scores!  Thumpity thump!  It is a fine time of year and a fine, quiet, tranquil, forested rv park.  If you are ever in Waco, Texas, stay here.  Mark (and you) will be happy you did!

Waco derives its name from a local Indian tribe and the town is considered the heart of Texas.  The Chisolm and Shawnee Trails passed through Waco and the Brazos River passes right through downtown.  Over the decades, cowboys drove millions of head of cattle along these trails heading to the northern markets.  Now, it is a big, busy city with a population of over 130,000 but there are still a number of old landmarks.  Among these is the old suspension bridge built in 1870, the first to span the Brazos River and upon which the cattle were driven.  An old cemetery is now an historic landmark with weather-worn stones the oldest of which we found was a person who died in 1813. 

 On a current note, we found Buzzard Billy’s, a restaurant with seating on the river.  It is famous for Cajun food such as catfish po’boys, jambalaya, gumbo, smoked black eye peas and the great Southern specialty, bread pudding containing pecans, walnuts and raisins and smothered in warm brandy sauce.  Of course, we ordered this to go so we could enjoy it with our coffee the next morning.

Morning has arrived.  Bread pudding and coffee are served on our patio among the leaves, trees and squirrels.  We had learned that there is an incredible sculpture on the west side of the Brazos River along the Riverwalk.  We were packing up and preparing to depart this morning when we realized that we had not seen this work of art.  We took a special trip back into town.  We are so happy we did this.  The sculpture, titled, “Branding the Brazos,” created by Robert Summers, is about a block long and is really a grouping of huge bronze sculptures.  Three cowboys drive a herd of 25 longhorns through the park near the original 1870 suspension bridge.  The enormity of this project took both of us by surprise and we stood and stared!  Here is a monument which must be seen!  How in the world do people dream up these ideas and then realize them?  It took the artist years to create this, understandably, and it was a big deal when the final sculptures were put into place.  I am deeply humbled by this artist and his work. 

Rob and the longhorns

Rob among the herd

Through the park

Lindy among the herd

Beautiful sculpture by Robert Summers

It is a short drive (maybe 200 miles or so) to Fredericksburg, TX.  For tonight, we will settle in and relax with a toonie in the pretty sunset.  Fredericksburg is populated by a pantload of Krauts.  Enough Cajun and Creole, let’s move on to bratwurst and sauerkraut; eine, swei, gsuffa!