Day: 9
RV Miles: 1,448
Location: Alamogordo, NM
Elevation: 4,214
Before I tell you about today’s happenings, I have to catch you up on a few things that will be relevant later on. First, I need to tell you about Sasha’s pre-occupation with stones. At home, individual stones are rather rare and when Sasha finds one she gets so full of herself with her special discovery she starts prancing around like she is something special while clicking the stone in her teeth so you know she has one. This is normally followed by Larry or Marsha chasing her butt all over hell’s half-acre so as to catch her and take the stone away from her.
Out here, grass is rare, trees are rarer and stones are everywhere. The first time I took Larry and Sasha on patrol (a walk) I took them straight to a GRAVEL road. I suspected Sasha would go into a glorious meltdown of glee in having found all of those stones. Sure enough, as soon as we had reached her field of dreams she reached down and grabbed not one but two or three stones and started rattling them in her teeth. (Didn’t I tell you this brat was going to be trouble?) She was barely though her first prance-step when she stopped dead in her tracks and looked around. She was surrounded by stones, anyone could be knee-deep in stones if they so desired. Then the realization hit her that stones were no longer special and styling over having found one would make you look really really stupid, so she spit the stones out and walked on like nothing happened. Since then she has taken up picking up twigs and leaves – something actually rare in these parts.
Next, you might want to know that Marsha purchased a walking stick. Those of you who know Marsha know she picked one that was pretty and not necessarily functional. It was pretty and long enough there was only one way to put it in the car without it being in everyone’s way. It took Larry about 5 minutes to figure it out – it goes in like a Chinese cipher and you have to know the combination to get it out.
Next subject – I think in some of the pictures you have seen Marsha’s new sun hat. Such things are necessary for humans in this desert sun, but . . . Marsha picked a hat that was pretty, not necessarily functional especially in this New Mexico wind. (The locals refer to the 20 to 30 MPH winds as the desert breeze.) Well when Marsha has this hat on she has more sail area than the flying nun – the brim is either flapped down in front of her eyes so she can’t see or is trying to blow off her head – and the chin strap doesn’t help. Just park these last two thoughts for a while, while I tell you what we did today.
Now that we are on the West side of the Sacramento Mountains here in Alamogordo the temperature seems a little lower (today’s high was about 90) and the humidity seems lower (about 3%). This makes things quite pleasant if you stay in the shade. Which is what I wanted to do so I could catch up on my naptime.
Larry and Marsha had different ideas. We all piled into the car and headed up toward White Mountain to a little town called Cloudcroft up at an elevation of about 8500 feet.
Cloudcroft is a neat little burg that registers at least 7 or 8 on the quaint meter with all kinds of interesting shops – sorta like Nashville, Indiana. We stopped there and I took Larry and Sasha on patrol while Marsha went grazing through the shops. The change in altitude lowered the temperature a good 15 degrees and it was nice and pleasant up there near the clouds.
Continuing our journey, we drove North though some spectacular alpine vistas in the Sacramento Mountains and finally joined up with what is known as the Billy the Kid trail. We are now in Lincoln County site of the Lincoln War, which made Billy the Kid famous. Once on the trail we headed West again to the gravesite of Smokey the Bear. From there we kept going West until we got to the Valley of Fire.
The Valley of Fire, a National Recreation Area, is located on a huge and very young lava field stuck right out in the middle of the desert. We decided to take one of the trails that would let us walk right out over the lava field. Here is where things got interesting.
Marsha donned her pretty hat and walked around to the rear of the car to get her pretty walking stick. Try as she might, the walking stick, despite its beauty, would not come out of the car. Part of the problem was she didn’t know the combination and the other part of the problem was that the desert breeze was having all kinds of fun with her hat. Without a word, Larry did something very stupid and dangerous, he – trying to be helpful – reached in and deftly retrieved her very pretty walking stick just has her very pretty hat brim flapped down over her eyes.
When Marsha pulled the hat brim back up off her face, the look on that face told the world that a much-feared Very-Special-Marsha-Meltdown was pending. Larry, being none too bright asked, “Is something wrong?”
Except for the wind, his question was met with a very long ominous silence until Marsh replied, “I don’t know whether to wear this hat or leave it.”
“Well if it is bothering you, just leave it here,” replied Larry. At which time, Marsha immediately turned and marched off toward the trail: One hand on her hat; one hand on her walking stick and my lead in the other hand. Needless to say, she had her hands full.
The trail was interesting but uneventful unless you count the fact that Sasha whimped out about half way through the hike. See the picture. The sun was quite hot and the walk quite long and “Princess Sasha” decided she had had enough, found a spot of shade, petulantly lay down, and refused to move. For a while, I was afraid Larry was going to have to carry her back to the car. I told you that little brat was going to be a hand full.
All in all, it was a really nice day – unless you count the female problems.
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