Days 6, 7 – Carlsbad (Caverns), Roswell (UFOs!), Artesia (home-made “gorditas” and tamales), and Albuquerque (car repair), NM.

Yesterday (Monday) was a better than a good day. Any day when I can “DQ” (Dairy Queen) not just once, but twice (!) gets a gold star. There is better ice-cream and gourmet flavors aplenty elsewhere, but nothing beats a simple cone of soft vanilla, with the signature swirl on top, to take me back forty years to when my first house in America was two blocks from the local franchise. A cone was a dime then….

The first one yesterday was at a DQ just off I-20 at the exit for Baird,Tx after two hours of visual monotony: mile after mile of a pencil-straight road bordered by table-top-flat farm land. Aside from the slight side-motion of the car, buffetted by an unrelenting cross-wind, the only other distraction was the steady impact of insects on the wind-shield. (After a while, I amused myself by trying to predict the next spot and what the “connect-the-splats” would produce in outline. It looked something close to Lincoln’s profile at one point.)

The DQs here have a full fast-food menu and this one was no exception. The chicken fingers were tender, freshly made, the portion-size generous, and my order brought to the table. It also came with a slice of toast (??) in addition to the fries. And, along the lines of “you know you’re in Texas when…”, my small drink was a 24 oz. (!!) cup. (You also know you’re in Texas when the predominant road-kill is armadillos and turtles.)

I arrived in Carlsbad in the late afternoon, my destination an Econolodge on the south side of town. It had been my intention to spend two nights, exploring Carlsbad Caverns National Park today (Tue.), including the tours requiring head-lamps and knee pads. However, replacing the burned out headlight bulb was a priority and the nearest Porsche dealership along my route was in Albuquerque, with their service department requiring the car for a few hours. (I decided to also get an early oil change as long as it was at a dealer.) Thankfully, re-shuffling things on the way from Carlsbad to Roswell and Albuquerque, was fairly easy to do and still allowed for a morning at the Caverns.

The Caverns. By getting there as the park opened at 8:30 am, I was among the first dozen to take the self-guided “Natural Entrance” tour, which is a 750 ft descent over a mile and a half into the bowels of the main cave. (And, by being the youngest – by far – or, at least, the fastest walker among that first group, I was alone for most of the time, which enhanced the experience. The lighting is subdued, so one can pretend to be an early explorer, though they didn’t have the benefit of broad and smooth paths with hand-rails. As for the sights, I would say that, if you’ve seen one staglamite, you’ve seen them all…if I were only a cynic. Yes, they start looking the same after a while, and, no, I couldn’t always match the formations with the imaginative names (“Chinese Temple”, “Bottomless Pit” – which the small-print acknowledged was actually 140 ft. deep…), but the scale of the place is astonishing and deserving of superlatives…which would also apply to the gift-shop and the other concessions designed to separate the visitor and his money.

The “Natural Entrance” tour segues into the “Big Room” tour, which is another mile-long loop, this time around the main chamber at the bottom of the visitor-accessible area. I took it as well, but for this portion, there were more people along the way, though I was still the youngest in most cases and, still, the fastest. (It reinforced the decision to make this trip now vs. later. First, “Golden Years” aren’t guaranteed. Secondly, given how much huffing and puffing I heard, I am glad to be travelling while still vigorous and (relatively) youthful.)

My next stop, in Artesia, NM, a small town 45 minutes north of Carlsbad – the caverns are 30 minutes south of Carlsbad proper – was the highlight of the day. Elizabeth, my young ex-colleague and friend, grew up in Artesia, to which her parents had immigrated from Mexico some thirty years ago, and where he still farms land leased from the same owner. (I “found” Elizabeth and her husband Paul, hired both into the firm, and trained, managed, and mentored her during her tenure at TP.) I had to pass through Artesia to Roswell, so she invited me meet her parents, since they had heard about me already over the years and that I spoke Spanish. (The original invitation had to been to have breakfast with them on Wednesday, but this changed to lunch, Tuesday, because of my car problems.) And that’s how I came to have fresh, home-made tamales and “gorditas” (deep-fried corn-dough pockets filled with beans and/or carne -- yum!) for lunch today and meet both her parents, Pilar and Enrique, and her brother Henry, in the photo below:

Elizabeth's parents and her brother


Most of the conversation was in Spanish, since it was a more comfortable language for the parents, but I did manage to convey how much I enjoyed working with Elizabeth and how proud they could feel about her combination of strong values, intelligence and industry. I told them how, seeing the children, we also see the parents and it was clear how Elizabeth reflected them.

Roswell was next or, rather, the “UFO Museum and International Research Center” in Roswell. It was in the outskirts of Roswell that the crash of a purported UFO, complete with little gray/green men, occurred in 1947 and was subsequently allegedly covered up by the government. The museum is in the space of a former movie theater and consists of a large, open space with displays, mostly text and photos, along the walls. The production value of the displays is on a par with that seen in middle-school science fairs – large matte-boards with lots of writing, big-headlines, diagrams and pasted-on illustrations or photos. By the very nature of the subject, there are no artifacts of proven extra-terrestrial manufacture or provenance. The best exhibit is a prop from a movie about the cover-up: a dummy alien on an operating table, complete with a gowned and masked mannequim doctor ready to dissect… The shop is worth a visit because of all the gee-gaws and T-shirts (some very imaginative) with the alien/UFO theme. See for yourself:

A store across from the UFO Museum. (Click on the photo to read some of the small print on the windows.)


I parked here for the museum. A little green man wearing a "E-Z Parking" T-shirt took my money...


The focal point of the alien experience in Roswell. (I love the "Research Center" subtitle.)


I wonder how Einstein would have felt about having his portrait in the museum.


Draw your own conclusions: REAL alien or something from a bad art class?


"Alien" in suspended animation...


A close-up. How seriously can one take a "museum" that uses movie props?


The "best" exhibit in the whole place. A prop donated by the makers of a schlock film about the Roswell Incident.


The "doctor" seems poised to fight or flee, but not to perform an autopsy...


So, what did I learn today? From the Caverns, that Time is insignificant to a ceiling drip that will take tens of thousands of years to form a staglamite, and how to use that in meditation. From lunch at the Hernandez’, a reminder about how hard first-generation immigrants work for the second-generation and how much our society would lose without both. From the Dalai Lama (on CD) that it’s not the fame of the teacher, the elegance of the writing, the themes of the lessons, or the truths in the teaching that matter, but our emotional connection/response to what is heard. (So why do gurus have followers??) And from the drive itself, that the way to average over 90 mph for fifty miles is to have a straight road, sparse traffic, and a bigger idiot averaging 95 mph ahead of you.

Tomorrow, it’s Santa Fe in the afternoon, after the car is done. At least it shouldn’t be a another case of “Oh, about a thousand dollars”….(see first entry).