Albuqurque

The Texas panhandle- so very flat and boring to drive- worse than Indiana and Illinois. All the hills, mountains are south or very eastern part of the panhandle. When I was driving, the smell of manure was oppressive (even with recirc on the a/c). The other thing I noticed was it gets very windy and the trees bend away from the prominent direction. As one travels through the panhandle, the terrain changes from prairie to desert like sage or scrub bush. (this was within 10-20 mi of the new mexico border). The land is mainly cows and farms, but less than before- maybe they need more land? I also noticed extrances for 3 ranches (inc Jarvis ranch) directly onto I-40 at a 90 degree turn.

BTW: there is a texas exit 0 and right after we enter New mexico aka the Land of Enchantment. Iw would describe NM as green scrub with some trees no higher than 6-12 feet and red and beige mountains.

After stopping by my hotel in Albuquerque, I headed out towards Sandia's peak. Its in a national forest just outside of the city by 10 miles. It has ski regions for the winter and the local volunteer even mentioned snow in may or june sometimes.

I took the tram to the top which was 10-11,000 feet. The volunteer gave examples of various fossils found in the rock. He also mentioned that there were about 160 volcanoes (active and inactive) in the state, that the Sandia's were formed due to fault activity, and that granite and limestome was the two major types of rock found. He talked about something called the Great Discontinuity that occurs in the rock record in the U.S. West. He also described some local wildlife including black bears, mountain lions etc.

After that I went to old town, bought some pottery, and ended up at the Albuqurque art museum. they had a lovely gallery about the history of the the city. Next stop, the Old church in the center of old town. But before going there, I ran into 5 Najavo code talkers from WWII- considering there are not too amny WWII veterans still alive and these were even fewer! For background, they only served in the South Pacific with Marines and would use their native language as a code which was never broken. Anyway, they were fundraising for their people, I bought a book and they autographed it and told me stories. I felt quite honored- truly heroes. I finally made it to the old church and took some photos of the area. Overall, a great time!