Trip of a Life Time- San Antonio- continued

This is a 1929 picture of a magnificent Spanish Revival home built in 1929. To the right the picture shows the current fountain and court yard of this home. It is now an Art Museum open to the public.  The McNay, in San Antonio.

this is titled:  Marriage of the Virgin

Netherlands  circa 1500

carved wood from 1 solid piece

I find I really like the dimensional quality of sculpture.

We went to this museum one day, went on Thursday afternoon/evening.  It's free to the public on those days.  Here is a link: http://www.mcnayart.org. The lady that built the house left quite a portfolio of art along with an endowment to maintain the house, property and increase the collection.  The art ranges from the 1400's thru to current contemporary pieces.  What I also loved was the house itself.  Absolutely beautiful.  The woodwork, tiles in the floors and the architecture are magnificent.

This one is titled: Saint Martin and the Beggar

Netherlands  circa 1500,  1 solid piece of wood

Trip of a life Time-San Antonio continued

We arrived in San Antonio on Wednesday evening June 22.  The Howard Johnsons that we'd reserved a room at did something surprising.  We were staying 5 nights.  The clerk mentioned we should have booked a room with a frig.  I told her I thought we had.  Mentioned that my nehew was graduating from the AirForce that week and we were here to see it all.  She upgraded our room to suite with a full kitchen for the cost of the 1st night's price in the basic room.  No upcharge even for weekend nights, too!! Amazing deal and person. The place was showing it's age, but was clean and the free  breakfast was just fine.

Thursday Patrick, my nephew, got awarded his Air Force Airman's coin.  He just finished with basic training.  Said it was some of the toughist 8 weeks of his life.  There were just over 500 graduating Airmen.  My sister, brother in law and his younger sister drove out to see their boy who is now a man. 

They of course are VERY proud of him.  He is going to school to learn his job.  That is to be the person that refuels the other aircraft in mid-flight.  A great job and hopefully he won't be in harms way!

He was the lead airman in his flight group because he was the top person in parade.  I guess the 4 years in ROTC has really paid off for him.

Trip of a life Time-San Antonio

We were heading to San Antonio and traveled thru Pecos Texas.  The city is the birth place of the Rodeo!  As we entered town, we were stopped by a police barricade.  They were having a parade. Just for our arrival, can you believe it??!!  Just kidding.  They were celebrating the arrival of the Rodeo and the whole town turned out.  That's all 7700 of them.  We waited for those last 2 "floats" to pass and then the police followed them.  The line of cars and trucks waiting followed the police cars so we got to be, sort of, in the parade.  People actually waved at us, we were the second car behind the police cruiser.  I waved back a couple of times. ha ha

                                                                                                    After leaving Pecos, we continued down the hwy.  Noticed a lot of oil derricks dotting the landscape.  These hadn't been around before.  Surprising how along the same hwy in New Mexico no derricks then as soon as into Texas, derricks.  Don't know if it really is because there isn't oil in NM or if there is another reason for no drilling.    A bit of a way into Texas we headed down the 10 Fwy and out of the earth pops up buttes and mesas.  Just flat ground and bam a butte.  They all had flat tops as though someone came out with a knife and sliced the peaks off.I'm sure a geologist could explain the reason, if anyone knows please comment.  I'd like to know the reason for the formation.

  

  Stopped in a rest stop and happened upon this stagecoach stop.  They reconstructed the station with the stones found on site.  Using historic records to recreate the structure.  So cool!  The old wood lintel was massive.  You could see the age of it, truly an old piece not just conjured up for the job.                            

Trip of a Lifetime-Observations on State Differences...so far

I forget that southern California is a desert.  Driving the Hwy 8 route out of the state, very definitely reminded me of this fact.  As I mentioned before, the landscape was layered with boulders upon boulders.  However when we entered Arizona, the boulders all but vanished.  Replaced by the "sentry" cactus previously mentioned in my 1st posting. The gas prices went down about 35 cents from best Cali price.  That was good news to be sure.  The journey thru southern Arizona was pretty unremarkable.  Only large city was Tucsan.  Otherwise nothing.

When we entered New Mexico the landscape initially stayed the same.  So it was hard to note any difference from sate to state.  One thing I got a laugh from were the warning signs along the N.M. freeway.  They said: "Dust storms may exisit".  Actually they definatley exist, just remains to be seen if they may happen while driving down the road. LOL LOL  I wonder what state offical came up with that statement.  New Mexico finally started to get  some changes in the landscape, some little little hills. Not always completely flat. In Deming we spent the night.  Next morning went to my sister's father's grave along with his parents.  They passed 2 & 3 years after he did.  The strange thing, Bersabe died 1 year exactly to the day after her husband. How amazing.  My mom said that she was very devoted to Jose, so who knows....

We had to go south into Texas, then sort of "u-turn" in El Paso up to Carlsbad, N.M. I noticed that the freeways in Texas seem to be of a rough texture as compared to Arizona and California freeways. Those are usually smooth surfaced.  We tried to think of a reason for this.   Only reason I could think of was maybe Texas has more rain storms and it's to keep better traction during those thunderstorms.  Anyone have ideas about this? 



There were some pretty run down building along the back country roads.  Seemed like people just gave up.  The buildings stand as a silent testament to the attempt those hardy people made to tame the desert.   

I tried to buy some groceries at this store, but, go figure, no one was there. ;-)

More stuff to follow....

Trip of a Lifetime-Next leg of the Journey-Caving

This is the Guadalupe Mountains.  For hours we've driven and the topography is flat flat flat.  Then out of nowhere this range just pops up.  Of course Carlsbad Caverns are in these mountains along with a lesser know carvern system.  The Lechuguille Cavern; visit this link to see the most amazing photos you'll ever see of cavern formations:  http://www.undergroundofenchantment.com/  This cave is not open to the public.  Only open for research, filming and microbiology studies.

These pictures were taken on my smart phone.  Can you believe how beautiful the cave is???   Some formations are unbelieveable. The fun thing to do was look at the formations and see what our minds eye picked out.  Like when you lay on your back and look at clouds and see a horse or monkey, etc..  A lot of fun.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

We had a wonderful time in the Carlsbad Caverns.  Didn't do the Left Tunnel Ranger guided tour.  Turns out AAA guide book is wrong, it isn't an easy hike.  So we just did the self guided tour of the "Big Room".  It's 1 mile long and takes minimum 1 1/2 hours.  We took our time.  Stopped and sat at times just soaking it in.  We took about 2 1/2 hours.  The temperature is a constant 56 degrees, year round.  Carlsbad has approximatley 30 miles of traversed tunnels/caves.  Compared to Lechuguillia's 100 miles.

My USA Road trip

Well the trip of a life time has begun.  Left Escondido, California Sunday 6-19-11 at 9:20am  Taking the southern route.  That is Hwy 8 along the Mexican/US border to Yuma, Arizona.  Stopped there and ate, gassed up and headed off again.  I drove the 1st leg, 3hours, my Mom drove the next 3 hrs to Tucson, Arizona.  I then drove the final 3.25 hours and slept in Deming, New Mexico. 

The landscape along the way is so desolate.  There are areas almost completely covered in stones/boulders.  Wish I'd taken pictures.  Looked like it had rained stones.  Just stacked on top of each other.  Then in Arizona the cactus, Saguaro I believe they're called.  Look like desert sentinels, waving "hello" to the occasional humans passing thru.  Can't imagine living out here.  So dry, dead and hot!  I realize that I'm definitely a forest girl.  This landscape makes me depressed.  Need my trees!

We have arrived in Carlsbad, New Mexico. http://www.nationalparked.com/US/Carlsbad_Caverns/    About 3.5 hrs from Deming.  Staying at a Super8 motel.  Fine accommodations at this cheaper price point. Tomorrow morning we are booked into the "Left tunnel Tour" at Carlsbad caverns.  Then we'll do the self tour that is also available.  Should take up most of the day.  Will leave Wednesday morning to drive thru to  San Antonio.  I'll start taking pictures, unfortunately I brought the wrong cable and can't up load my pics.  Will buy a cable in San Antonio then start uploading.  Thanks to my brother Scott, for asking me to document my trip so he can "travel" along.  I'm glad to do it. Makes me feel important, LOL LOL.