Day 10 – 12/26/07

Lake Brantley SP to Roswell, NM to Santa Fe, NM to Albuquerque, NM

Before talking about anything else for today, I’ve got to state: today we had an adventure. So we’re driving out of Brantley Lakes state park just like we always do. Jay was driving and we had set the GPS up to take us north to Roswell. After looking at my (old fashion, incredibly non-gadgetty) traditional Rand McNalley map, I had assumed we would go back out to the main road and turn right. No big deal.

However, Jay and the GPS had other ideas. Before we had even reached the visitor’s center in the state park, the GPS was telling us to turn left and right at seemingly random places. I quickly decided the GPS wasn’t to be trusted and advised Jay to go the standard way. When we reached the decision point, Jay stopped the van and consulted the GPS.

Jay: “See, honey. The GPS says if we just go left, we’ll loop around, cross the river and hit the highway just a bit north.”

Val: “I don’t think it’s a good idea. My map says that’s (at best) a gravel road that runs 30 miles north to Artesia.”

Jay: “But the GPS shows these roads. They’re right there.”

Val: “Yes, and the GPS has been wrong 4 times and we haven’t even made it out of the state park. The GPS is not having a good day.”

Jay: “But, it will be an adventure.”

Val: “Fine. I’ve stated my objections. I think we should go the way that we’re sure will work.”

Jay: “I’m going to follow the GPS.”

And that, friends, is how we came to be driving along roads like this:

This was after the GPS had assured us there was a road crossing that 20 ft. wide river on the right hand side of the picture. There wasn’t. Somehow, we ended up driving through what I’m sure was private land (which is a good way to get shot out here in the west). This was also about the time that Jay suddenly stopped the van with the exclamation, “Crap! There goes a piece of the van!” and jumped out and ran after one of our hubcaps which had come off the van and was rolling through a field.

I finally convinced him to turn around and head back out the way we had come (after only 20 minutes of off-roading through random fields). However, the path was then blocked by something else. As a matter of fact, that IS a llama leading a herd of goats down the track in front of the van! Jay was nice enough to keep the van far enough back that the goats never actually stampeded.

So, as you can see, we had an adventure. And Jay earned a new nickname. Jay is now to be known as The Destroyer of Hubcaps and Terrifier of Goats! Suits him, I think.
At any rate, 40 minutes later, we were on the road north to Roswell. We drove through Roswell but decided we didn’t want to stop at the UFO museum. We had heard it was pretty hokey, and since it was $5 each, we decided we just weren’t that interested. However, since it was about 11:15 and we had had an early breakfast, we decided to stop for lunch. Jay was craving tamales, so we tried to find him some.

I happened to spot a little mobile cantina like you see in so many towns with a heavy Hispanic influence. Usually, they have good, authentic food and you can tell the really good ones by how many vehicles are waiting around it. Well, The Burrito Factory looked pretty good since they had at least 4 trucks and people standing around waiting. Jay was quite excited over the prospect and pulled several u-turns to get back to it.

It turned out to be completely worth it. I had a “fiesta bowl” with asado (chile spiced meat in a red sauce), rice, beans, guacamole, salsa, sour cream, lettuce, and tomato. Jay had 3 tamales with rice and beans. The asado was unbelievably good. It had a bit of spice to it (the woman at the counter had warned us gringos about this), but it was such a great flavor. Nothing like the green chile burger (which has turned me off of green chiles for quite some time). Jay proclaimed the tamales very good although “not as good as Mom makes them.”

After lunch, we consulted our map and discovered we had some extra time since we hadn’t stayed in Roswell too long. Rather then drop in on Jay’s relatives earlier then we had told them, we decided to add a half-hour to our trip and jaunt up to Santa Fe, NM.

We embarked on a distinctly uphill section of road and got into some snow since Santa Fe sits around 7000+ ft in elevation. The van lost some of it’s power (probably not being a new enough vehicle to automatically calculate and adjust for high altitude environments) going up and accelerating through the mountains. But Santa Fe was decorated for Christmas and we got a great parking space right in front of the church. Good enough. We spent an hour or two browsing around and window shopping before heading down towards Albuquerque and Jay’s aunt and uncle’s house.

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