Heading East, new territory!

Hoped to get an early start from Benson Friday, but instead, spent a lot of time making sure my tow setup was just how I wanted it. Do you blame me? By the time everything was done, gas purchased, I left Benson about 1:30 in the afternoon, aiming for Pancho Villa State Park in Columbus, New Mexico. 

It is the amazing Southwest again. The clouds make moving, dramatic black shadows on the vast views of mountains and plains. Worn rocky fantastical Dragoon mountains remind me of the Alabama Hills, near Lone Pine in California. I hated to bypass the Cochise Stronghold and Chiricahua National Monument. However, I've got a timeframe to get to Austin, and I don't want to use up my buffer days too early, in case I run into bad weather in Texas. Highway I-10 is not too bad, traffic is light.  

Leaving I-10 and heading abruptly south, there's a sudden change, a portal to another universe on Hwy 80, from giant trucks passing 55 mph me at 80+ miles per hour, to a deserted two lane country road. The scenery was of distant ranches, rangeland, dust raised by farm equipment. Cotton City, depressed, a grand name for what I actually saw. There were dried out wetlands, and fallow fields. An optimistic speed limit of 55, but I'm at 45, taking my half out of the middle to decrease the bouncing. Finally turned East on Hwy  9 very isolated, close to the border. No other cars or traffic, so I have poor sense of my speed. A few cars, a few Border Patrol vehicles. Suddenly, and with no obvious altitude increase, a sign for the continental divide, 4520 ft. Its all downhill from here, on the way to New Orleans. No telephone poles or fences in sight. The road follows a railroad that operated between 1882 and 1902 to haul copper ore from Bisbee to El Paso. 

Arrive at Pancho Villa State Park at deep twilight. Not fond of setting up in the dark. Retired to my blue cocoon for the night, thankful for automatic levelers, as it was windy.

Have discovered that wearing tight lycra running gloves to sleep helps my hands and twitchy focal dystonia fingers quiet right down. Each finger is wrapped in its own little Ace bandage, which helps to quiet the fingers. Hope this continues to work, as it is my aching hands that wake me up in the middle of the night. I had put the gloves on some days earlier for driving and liked them. I thought they would feel funny while sleeping, but they don't, they feel great. Weird, huh?

   

Once it was daylight, I could see that the park was pretty empty and pretty nice. Saw a roadrunner, but he was hard to catch on film, speedy little sucker!

Saturday morning was a lovely time of solitude, catching up on housework, correspondence and other paperwork. 

Went to the museum about this small war in our history, found it closed for lunch, but other travelers told me they were going to Palomas for lunch at the Pink House, just three miles away, across the border. Great idea, sounds like fun, glad I have my passport card along. The Pink House would be hard to miss, even in a dense fog. What a great place, a good concept well executed. It is a shopping heaven for Mexican crafts. I did a little gift shopping, fueled by the free margaritas they kept offering me. When I was done shopping, I went into the adjacent restaurant for some guacamole and chips, and to listen to the live music.  

 

A nearby table of seven saw me sitting alone, and Barbara came over to invite me to join them.  How nice, I picked up my stuff and moved right on over. Except that they were way ahead of me in margarita consumption. Fortunately Barbara was the designated driver. They were from El Paso, and they regularly drive over to Palomas to go shopping and have lunch. Friendly, nice folks, its amazing, they're everywhere!

Came home, ate dinner, stowed for tomorrow's early departure, and went to bed, having had one more margarita than I should have :-)