Pilgrimage To The Ozarks - Part Three
Created | Updated Apr 20, 2006
Big Bend Cacti
They Built a Rubber LBJ
Austin, Texas - 31 March, 2006
We watched over a million bats fly out from under the Congress Avenue Bridge last night, but they were moving to fast for the camera to record.
This morning we boarded the Yellow 'Dillo' and headed for the LBJ Presidential Library. Turns out the Orange 'Dillo' is the only one that goes there so we walked the last mile though the University of Texas Campus. It's the second largest University in the US. We saw a co-ed wearing shorts and elaborately tooled cowboy boots.
The library gets an eight on a scale of ten. It's a huge ten story building. There's a large display of Vietnam era paintings and a blue Lincoln presidential limousine with a 460 cubic inch engine and oversized brakes and transmission. One display is an animated rubber LBJ in a cowboy hat telling folksy jokes with a political point. The rubber LBJ cracks this one:
An old farmer goes to see his doctor and complains about his hearing.
The doctor tells him he has to give up drinking if he wants his hearing to improve.
On the next visit, the doctor asks if the farmer has given up drinking and the old farmer says 'No'
'Why not?', asks the doctor.
'Well, I went home and thought about it and decided I like what I drink a lot more than I like what I hear'.
LBJ should be remembered with charity for the 'Great Society' programmes, his civil rights efforts and his impressive depression era 'New Deal' legislation.
Lady Bird had a big section. She built the library. She was an interesting lady. She started a committee to build hiking trails on the riverfront 'Town Lake' here in Austin and her results were impressive.
If you are of a certain age, you will remember that she worked hard as First Lady to get Lyndon to pass the Highway Beautification Act. This called for fences around automobile junkyards and a reduction in billboards on Interstate highways.
Here are a few LBJ Presidential museum pictures. No flash is allowed, so some are dark.
The George Washington Carver Museum was a one on a scale of ten. The museum really wasn't about this black American genius who held over 300 patents and invented peanut butter and mayonnaise. Save your shoe leather.
I meet a somewhat inebriated man wearing a cowboy hat at a bus stop. He starts talking to me as I approach from 20 feet away. He says he is sixty years old and a full-blooded Cherokee Indian professional guitar player. We swap jokes and 'Beverly Hillbillies' trivia for twenty minutes until his bus comes.
A Man for All Reasons
San Antonio, Texas – 1 April, 2006
San Antonio is the basic training centre for the Air Force. Downtown hasn't changed much since Mrs Phred and I left in a green British TR4-A in March, 1966. We see a grim-faced Air Force 2nd Lieutenant in dress blue uniform holding a well-dressed young woman by the hand and heading into the courthouse in the town square. They look very young .We decide they are going for a marriage licence and hope they make a good life together and come back in 2046. Here are a few San Antonio pictures.
The River wanders around downtown in a confusing way. The River Walk district is packed with bars offering umbrella shaded seating. We have a glass of sauvignon Blanc and meet two Chicago liberals. They tell us that the current Mayor Daley is as much an embarrassment to Democrats as Bush is to Republicans and tell us stories.
Two Texas Republicans at the next table join in the conversation. One offers us his card. It reads:
Gary Fisher, PhD- 'A Man for all Reasons'
- - Uprisings Quelled
- - Bridges Destroyed
- - Revolutions Started
- - Foreign Debts collected
- - Coffins Filled
- - Bagpipes Tuned
- - Saloons Emptied
- - Earthquakes Arranged
Victory or Death!
San Antonio, Texas – 2 April, 2006
Back around 1812 the Mexican government was encouraging foreigners to move in to the Texas area and offering them land at 12.5 cents an acre. This was cheap even then. They only had to agree to become Mexican citizens and Roman Catholics.
The vicious and evil General/President Santa Anna didn't like how things were shaping up demographic-wise and he reneged on that deal in the 1830s telling the Texan foreign settlers to vamoose.
The Texicans didn't like that one bit and they made a stand at the Alamo. 'Victory or death!' cried the Texans. There were about 150 Texans and several thousand Mexican soldiers at the Alamo. Santa Anna's surrender offer was rejected by the Texans so Santa Anna had his buglers play an eerie song that meant 'Take no prisoners!'.
After twelve days of cannon bombardment the Mexicans took the Alamo on the 4th assault and killed all the Texans, including Davie Crocket and Sam Bowie.
About 400 Texans later surrendered at Goliad under a promise of humane treatment, but Santa Anna changed his mind about that and had them all shot by firing squads.
At this point, the Texans were really good and p*ssed off. Three hundred of them caught 1400 Mexican soldiers taking a siesta on the banks of the San Jacinto River and killed 700 and captured the rest. 'Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!', they shouted, as they rained hot lead down on the sleeping troops. Nine Texans were also killed during this battle.
Later the Texans captured Genera Santa Anna and that was the ballgame. I'm not sure whether or not the Texans according him Geneva Convention protections. The fat guy with the microphone glossed that over.
The Republic of Texas was a sovereign nation for about twelve years until they voted to become a state. After a few years Texas went with the Confederacy and was admitted back into the Union after the Civil War.
Here are some Alamo pictures.
Victory or Death!
West of the Pecos
Marathon, Texas - 3 April, 2006
I meet Earl and Dick in the Marathon Campground. Earl is 79 and has ridden his bicycle from Nebraska. He plans to go east to San Antonio and ride back to Nebraska.
Earl is fit, tanned and slim. He has ridden 30,000 miles since 1993 in the US, New Zealand and Europe. Earl and Dick (age 63) have an American Cancer Society '2006 Cancer Survivors Ride' flag on their bikes.
They are raising money for the all volunteer Iron County Unit, Michigan Unit of the American Cancer Society. Here are some pictures of Earl and Dick.
They have set up tents near the pond and hope to see some coyotes and birds tonight. Earl says he has tow ropes and asks for a tow on our motorcycle.
The Comanche Control Camel Experiment
Big Bend National Park, Texas – 4 April 2006
Before dawn, the lime green and pink neon lights of the Cactus Café and Motel flicker on the dark desert highway. The headlight of a fast freight train can be seen approaching for fifteen minutes. Dawn breaks and light and shadow play on the surrounding mountains.
We pack ham sandwiches, bottled water and swim suits and head south 110 miles on the motorcycle. We will follow deserted Texas State road 435 to the Mexican border and the Rio Grande River.
This road was built on the old Comanche Trail. The Comanche came down from the Fort Stockton area and crossed into Mexico to liberate cattle and horses. The US Army shipped 30 camels to this area in an experiment in policing the area in 1859. The start of the Civil War brought this experiment to an end.
The desert gradually changes. We begin to see green cactus with purple flowers. Then we see purple and pink cactus with yellow flowers and things that look like cattails with red flowers.
At first the morning is very cool, but by noon the temperature is over 100 degrees. It feels like a giant hair-dryer is trained on us. Mrs Phred yells in my ear that this is like picking apples on an Israeli Kibbutz.
When you get older, your facial skin gets looser. At 60 MPH, with a 20 MPH headwind, everything flaps rapidly. The skin under my eyes flaps and stings my eyes like being slapped with a wet towel. My cheeks flutter like a southern belle's eyelids.
The Park ranger at the entrance to the Big Bend National Park tells us not to swim in the Rio Grande River. We take a nap under a tree on the river bank. We are alone. The water looks cool. I wonder what the problem is. Pesticides? Bacteria? Piranha? Little fish that swim up your urinary tract?
We ask a guy working at the camp gas station about the no swimming rule. He says there is an undertow, the water is not real clean and they don't want you swimming 40 feet into Mexico. He shrugs apologetically.
We return around dark, exhausted, with 225 miles on the trip meter and have a Margarita. Here are some Big Bend pictures.
Big Bend Ride
West Texas Dumpster Diving
Terlingua, Texas – 5 April, 2006
It's 5 AM and the Milky Way is a big and bright band extending though the Navigator's triangle (Deneb, Vega and Altair) and into Sagittarius the Teapot in the South. Venus is beginning to rise in the east.
Yesterday we drove 100 miles further South to explore the western side of the Big Bend National Park. We stopped at a rest area for lunch... it was a nice clean rest area and I saw a fairly clean 55 gallon trash can with a nice new liner and so I peeked inside to see what people had left and saw this little Big Bend Gazette under several beer cans and it was open to a cartoon of George Bush and he was saying I only am accepting questions from reporters who believe in the Easter Bunny and so I fished it out. Wouldn't you?
The Gazette had an article about bird flu. Seems that avian flu was originally non-fatal to the wild bird population in which it originated. Then it was transmitted to domestic fowl, mutated into something lethal and was passed back to the wild birds.
People who are involved in cock-fighting and those who clean chicken coops are at the highest risk. Also, people who belong to the sub-group that drinks duck blood are at high risk. Two of these have died.
As long as you cook your chicken with no pink parts and don't eat runny eggs you should be safe from the poultry vector, A nasopharyngeal swab (though the nose to the back of the throat) will be used to test humans for bird flu.
Life is like a 55 gallon trash barrel: you never know what you're going to get. In the late afternoon we took the motorcycle for a scenic drive in the park. It was 42 miles down to the Rio Grande and a huge cliff at the Mexican border and 42 back. Here are a few more Big Bend pictures.
How many cactus pictures do you plan to take?
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Texas – 7 April, 2006
We left the Big Bend Park two days ago and drove though the mountains on the border along the Rio Grande River to the small border town of Presidio. It had lots of unpaved dusty streets. We see herds of brown and white antelope as we drive. We turn north and end up camped in the Guadalupe Mountains National Park on the Texas/New Mexico border.
A lady with a German accent glares at me and asks if I plan to use my generator. She has been parked in Big Bend next to a man who ran his all day so he could watch TV in air-conditioned comfort. Apparently he felt it was too hot to venture outside. I ask her if her dogs barked and promise not to crank it up. She softens a little and tells me about an Arizona State Park where she has been a Ranger that has much better caverns than Carlsbad.
We took a two hour hike yesterday morning here in the Guadalupe Park. Mrs Phred catches me taking another picture of a cactus and questions my judgment. There aren't many animals or water sources here. The hike to the Guadalupe peak had a 3,000 foot elevation gain. (I'm not ready for one like that yet).
In the afternoon we drive 50 miles north to see Carlsbad Caverns again. The last time we saw them was 1982 on a long camping trip in a van with our twelve year old son and one of his friends. Both of them are lawyers now with children of their own. There are only 300,000 Mexican Free-tail bats left in the cave. A paltry number after seeing the Austin Bridge. Here are some Calsbad Cavern photos. I had a tripod for the long exposures in the darkened caverns.
Billy the Kid Hair Salon
Las Cruces, New Mexico – 9 April, 2006
We spend three days in Las Cruces. It is at an altitude of 4,000 feet and is near the Mexican border. The Rio Grande River is just south of town and the rugged Organ Mountains are visible to the north. Las Cruces has a population of 75,000 and housing prices seem very reasonable. Rainfall averages eight inches a year. There are two city parks with municipal tennis courts
I take Mrs Phred to the Billy the Kid Hair Salon for maintenance. We also run the cycle and RV though a car wash to get rid of accumulated road dust, do laundry and check tyre pressures and fluids. The motorcycle front tyre is showing sidewall cracks from age. We both like the feel of this place and the people we meet here.
The Howling Coyote Open Mic provides a forum for poets and musicians to perform on Friday night. The Fine Art Museum has a fine display of amateur astronomy photography. We go to the town mall weekly craft bazaar and buy used paperbacks and a jar of mesquite honey.
The small town of Mesilla a few miles away has an historic movie theatre called The Fountain. The theatre walls are covered with large murals. The building has large cracks and you can see that straw was used to strengthen the mortar in the walls. Billy the Kid was sentenced to death here in Mesilla. We see a very good but disturbing French movie with subtitles called 'Cache' (the hidden) and drink some local wine called 'Plum Loco'. There is a Catholic church in the Mesilla town square. It has a large memorial for fallen servicemen and those who also served. All the names on the monument are Hispanic. A policeman drives slowly past as we read the names and makes the sign of the cross in his cruiser. Here are Las Cruces pictures.
Buffalo Soldiers
Fort Seldon, New Mexico – 10 April, 2006
In the afternoon we drive 13 miles north on a deserted highway to historic Fort Seldon. The highway along the Rio Grande is lined with Pecan groves nourished by the river water. The trees are perfectly aligned like soldiers on parade so that an exact alignment appears each time the observer shifts position 45 degrees. The houses offer spectacular modern examples of southwestern adobe architecture.
We arrive at the fort as the historical re-enactment is breaking up. We meet an enactor called Rome Clay. He gives us a 15 minute run-down on Fort Seldon. The fort was staffed by black 'buffalo soldiers' after the civil war. These had a valiant civil war record and escorted travellers though Mescalero Apache territory for a number of years.
Rome Clay tells us that the small town of Mesilla was the capital of both Arizona and New Mexico in 1865. The 37 star flag on display at the fort dates from 1866. New Mexico and Arizona became states in 1912 (number 47 and 48).
The once mighty American adobe fortress is melting in the rain. These Fort Seldon pictures show that only small stubs remain.
Carlsbad Caverns
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