Clayton, New Mexico, USA
Created | Updated May 17, 2003
Clayton is located about sixty miles south-east of
Capulin Volcano. It is just inside the state, west of the bottom left-hand corner of the Oklahoma panhandle and top left-hand corner of Texas.
Fu-Manchu, in company with Number One Wife, drove along US HIghway 64 from Capulin to Clayton across the plain below mesa-like clouds, from some of which we could see smoking
trails of rain1. Pronghorn deer grazed between Aermotor windmills2
bringing a trickle of water up into the galvanized iron butts for the cattle.
Clayton is a cow town, the smell of cattle excrement from the feeding pens is not unpleasant but it is pervasive, making the fly screens on the windows of the hotel essential. Scouting Clayton for eats we chose the Hi-Ho Cafe and Mexican food, the saloon looked too rowdy.
For us Clayton was a waystation. Morning after our arrival we found the continental-breakfast room of the hotel full of Oklahoma State University fans on their way to see their team play the Air Force at Colorado Springs. We surreptitiously marvelled at a family breakfast nearby who were spooning up small fluorescent coloured donuts floating in a pools of milk; Mom fed her baby with pieces of glazed donut.
Spain is not the only place where rain falls mainly on the plain. And it is not often that you can see smoke descending, but then life sandwiched between Canada and Mexico proper often has its surreal moments.
2 Aermotor windmills have become a characteristic feature on the plains of the United States of America, evocative of a bygone era when electricity wasn't so widely available. You can see any number of these machines in various states of repair. Aermotor is still in operation as a manufacturer of pumps. See the
Aermotor Home Page, their web-site.
