100 Days Roadtrip: outlaws & aliens

saturday, november 14, 2009

we left the funky sweet route 66 motel this morning and drove back west (!!) because it was the way to get to ft. sumner. ft.sumner is a dinky little town that boasts billy the kid’s grave site. ft. sumner was established in the 1800’s to “keep an eye on” the indian tribes in that region. dont get me started.

we visited billy the kid’s grave, and i’d heard the appropriate respect was to toss a quarter on his grave. i didnt have a quarter, so i tossed two dimes and a nickle. no offense.

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you may notice that the tombstone is shackled to the ground, that is because it has been stolen twice.

next stop was roswell. we drove a couple of hours to get here. in case you are wondering what it is like driving to roswell, here you go:

heading south on road 20 towards roswell, nm

i dont know what we were expecting, but it’s a little disappointing. its a small/medium sized town out in the middle of the desert. yep, that’s about it. except for the fact that their downtown area has an alien motif all over it. the mcdonald’s is a space ship, for cryin out loud! i’d read on virtualtourist.com that if you drive 13 miles north of town and turn down the dirt road past the “ufo tours” sign, you can see the actual site where the ufo crashed in 1949. we drove out there for 20 miles, and never saw any signs. we saw a few roads, but didnt one to turn down, so we came back and are settled in nicely at the alien ewpl.

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roswell is also noted for the new mexico military institute:

julia and i had a long talk today. she is terribly homesick and said she was thinking that she might want to go home. she wants to see new orleans and florida, but those are a week and more away and she is missing home. i told her to sleep on it and we can talk about it again tomorrow. if she does go home, she will come with me to my friend laura’s, who lives a little west of here in couldcroft (up a BIG mountain), then we will travel to san antonio and she will take a bus or plane home from there. no decisions have been made, and tomorrow is another day, so we will see.

if she does go home, i will finish the trip alone, which is not so bad as i will be seeing family most every night anyway.

here are some beautiful new mexico sunset shots: