There is a tree next to our campsite that’s still waiting for
leaves to pop out. My bike was parked
near it…and a little bird landed in it and chattered at me. From the time I noticed it to the time we
left was about 15 minutes. I watched it
and carefully reached for my camera in my saddlebag, hoping it would stay long
enough so I could get a picture. It just hopped from branch to branch, making
its bird noise, but never flew away…15 minutes it did that. Occurred to me as I rode off on the bike that
it was probably a young one, just learning to fly. It had landed in the tree, didn’t know how to
take off again and was calling for some help.
Can’t see any other reason that the bird would stick around when both bikes
started up. However, it was gone when we
got back. Must have figured out how to
use those wings.
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Originally we reserved a site for two nights…Wednesday and Thursday. Then we extended to Friday and Saturday
night, with a possibility of staying Sunday night and leaving Monday. That’s where we’re at right now, but if the
site is available we just may extend for another night or so. This is a nice area, both for riding and for
the ‘eye scope’.
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In our travels the last few weeks, we’ve come across several mountains with letters on them…painted, I presume. There’s a ‘C’ near Coolidge, AZ…there’s a ‘W’ near Willcox, AZ….and there’s a ‘W’ near Pinos Altos, NM. The first two made sense to me, the third one didn’t at all. So on a chance I googled ‘meaning of W on mountain near Pinos Altos’ and found a reference to it on the website 100hikesinayear.wordpress.com. The following showed up on Hike #100:
“Julian and Lynn let us traipse through their property and
then onto an old dirt road headed south towards “W” Mountain. Some of you (in
all probability not from around here…..) may be wondering what I mean by “W”
Mountain. North of the town of Silver City there is a mountain with a HUGE “W”
painted on it. It stands for Western New Mexico University and each fall, the
college kids repaint it a bright white. It is visible from the entire area to
the east, south and west of town. It is currently short one white rock which I
currently have as a souvenir.” Satisfies my need to know.
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This area is very hiker and cyclist friendly. In our short time here, I’ve seen many people
out exploring on foot and as I go tooling by on my bike with a motor, I’ve seen
many bicyclists using pedal power to ride these mountains roads as well as the
easier roads. Right now the temperatures
are perfect for getting out and enjoying the mountain freshness. Temperatures have been in the high 70s or 80s
during the day, but without the oppressive hot quality that we experienced in
Arizona. And, just like Arizona, there’s
no humidity…just a fresh open feel to the air.
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This morning, we went to Cross Point, a little church up the
road a mile or two. We don’t have
‘church clothes’ with us, so we were fairly informal in our mode of dress. I had thrown on my riding sweatshirt, which
has some of my patches on it. Even though
we climbed out of a truck, we were pegged as bikers right off the bat…I’m sure
it was a mixture of my jacket patches and Kim’s general look. It’s that bad ass
biker thing. Upon entering, we were
greeted by a couple of older woman. One
leaned forward and said with a smile, “I agree…Crashing sucks…I’m with you on
that one.” My jacket has a patch that
reads “Crashing sucks”. 😏 Very friendly people, even met a transplanted
Michigander during the ‘go greet your neighbor’ part of the service. Several people recommended going to The
Catwalk…admitted that we tried to go there but were defeated by the water over
the road.
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| The City of Rocks State Park |
We had decided to go south on Hwy 180 to Deming today, if for
no other reason than it looked like a good ride. Some people at church recommended stopping at
the City of Rocks which is between Silver City and Deming. So we rode to Deming, got fuel and headed
back north to check out the City of Rocks State Park. The park brochure gave a lot
of geological detail about the formation process but I can sum it up quite
quickly: The large upright rocks were
produced by a very large volcanic eruption over 34 million years ago. The rocks seem to be the reason this state
park exists; otherwise it’s just a big field with a 3 mile circle walking
path. There’s huge columnar rocks in a
section of the field, which makes for a good reason to charge entrance and
camping fees. It was a little different
than I was expecting… but still interesting to wander around the rocks looking
for snakes (Kim) and roadrunners (Karen).
What I didn’t expect was to see people camping in among the rocks. That’s right…not only are there campsites out
in the open treeless area, there are campsites in the rocks. And there are enough of these big rocks all
looking the same that’d it be easy to get a little misplaced among them if you
didn’t have a former Boy Scout with you like I did. 😏
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Dust plumes were scattered about the horizon today. As we approached one, we were unsure if it was
a huge dust devil or smoke from a fire.
As we got closer, it appeared like a fire because of the way it was
rolling close to the ground. Then it grew
taller and started dissipating. That,
plus the fact it was by a house and there were no firetrucks, confirmed it was
a dust devil. Came to that conclusion a
little late to get a picture approaching it so we stopped beyond it hoping it would still be visible. These things can rise and disappear quickly. Oh, goodness, the base of it was even larger than before and it was
visibly swirling like a tornado.
Incredible! And there were various
sizes of these things all over the fields.
No way would people in dusty areas hang their wash out to dry. That’d be a lesson in futility!
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While I like my boots for riding, they’re not kind to my
knees if I walk much distance in them.
So when we get to a place where we’ll be walking, I take my boots off,
roll my pant legs up, roll my socks down and put on the Keen’s sandals that I
keep in the saddlebag. It’s cooler that
way as well as easier on the knees. Went
through my routine today…then decided I needed to get back on the bike to get a
picture. Thought I had my leg out far
enough not to get bit by the pipe but a quick hot sting told me otherwise. Didn’t have any ice to put on it until we got
back to camp. It was warm enough out
that the ice was melting in my hand, causing water to run down my leg and make
a mess in my shoe. So I wrapped some ice
in a cloth, then tied the cloth around my leg with one of my riding socks. Looked funny but it helped with the burning
sensation and allowed me to continue using my hands.
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| The super hero Bendy Man |
The mighty and powerful Zeus has a little riding buddy. You
wouldn’t know it to look at him, but he’s a super hero with special
powers. His super hero name is Bendy
Man….but we just call him Ben. I haven’t
seen him use his powers to fight evil but he was able to twist his legs and
arms around the mirror so he can hold on when Zeus is flying down the
road. He must really enjoy it because
every time I look over at him, he’s grinning like a fool. He keeps Zeus company when I’m not around. 😎
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Rode 118 miles today
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