This was a vacation with a friend in 1988. That was before using the internet became commonplace. So I got out a map, mapped out the general itinerary (list of cities), and then as I remember it I went to the library and looked up the addresses to the chambers of commerce (or tourism board if they had one) in the cities where we were going. I wrote to them and told them I’d be coming for a visit and asked for any handouts available such as maps, lists of hotels, and any festivals going on in the area. Then I’d wait and wait until the packages started coming in and then we’d go through them reading the material.
Plus back then I took two weeks vacation and we drove instead of flew because we were camping. Also we left some of our itinerary open and decided destinations later.
On this trip we drove 4,000 miles and spent $114.28 on gas for that whole trip.
10-7-1988 Friday My friend Keith and I are headed to the annual Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque.
I checked the weather for the next couple of days and jotted it down to take with us.
We left Houston at 9:30 pm. I was late getting out of work. I think I worked 60 some hours that week.
We stopped at 12:15 to take a nap and woke up a little before 5:00 am.
10-8-88 Bought gas and snacks in Wichita Falls
Weather: gloomy and raining but easy on the eyes. It’s a long drive – we played word games in books and started listening to the book on tape “Hunt for Red October”.
Albuquerque Exit 157 info center free maps
We didn’t go there – went right to the Hotel and to Furr’s cafeteria. I felt really awful till I got some sleep. We stayed at Royal 8 hotel.
10-9-88 Sunday. Balloon Fiesta was wonderful. There were somewhere around 700 balloons. This was nothing like I had seen before. There were huge colorful balloons everywhere and teams in jeeps or other vehicles that tracked them. We used about 3 rolls of film each that day. After developing my film I realized I shouldn’t have shot so many pictures toward the sun – duh – too many dark balloons. I was a little too excited to think. By the end of the trip we will have used about 14 rolls each.
Then we went shopping for a short time in Old Town Albuquerque. The low humidity in Albuquerque was uncomfortable. I can’t take humidity down in the teens – I could write on my dry skin with my nails, like I have seen on television.
That night we had dinner at the Firehouse restaurant. We had chicken Diablo with peppers. It was ok.
Balloon Fiesta
Balloon Fiesta
Balloon Fiesta
10-10-88 Today we are on our way to the Albuquerque Zoo and then on to Chaco Canyon.
We both got into the zoo for free since I’m a docent at the Houston zoo. It was a real nice zoo. They appeared to be doing a lot of work on it. Light wasn’t’ very good.
7:50 pm It’s dark – sure does take water a long time to boil at this altitude – anyway – its cold.
We were able to set up camp. Will take a 5 mile hike tomorrow.
We stopped for gas at this teensy weensy itty bitty little store. Saw a cute dog in the back of the truck – looked like a blue healer. I got some neat panoramic shots near the ruins at Chaco Canyon. We also took some ghosty shots (time exposure with us moving around in them).
The ruins were made out of a zillion little flat rocks where they got them we may never know….
Spam for dinner
The buildings are fascinating here – the Indians knew what they were doing – the way things are put together and the alignment of buildings and light that appears on the shortest day of the year…etc
10-11-88 Tuesday. We hiked the Kin Kletso trail today – it was a little rougher than we thought.
When we woke up, it must have been in the 30s. There was ice on the tent and car. Later in the day it was quite warm.
Chaco Canyon
Sharon in one of the Chaco Canyon Buildings
Now we are on our way to Pima Air museum in Arizona
300 pm
Saw these animals going thru Apache Forest – in the middle of the night: Elk?, big buck, 2 skunks, pecarri & babies, cows.
We slept in the car in the forest and moved on to Pima.
10-12-88 Wednesday. We are on our way to Silver City now we will see forests and maybe a ghost town. Probably will stay at a KOA and move on to Ruidoso tomorrow.
10-13-88 We got to Silver City in time to do laundry. Keith went to the store and got some chicken legs. Were they good.
The KOA kabin we are staying in is outstanding. Very clean restrooms. We can do laundry – the Kabin is warmer than the tent and they provide a space heater. For 18.00 it’s the best deal in town.
9:30 am Now we are on our way to Mogollon – a ghost town and then the cat walk.
Tomorrow we will probably do City of Rocks and another ghost town. (Info on City of Rocks in New Mexico: The City of Rocks was created 34.9 million years ago by a volcanic eruption. Then over millions of years, erosion sculpted the rock formations seen today. The eruption was from the Emory Caldera, centered near Hillsboro Peak at the southern end of the Black Range. The eruption was estimated to be a VEI 8.5 eruption.)
City of Rocks
City of Rocks
10-13-88 Thursday 8:30 pm New Mexico, Silver City KOA
We’re staying in the Kabin again tonight. If it were possible I’d use these every night.
Today we went to Mogollon pronounced Mug e (long e) yon. It was described as a semi ghost mining town.
There were a few people there – but only one came out of his house. Many people had warnings to “Stay out” or electric fences, etc. Mostly everything was for sale. It was very quiet – small – and old. We could see old mine shafts had been boarded up. Kind of spooky.
Then we went to the Cat Walk. Also a mining area dating back to the 1800’s. Real pretty walk.
Chicken , potatoes and onions and a baked apple for dinner.
10-14-88 Friday 11:00 am We made reservations at the Alamagordo KOA thru the Silver City KOA.
We just came from City of Rocks. Odd shaped rocks a long way from the volcano where they are said to have come. Took several pictures here.
We arrived in Alamagordo and set up our tent. Then we went to the air and space museum. We toured the museum, but didn’t go to the planetarium because the show times were not convenient. We wanted to be at White Sands National Monument by Sunset.
White Sands was really cool. The real challenge here was to find some sand dunes without peoples Graffiti all over them. This disfigured the dunes horribly (for picture taking). Sunset drew near and here came the mosquitos – from where?! Sunset was not spectacular so we ate out at Western Sizzlin’. I had a sirloin and it was good.
White Sands as seen from the Solar Observatory
White Sands New Mexico
10-15-88 Saturday
We woke up last night and the wind was buffeting the tent around like crazy. Then I woke up again and it was raining. After this – 3:00 am I slept very little. Eventually, water pooled on the ground cover and the bottom sleeping bag soaked it up. That water then soaked into the sleeping bag under me. Oh well – I slept some in the car before we decided to pack up and go to the on site laundry mat.
We decided to go to Roswell via Cloudcroft. There was a little town before Cloudcroft called High Rolls. In my literature it said we were in time for the Apple Festival – yeah!
There were arts and crafts and home-made goodies. We bought banana bread and apple cider for the trip. For ourselves we bought apple butter. For friends we bought strawberry preserves and apple butter.
We also had some apple turnovers while we were there.
There was also a lady there handing out samples of apple cider mixed with applejack and that was good too.
Then we were off to Cloudcroft. We stopped at a Texas Barbeque Restaurant – great chopped beef and cherry cider.
It snowed up there for an hour. Really cute little town. From there we went to Sunspot Observatory. We saw the sun – live – on a TV screen! There were some great pictures there. Saturn – a multiple exposure showing positions of the sun all year.
We went on to Roswell to visit bitter Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. We photographed a Great horned Owl. I saw a marsh hawk and lots of ducks and very little else.
Then we drove after sunset to Bottomless Lakes State Park. Chili Pie for dinner
10-16-88 Sunday. We ended up staying in a motel in Roswell. On Cable TV we watched “Someone to Watch Over Me” and “Maid to Order”. I liked them both.
We are on our way to Carlsbad now. This is the second time I’ve seen Pronghorn Antelope – maybe next time I’ll get a picture.
On this trip we have passed by many prisons.
We went thru the Living Desert just outside Carlsbad. They had many cactus varieties, wounded birds and other animals. Harris Hawk, Red Tailed Hawk, Barn Owls, Great Horned Owl, Burrowing Owl, American Kestrel.
Javelina, Porcupine, Raccoon, Kit Fox, Cougar, Wolf, Pronghorn Antelope, Elk, Mle Deer, white tailed deer. Reptiles – rodents.
We didn’t do a lot else – just checked out the town. We’re having swordfish tonight.
10-17-88 Monday Dinner was good last night a little cat appeared that afternoon. “Muffinette” – a kitty that came to our campsite – She had milk & swordfish for dinner. This morning she had milk and banana bread.
We went through the Carlsbad Cavern. It was really big and really far down. We took pictures in the Papoose room and a picture of an unnamed formation that looked like a Christmas tree. We spent about 4 ½ hours in there. That included lunch and talking to park rangers.
Afterward we went to Rattlesnake Springs – whoppee (that’s what my note said – I guess not impressive)
Then we went back to the cavern for the bat flight. It started at 5:30 and lasted till 5:50. They estimate that there are 750,000 bats in that cave. They say the first people that saw them saw from a distance and they looked like smoke streaming thru the air.
The bats stopped flying out of the cave for awhile and then began again at 6:30 and by 7:05 we had to leave – time for dinner and it was dark. Awesome.
Bats flying out of the Cavern
10-18-88 Tuesday
We went hiking in McKittrick Canyon today. It was really pretty. Lots of trees were already yellow-orange and red.
We stopped about halfway and ate. The only wildlife we saw was a caterpillar – and some birds – that’s about it.
The hike was about 6.7 ? some odd miles. Most of it was pretty easy hiking though. Then we went to Smith Spring to hike about 2.7 ? miles. Before we got started I visited with the rangers horses.
The trail on the way to the spring was uphill – so that wasn’t fun but the spring was real pretty and the walk back wasn’t as bad.
We saw some deer – but they ran by pretty quick and didn’t get pictures.
McKittrick Canyon
10-19-88 Wednesday this morning we had a puncture fixed in one of the tires. Then we had the oil changed. Meanwhile I walked to the pack-n-mail and sent the apple butter to Florida to my Dad.
Then we started our drive to San Antonio.
We stopped at Monahan’s Sand Hills to take pictures.
We were pretty awake so we decided to drive straight thru to San Antonio.
Earlier that day on I-10 beginning at Ft Stockton I started seeing bits and pieces and sometimes whole red peppers. This went on for 140 miles – well all the way to Sonora – before we caught up with 2 18-wheelers just full to overflowing with red bell peppers. When you are driving that long in the middle of nowhere seeing something like that adds entertainment.
We stayed at Motel 6, ate BLTs and watched “the Principal” movie. It was good.
10-20-88 Thursday
Today we went to Sea World. This was fun – we also bought the guided behind the scenes tour. The tour guide was too funny. The lady tour guide told us even though they use the name Shamu for all the killer whales they really had other names – like Fred – and while they weren’t working they were hanging out.
We saw penguins – nice display new friends show – relatively new animals to the stage – but very eager.
The seal, walrus, and otter show was hysterical – it was a Halloween theme. They had the seals doing many human things. Shamu show was good too.
The highlight was probably feeding and touching the dolphin. They were very smooth.
Feed me! Sea World
10-21-88 Friday
Today we went to the San Antonio Zoo.
One of the little monkeys was interested in my tripod – so I started showing him all the things it would do. They were fascinated. So were the golden lion tamarins.
We saw an Aardwolf – he was pretty – and a baby Aardvark – how cute.
Then we went to Market Square – then on to the River Walk. We ate at Olive Garden – lasagna – near the River Center a 3 story shopping mall on the River Walk.
Then we went to the Melodrama Playhouse and Saloon. “Young Dracula Moves out West”. It was a great show.
Time to move on to San Marcos.
10-22-88 Saturday
We checked in at Motel 6 San Marcos – and took a nap. Then we went to Aquarena Springs to see the birds.
Then we changed clothes and went to Peppers on the Falls and discussed Halloween costumes.
10-23-88 Sunday went to 5 mile dam – the water was down really low – and back to the Springs – and back home – Hiss – Boo! (in true melodrama style)
Planning To Relax 