Aliens, Aliens, and more Aliens...

It was bound to happen, I am sorry it happened at this particular time - but the aliens came and erased the pictures I took in Roswell, NM.

The second day planned in New Mexico was a Sunday. It was eerily quiet in Roswell. I left early from just north of Albuquerque to drive the 5 hours to the border of Texas to get to the Carlsbad Caverns National Park with a planned stop in Roswell.

I stopped in Roswell as planned and took some pictures around town of the UFO Museum and a shop down the street called Area 51 - very cute. It was a warm lazy Sunday afternoon - not many people around. After the picture taking around town I headed out of town towards Carlsbad. About 10 minutes out of town I remembered that I was supposed to look for a 6 foot poster of an alien for my brother. So I drove back to town. There were no posters that size, but I was able to get a 6 foot blow-up alien and I thought he could use that instead of the poster.

Okay, this time it is good to go. I buy gas before leaving town to heads towards Carlsbad. I get a little a further out of town and I remembered post cards that I wanted mailed in town to get the Roswell post mark. So I turn around again to look for a post office. There aren't many cars on the road; there are fewer people on the street; some paper blowing across the street on a windless day. At the Visitor Center, which was closed, there was a mail box.

As I opened the mailbox, a piece of paper slipped out of the mail box into the car. Thinking that was odd, but maybe the box was full, I put in the post cards, closed the box and then opened it again to check to see if they would fall out - they didn't. I couldn't see any mail in the box. As I was putting the piece of paper back into mail box I noticed it was a map. A MAP?!

It showed the are of town where I was and the way out of town. About 15 miles out of town it showed a road to the left and then a blank area. Since it was the way I was heading I did not think much of it but went merrily down the road headed towards Carlsbad Caverns.

There wasn't much traffic on the road but since it was Sunday and out in the middle of nowhere New Mexico I did not think of it being unsual. Approaching the 15 mile road on the map, the skies started to turn dark and the wind picked-up. Not that unusual. It had been raining on me the whole trip. Up to this point, the 27th day on the road, it had rained every day but 4 and rain had been forecast on two of those days - so the clouds gathering was nothing new.

However, when looking out to the horizon in the three directions I could see well, there were no other clouds in the vicinity - now that was strange! So I turned on the 15 mile road. It turned out to be a gravel road, packed gravel not unlike many of the gravel roads I traveled in State and National Parks on this trip. And then it turned into not so packed gravel and then finally to dirt. I came to a little rise and stopped dead in my tracks!

Before me was a large dry lake bed with a fence and gate 1/2 mile over the rise. A garage type building off to the left of the gate behind a row of large trees. Now this was incredible. I do not believe in Area 51 and aliens (much to the disappointment of some of my family members) - but this was friggin INCREDIBLE!!

The clouds gathered and the wind blew - from behind the garage rose a an oblong object - it was a dull reddish blackish shimmering color I was snapping pictures like crazy...

The next thing I knew I was on the road just outside of the Carlsbad Caverns heading towards the park entrance and now over 100 pictures are missing. So it was either the aliens or I was so exhausted when I was filing pictures into the various folders I created I through them away or put them in the wrong folder. I am sure it was the aliens.

Talk about aliens! Carlsbad Caverns are very cool. It must have been created by aliens. I was so late in getting back to earth that I had to take the elevator down to the main room of the caverns instead of walking the mile down the path to the big room. Even with missing the walk down what you are able to see in the big room is amazing.

The path is paved with a hand rail on both sides. Getting the asphalt down to pave the path must have been a real fun job.

Some of the formations have names but most do not. Some of the formations are lighted which sometimes caused more problems taking pictures than not have formations lit. But the one I had hoped to have lighted was not.

The bottomless pit has a sign but no lighting in the pit. I had hoped they would use lighting to show how dark and forever deep it goes. But alas, no money for creativity in the Park Budget.

There was not much water seeping into the cavern. The area around the park is in a long drought period. When it is raining on the surface it takes from 4 months to several years for the rainwater to make its way through the limestone to the caverns. The big room is a 850 feet under ground and it has to be over 100 feet high in places.

Like most National Parks, Carlsbad offers an evening program where you can get to see the bats leave an underground cave. The bats do not live in the big room today but there is evidence of bats living in the big room thousands of years ago. Because it is a 5 hour drive back to the campground and they do not let you take pictures of the bats leaving the cave, I did not hang around. I had had enough adventure for one day.

On the way back to Albuquerque I ran into a couple of storms. Didn't get wet, but still got the benefits.

I have pictures of rainbows from 2 of the storms but the third storm was a huge lightening storm and I was driving right into it. One of the rainbows is from between Carlsbad and Roswell and the second one is between Roswell and heading towards the moutains. Just great to have 2 rainbows on the same day. I think these were the third and forth rainbow of the trip.

The whole trip I had hoped to see a lightening storm. Far enough away not to get caught in it, but close enough to watch it. Had the later but not the former. The state highway I was driving took a sharp left at Roswell to head towards a ghost town of sorts called Lincoln. Just the name was enough to get me stop and check it out.

It had nothing to do with Abe but was named for the County it resides in then and today. There were a couple of very old buildings and a museum (which was closed because it was so late) and it was not really a ghost town as there were people who lived in Lincoln today.

Leaving the mountains and heading towards the Interstate to head north to Albuquerque there was a steep straight grade to get out the mountains to head to the valley floor heading due west to the Interstate. What turned out to be just at the Interstate was a huge storm gathering.

It was a great lightening show for the hour or so it took to get to the Interstate. Because of the distance I had to hold the shutter open and so the other cars and lights nearer to me are also in the picture, but you see the first pictures I have ever taken of lightening. They are not that good due to the distance, the lack of a stopping place to take better shots and of course the lack of photography skills of taking pictures in low light by yours truly, but some of them of have an interesting aspect to them.

And then after watching the storm as I approached the road turned north and I beat the storm. I had 4 or 5 drops fall on the car and that was it. The storm stayed where it was and I headed north to Albuquerque and beyond and did not get caught in it. Storms in the desert and wide open spaces of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah were like that. You would see them but there were very finicky where they stopped and deposited their water. I am sure that is frustrating to the farmers and ranchers seeing a great storm gather, watch it torrent off in the distance and nary a drop for your crops or animals.

As we end this Sunday June 27th we had aliens for lunch and then some more aliens under ground in Carlsbad, a nice sunset and finally the lightening storm I had hoped for - quite a day, quite a day!

Thanks for traveling along with me and I will get you back to California as quickly as I can. Tomorrow morning it is off to Gallup, NM for some visits to some historical Indian sites.

Michael