Way Underground

Carlsbad Caverns is about three hours east of El Paso.  I'd been there as a very young kid, but really couldn't remember it at all. 

Once we get beyond the City limits, the Highway 180 meanders through rangeland before you get to the Guadalupe Mountains.

"Why do I always feel like we're going to encounter cannibals when we enter one of these areas?" asked Magda.  Too many slasher films, I suppose, and not enough communing with nature.

McKittrick Canyon is supposedly the most beautiful place in Texas though it was hard to tell in February.

In springtime, the desert blossoms with color.

We arrived at the caverns a little after noon, with plenty of time to descend on foot to the King's Palace for our 2 p.m. tour.

A ranger warns people with bad knees or hips to take the elevator down.  I have both, but I was determined to walk 900 feet below ground.

Here's where you enter, and here's where all the bats fly out at sunset in the summer.  In fact, that's how some cowboy discovered the caverns.  When he saw the bats emerging from a distance, he thought they were smoke from a fire and went to investigate.

The National Park Service has done a wonderful job of lighting the stalactites and stalagmites, but it's hard to convey the strangeness of the caverns.  Doesn't this slimy wall look like the skin of the creature in Alien?

This picture of Magda reminds me of the cover art for the Rolling Stones album "Goats Head Soup."

This formation is called "Whale's Mouth."

And this one looks like a menacing ape to me.

Forget the King's Palace--the Big Room is way more awesome!

Magda said Saturday and Sunday couldn't have been more different.  "Yesterday, we were in the bright sunlight and today it's all about darkness."

My one complaint about the trip was that we didn't see any wildlife.  But I did spot these lizards in the carpeting of El Paso's International Airport when we departed.

A Perfect Day

The two-hour time difference had me up well before dawn, so I left Magda sleeping at the hotel and drove back to Scenic Drive to watch the sun rise.  I told you El Paso looked better at night!

The full moon was visible above the Asarco plant which used to smelt copper and lead.  The process left the skies hazy over Juarez and contaminated the ground in El Paso, but the smokestacks looked kind of pretty.  And look at the long shadows they cast!

Next stop:  Fort Bliss National Cemetery, where both my parents are laid to rest against the backdrop of the Franklin Mountains.

I love the simplicity of the headstones.  My mother was buried first, in 1975.  When my father died in 1992 they engraved the other side of the headstone and turned it around so Dad is in front.   Patriarchy dies hard in the military!  That said, I love the fact that privates can be next to generals for all of eternity.  My parents are close to a cook.

Next stop:  White Sands National Park, about 90 minutes north of El Paso, in New Mexico.  I remembered it vividly from my childhood and wondered if Magda, who was visiting a national park for the first time, would be as impressed by it as I had been.  "Uncle Jeff," she observed as we drove into the dunes which get whiter and whiter as the vegetation gradually disappears, "it looks like a Ford commercial."  And later:  "It looks like a screen saver."  To which I hissed:  "Magda, this is the source of those images!"

Sand & Sky

Sinking

Don't you love the contrasting colors of Magda's clothing?

Dune Walker

Homage to Jackie O.

Indian Style

And check this out (sorry about the noise--it's the sound of the wind):

Some visitors surf down these dunes on sleds or waxed boards.  I used to when I was a kid and had the breath knocked out of me when I hit bottom.  This time I indulged in more age-appropriate activities.

Windblown Gypsum

Sand Angel

We took a nature walk too, closer to the entrance, where it felt more like a desert and less like the moon.

The trail markers are family-friendly.

See how the soaptree yucca reproduces itself, even in the harshest conditions?

There's plenty of other vegetation.  I love the shadows it casts.  

Not quite a tumbleweed, but pretty damn close.

The sun dries and bleaches everything so decay doesn't seem quite so gross.

Who says you don't have seasons in the Southwest?  Just look at this tree and tell me it's not winter!

You get a sense of how high the dunes are from this shot of Magda walking back to the car.

Peace, baby!

If White Sands weren't enough, we took the scenic way home through the Rio Grande Valley and made a pit stop in La Mesilla, where Pat Garrett gunned down Billy the Kid.  It's a little too picturesque for my taste.  You can tell how sunburned we got at White Sands in a couple of these shots.

Notice the luminarias on the roof of this building.

Guess who?  His descendants recently petitioned to have him pardoned.  The new Republican governor killed that proposal.

Definitely no kid here.

A green-robed priest was about to celebrate mass in this colorful church.

A "blue highway" took us back to El Paso, through some of the largest pecan groves in the country.  All the trees are perfectly pruned.  The visual effect is dizzying at 50 mph.

We came across this bizarre place when we tried--unsuccessfully--to find the Rio Grande.

As the sun set, the landscape just got prettier and prettier.

A detour took us past this pauper's cemetery in Anthony, New Mexico.  The ground hadn't even settled on some of the graves.  I love photographing cemeteries and announced "I'm in heaven!" when we parked.  Magda was pretty nervous as there were houses all around us, and a small crowd of men drinking beer in front a trailer home.

More El Paso (2021)

More New Mexico (2021)