New Mexico - Day 5 - to Sandia Park

My friends' home near Sandia Park
Friday, 5 November 2021

today's route

The yellow line on the map is from when I visited my friends in July last year - during my COVID hiatus.  You can see today's drive wasn't particularly long, and Google said it'd take me only 2 hours.  But of course it took me much longer, as usual.

I left the campground just before 8:00 - just after sunrise - and found the interstate along that section to be not like usual interstates.  I suppose it's because it curved around mountains and through forests, so it looked more like a US route than an interstate.

We took a break at a park in a town that I now can't remember the name of.  I remember the park well but can't find anything that looks like it on Google Maps.  The parking lot was next to a playground, which didn't have a "no pets" sign but I was sure wouldn't want my dogs there, so we just walked around the large area where the parking lot was.  

We were just coming back to the RV when a police car pulled up quickly right in front of my RV, and the officer got out and put on a mask and started coming towards us, so I immediately started wondering what I'd done wrong.  Nothing, it turned out.  He wanted information.  Had I seen a woman around there?  I pointed to a woman in a yard nearby but said we'd only been there about 15 minutes and asked whether there was a problem.  He said they'd gotten a report of a woman who was unclothed - his word - in the vicinity.  I was glad it was cool enough for me to be wearing about 4 layers of clothes.

We had an early lunch and stayed a while, which was just as well because the cop stayed parked in front of us for a good part of that time.  And another police car pulled up beside us, the 2 of them talked for a while, then the 1st one left and the 2nd one stayed a while longer.  This was not a large town (I wish I could remember the name) and I didn't expect it to be a hotbed of excitement.

I passed the turn for the Pecos National Historic Park, which is another place that would be interesting to spend time in.  It includes a surprising array of historical sites, ranging from prehistoric ruins to cattle ranches (once owned by Greer Garson, the actress) to the Glorieta Pass Battlefield.  That last was where a significant Civil War battle was fought that I knew nothing about.  

Seems southern NM was aligned with the Confederacy, and troops from Confederate Texas tried to cross Glorieta Pass to take over Fort Union, which was then controlled (appropriately enough) by the Union.  It looks like the Texans won that battle but ended up losing the war, so to speak, because the Northern forces destroyed the Texans' supply chain, forcing them to retreat, ultimately, back to Texas.  There's an interesting account, including controversy over who should get the credit for the winning strategy, on this Wikipedia page.   https://en.wikipedia.org/Battle-of-Glorieta-Pass

We turned onto NM-41, which took us past several small towns and down to I-40 and the town of Moriarty, elev. 6,200'.  We stopped there again at a nice little park where we could walk around a bit.

I was interested to note that I had found hardly any religious radio stations until we got near Albuquerque.  Not sure why that would be.

And then up off the interstate to Sandia Park and the other small communities that dot the mountains above the city.  It was really nice to see Paula and Bruce again.  I'd been dealing all day with the continuing dizziness and headache that hit me a couple of days ago in Taos, so it was good to know I could just sit and relax with friends who knew me well enough to know what to expect.