San Ahhhhntonio

If San Antonio is anything like this KOA campground, then this is certainly a place I could live.  It's green here, lush, lots of beautiful trees, lively fauna including small diapered children who have no fear of Higbee! 

So I left Bisbee two days ago and drove up state highway 80.   At one point, I noticed I had no signal on the phone, but I also noticed the clocks were wonky.  Then I looked around and noticed there was not one living thing (besides Higbee) in the area.  Nothing, no one.  I pulled the car over, went to the bathroom on the side of the road (which historically ALWAYS draws a person or two no matter where I am - even in the middle of the woods) and then walked around and nothing, nada soul.  Here are the photos I took looking north and south from the middle of the highway.  

The plan was to spend the night in Las Cruces NM, but I wasn't tired, so I decided to keep driving to take some miles off of the next day's drive.  Could see the lights of Mexico as I drove along Hwy 10, it was a bit strange knowing an arbitrary line kept people in one place.  Went all the way to Van Horne, TX - drove through 3 time zones that day.  Found a reliable Motel 6 - Tom Bodett might sound hokey, but you can depend on a clean, inexpensive and dog-friendly place with Motel 6.  As a sola traveler, I do appreciate the reliability of the chain.  

Got into the room and for the first time in a week or so I was able to get a close look in a well-lit mirror -- OH MY GOD - what I thought was tan was actually a finely embedded layer of dirt, and my face was so dry, I had flakes of dry dead skin on my cheeks!!  A good scrub took care of the problem, and continued driving the next day helped to ensure no more super dryness.

Found Boracho station - I'm sure that place was named by someone's angry wife!  (Borracho = drunk in Spanish)  

While tooling along hwy 10 (which has a speed limit of 80 btw - never saw that before!), A trucker had pulled off the side of the road.  He came out of the cab, grabbed the handles and then missed the first step and lost his balance.  It was like a slow-motion movie.  He let go of the handles and peeled off the cab and fell right on his back in the middle of the highway.  Meanwhile I was barreling up on him (at 75 mph - I respect the law), and had to swerve to miss driving over his head.  I did crush his glasses - hope they weren't his only pair of seeing eye glasses - but in any event, I'm pretty sure he wasn't going to be driving very far - that fall looked like it HURT bad!!!  It took me a while to straighten out the swerving camper in the back.  I'm damn lucky I didn't crush that guy's skull, and not roll the friggin camper.  

From that point forward, a rather uneventful trip to San Antonio - and this beautiful place.  I paid for a week - figure that Lisa Ingle won't be available until after the weekend, and I can use the time in between to work on the thesis.  It's shady and not dusty here - very conducive to intellectual work......or maybe a walk with the dog.