St. Jo

Waiting for Pony Express Museum to open. Then on to Hannibal.

Mountains, plains, grasslands, forts

Abandoned windmill, Pecos. Aermotor has been in business since 1888.

Always hard to leave Santa Fe. Walking in Pecos, tapas for dinner, fine weather (wildfire smoke mostly keeping its distance).

But, today was a driving day, so we were on the road early through landscapes right out of my once-beloved The High Chaparral  (though that was Arizona), and stops at national historic spots so we could stamp our National Park Service Passport booklet.

The high desert was beautiful.  Then grasslands stretched out for miles on end, no sign of civilization except a ranch house here and there, sometimes inhabited, sometimes abandoned--intriguing yet inaccessible Rural Decay. Cattle dotting the land like insects on the fur of an enormous tawny lion. Stopped at Fort Union--a cool ruin now in the middle of nowhere, but once a busy stop on the Santa Fe Trail. Lunch at a trendy, healthful cafe in Trinidad, Colorado--a neat town, like Northampton in the Olde West, i.e.: flyer for a holistic veterinarian posted on the cafe bulletin board. Climbed over a mountain pass, and swooped down on the other side.  We passed through the Comanche Grasslands and visited Bent's Old Fort in late afternoon.  After the barren vistas, it was startling to see corn where the Arkansas River could provide irrigation. Temps crept over 100 sometimes.

Disappointed with photos I've taken, not being up to the challenges of Western scale and light, wide open spaces and high contrast.

Fort Union, New Mexico

We reached our destination on the former edge of the Dust Bowl--Lamar, Colorado--around 5:30. From a Thai restaurant on the wide Main Street, we watched a real prairie thunderstorm blow by through plate-glass windows on three sides, while cars pulled up to the window of the drive-thru liquor store across the street.

Intermezzo

What a pleasure it is to be at Las Brisas de Santa Fe: doves cooing on a cool quiet morning with coffee on the patio instead of "free" raisin bran bolted down in the lobby of a chain hotel before hopping into the car.

And we had a good night's sleep here, as opposed to our night in Amarillo. There, the night clubs revved up--it was Saturday night, after all--but that was not a problem. We only heard the occasional throb from a hip-hop-mobile until about 2 a.m., when we were awakened by a preacher's harangue, magnified so that we could hear every word, blasted into Polk Avenue from a bullhorn:  "....the bible says so!  You will burn in hell fire, FOREVER!   The only way is through Jesus Christ..."  blah blah etc. etc.  Without parting our draperies, we assumed he was publicly castigating the cattle-country "meat market" crowd as they left the clubs to sleep until time for church. Welcome to Texas.

Adios, Texas.

From the Asheville hotel room, on the 4th of July, you could see an intermittent glow where fireworks were ignited at some low altitude. Because they weren't rocketing upward, the buildings blocked the real display, and all you could see was a kind of Northern Lights against the blackness behind the shadowy, boxy cityscape. This made me think of Plato's allegory of the cave, where constrained observers only see shadows dancing on a cave wall, but they think it's reality.  That is sort of the overall effect of our drive West, where even "taking our time," not barreling through 6 states as quickly as possible, we only caught a glimpse of our surroundings, accepting the surface and making assumptions about the rest.  There just wasn't enough latitude to stray from our itinerary--and indeed, we only scratched the surface of that--and enjoy serendipitous discoveries.  All in all, more traveling than touring.

But still, there were some fine experiences.  My ode to Asheville:

Urban chic and mountain roots,

Little short skirts with sturdy boots.

In Nashville,

loved hearing The Silver Threads at Layla's, late afternoon--some of the band members play four hours there then go on to another gig. Eileen Rose belts out Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn.

 The lead singer (Mandy Allen?) of Savannah at The Second Fiddle announced that "the only place you can come where the band can play a song they don't know and it sounds like the original is Nashville." They also introduced patrons to the local tradition of "holler and swaller":  raise your glass, whoop, and take a drink. "Raise your left hand and wave at somebody you don't know," they said to the audience. "That's called Southern hospitality," then sang "put some gas in my truck/butter on my biscuits," [Josh Thompson] "I love good cold beer/and mustard on my fries," [Eric Church] and Joan Jett's "I Love Rock and Roll." A gray-haired couple danced to a Ronny Milsap song in the back of the club. After singing "heads California/tails Carolina," Miss Allen called out, "Where are my Carolina people?," having asked where everyone was from; they work hard to please even sometimes sparse weeknight crowds. These great musicians play only for tips, a Nashville custom. We wanted to write our own country song with lyrics to the effect of "cash on the bar/is better than a credit card" after seeing how people pay for one Bud Lite with Visa. That's somehow a much less personal, comfortable transaction than leaving some bills out for the bartender to deduct from. But we didn't get further than that.

The Silver Threads

Savannah

Hatch Show Print was cool.

Walking back from there in the morning, I stopped at a corner with two down-and-outters with bags of cans, who turned to see who was behind them. "Morning," I said. "Making my way back," one said, cigarette stub bobbing in his lips, "to the Shelter. I'm not a millionaire, you know."  "Not many of us are," I said.  His seedy companion muttered, "Yeah, gov'ment took it all."

Do you think they vote Republican?

We drove directly to Sun studios.  Really amazing to stand on the very linoleum where rock 'n' roll was born.

Lunch at Central BBQ was a treat.

In Little Rock, cruised the impressive Clinton Library. There, also, happened to be a gallery exhibit of wonderful photographs, large black-and-white prints, of Elvis from 1956. Then we visited Central High School National Historic Site.  Later, we had "six degrees of separation" moments:  at a trendy wine bar we met a community leader who is friendly enough with Clinton to have been teased by the former president about his flashy designer socks, for which he is now acclaimed in his city.  In our hotel, Tim fell into conversation with a guy from Chicago whose father (now deceased) was a freshman at the Stoneham, Mass., high school when Tim was a senior there.

On the way to Oklahoma City, we paused at Fort Smith for the historic site commemorating the despicable history of U.S./Native American relations, and the taming of the white frontier. In Oklahoma City, walked through the well-designed and moving Memorial, but felt no need to see the related museum.

We highly recommend Russell's truck stop in Endee, New Mexico. Diner decor, swiveling stools at the counter, a vintage car display, immaculate, friendly.

The highlight of Amarillo was Cadillac Ranch--I'll save that for another post. Time for breakfast.

Greetings from Amarillo

Picnic table at Oklahoma rest area, Route 40.

We are on the 4th floor of the historic Fisk building in downtown Amarillo, Texas.  Amarillo used to be named Oneida, and when the name was changed by popular preference, many inhabitants painted their doors yellow in honor of the meaning of the Spanish word.  Looking down Polk Street, we have a view of two great neon signs:  the Paramount theater and the Acapulco Mexican Restaurant.  The streets are as empty as if someone hollered that the gunslinger was comin' into town so everyone should hightail it into the nearest saloon. But it's just that it's Saturday afternoon in a city center, and about 104 degrees outside.  Oh, there was one guy going into the tattoo parlor earlier. Let us hope that Tatums Night Club, just below, is not too happenin' on Saturday nights.

Tim and I pretty much agree that the only city we've seen that might have long-term appeal is Asheville. Maybe it was just because it was the 4th of July. Maybe the low mountains reminded us of the Flat Hills of our New England Homeland. But there were lots of people with baby carriages.  Street musicians.  "Arts" neighborhoods.  Music galore--as accessible as it was in Nashville. 

One of the highlights of our trip was the story we heard about the veteran Bluegrass Boy, Ralph Lewis, age 83, whom we saw play the mandolin with astonishing facility at an Irish-esque pub with "The Sons of Ralph."   They'd played at the wedding of the daughter of a guy in a baseball cap, sitting next to us at the bar (whom we later learned was a prominent Methodist minister). One time he asked Ralph how he liked traveling around the world as a performer.  How was Japan?  He liked the food.  How was England--what was his favorite part? "Buckingham Palace," Ralph said.  "Oh, did you take a tour?"  "No, we played for the Queen."  "You mean she came to one of your concerts?"  "No, we played for her, in a room."  "A personal audience? Did she like it?"  "Well," said Ralph, "she was tappin' her foot.

 The tour of  Thomas Wolfe's house was absorbing, since I started the intensely autobiographical Look Homeward, Angel in honor of the visit. Alas:  the actual angel (from his father's workshop) now resides in another town, and the door knobs were nondescript metal.  But it looked just as it did when it was the boarding house, Old Kentucky Home, that the fictional Dixieland was modeled after.

Another highlight was the view from the Sunset Terrace at Grove Park Inn, an historic resort where once Helen Keller, FDR, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Bill Clinton, the Obamas, and other celebrities found repose.  As we sat calmly eating salad in the stone fortress, open to the air, a storm swirled and lightning flashed in the distant mountains. 

I'll now sign off, and Tim will interrupt his reading of a history of the Dust Bowl, in order to get supper at a nearby splurge-y restaurant.  The outdoor seating at the Acapulco might be a little toasty this evening.