We arrived in the tiny town of Tatum, New Mexico, to find half the restaurants in town closed for the Independence Day holiday. Therefore, we turned around and drove the few blocks to Tatum's other restaurant.
When traveling off the Interstate, slow down entering towns. Bears are hunting.
We were promptly seated at the only open table. As we ate, we noticed that Tiny's started turning away new arrivals. They were closing early at 2 pm so that they could join their families for the holiday. We were the last ones in and the last ones out.
(We later discovered that closing restaurants on July 4th is more common than I had thought when we were unable to find any not-a-national-chain restaurants open for dinner later in the day.)
We continued east towards Texas; with a goal of Abilene for the night.
After an awesome breakfast at The Red Onion, we set out to explore Roswell, New Mexico, in the daylight. (We got there too late and too tired and too hungry to do much exploring the night before. However, we did encounter an extra terrestrial missionary shouting out "Earthlings, Jesus loves you!" over a loudspeaker.)
The town is obsessed with UFOs and aliens -- or, more accurately, the town seems obsessed with getting people obsessed with UFOs and aliens in order to encourage them visit and spend money in Roswell.
The Roswell connection to UFOs and space aliens goes back to a UFO crash near Roswell in 1947. The US Air Force claims it was a weather balloon. Some prefer to believe it was something from another world. Conspiracy theories abound.
We wandered around downtown Roswell and its many shops selling everything alien -- but mostly t-shirts. Aliens visiting Roswell must like t-shirts. Or maybe the locals in Roswell just want to clothe the poor naked aliens who visit their town. The aliens are naked in most of the depictions I saw in Roswell.
The museum primarily consists of photos and stories of UFOs. Due to a special event, the place was also filled with authors peddling books about their UFO research and personal close encounters. In speaking to a couple of these people, I found myself utterly ignorant of their world -- a world in which one is expected to know the stories and the processes for identifying and classifying UFOs and all the associated vocabulary. I quickly and unintentionally outed myself as one not in their community -- an alien.
Operating on an alien crash victim
An naked alien team standing around trying to decide where to go for lunch
I found the whole thing to be a bit cheesy -- a bit of cheesy fun. After all, I have heard that Roswell is home to one of the largest Mozzarella factories on the planet. Perhaps extra terrestrials go there in search of cheese; not t-shirts.
Until someone convinces me otherwise, I'm going to believe that it was a weather balloon that crashed in New Mexico in 1947. Although, the writers of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine do offer an interesting theory...
Having had enough of Roswell, we got back in the car and headed east towards Texas.
Just outside of Roswell, we picked up a couple hitchhikers.
At the start of roadtrip day 2, we set out from our motel room in search of food.
The local Sonic was not in compliance with our "avoid chain restaurants" rule, plus it appeared that they might not be very friendly towards us earthlings. We kept on driving in search of a local human-friendly establishment.
We came upon what, at first glance, appeared to be a mostly-empty shopping center; except for a clump of cars on one end. I caught a glimpse of people walking from their car to one of the buildings as we passed. We turned around. Cars in an otherwise-empty shopping center early in the morning before shops open suggests there might be a good restaurant there.
Sure enough, there was a restaurant there -- one I would not have recognized as a restaurant from the street.
Inside we found friendly people serving up tasty food.
Waiting for food
An inside-out omlette
A tasty steak and egg burro
If you ever find yourself in Roswell, New Mexico, I recommend you try breakfast at The Red Onion -- unless you're an alien. If you're an alien, go to Sonic.
West of Socorro, New Mexico, we passed the Very Large Array -- a collection of radio telescopes operated by people waiting for E.T. to return their call.
In western New Mexico, a few miles west of where US Highway 60 crosses the continental divide, I had a vision -- a sign. This sign came n the form of a giant bird-like creature, and it demanded I stop for pie.
This sign stands in a town that appears to be miles from nowhere -- a town named Pie Town.
I stopped at Pie-O-Neer. It turns out that the find folks in Pie Town, New Mexico, have been serving up pie to travelers for nearly 100 years.
Try the blueberry.
Our bellies filled with pie, we happily resumed our journey east.
A little over an hour east of our home in Gilbert, Arizona, is the copper mining town of Globe. As we entered Globe, I got off the highway and drove through downtown Globe in search of breakfast.
I noticed a cafe, La Luz Del Dia, with lots of cars parked in front of it. We too parked.
La Luz Del Dia is a tiny cafe staffed by friendly people who serve up awesome breakfast burritos for cheap.
Our waitress and the guy at the next table recommended we check out a local store called The Pickle Barrel Trading Post. First, we wandered around downtown Globe.
After a bit of wandering around Globe, we got back into the car and headed out in search of the Pickle Barrel Trading Post. As I pulled into the parking lot, I was happy to see that the facilities were easily accessible.
The outside of the Pickle Barrel Trading Post is filled with metal art. If it weren't for the need to haul any giant metal creature purchase around the country over the next couple months, I might have bought something. We'll have to revisit this place after we're back home.
Having failed to find any pickles at the trading post, we resumed our often-slow drive through the mountains.
Rather than take a contiguous week or two off work for a vacation this summer, I am launching an experiment in extreme telecommuting.
I am taking my work as remote telecommuting employee on the road -- transforming work from home into work from wherever.
Sophia and I are running away from home. We're going on a road trip that will likely last the rest of the summer.
We're starting out with the long Independence Day weekend made a little longer with a couple vacation days. After that, we'll explore the country and I'll work from wherever.
In making the journey more important than the destination, we've set some guidelines:
Our Roadtripping Rules
No whining
Avoid Interstate highways
Avoid chain restaurants
Stop, see, and do stuff along the way
Work as if I weren't traveling, at least 4 days a week (I'm taking vacation one day a week.)
