Mildly desiccated

All too soon it was time to leave.

But wait!

With two (TWO) hurricanes hitting Houston, a virus that won't leave, and more delays to school starting, we decided maybe we could squeeze a couple more weeks out of a summer that robbed us of our usual holiday back to England.

"I found us the perfect place!" declared Hannah. "It's in the desert, but the temperature's the same as here." 

While I will admit that it's still cooler than Texas, a move away from the shady pines to the arid sandstone of Santa Fe has certainly warmed us up a little. We're in a beautiful adobe house that's as off-the-grid as you can get while still having reasonable Internet access. There are solar panels out the front and the water comes from a well. We also have 500 acres to roam, as long as we watch for rattlesnakes and coyotes.

Pete is in his element! Every rocky outcrop is a new kind of vehicle/spaceship/hideout that demands to be climbed, explored, and played on, while two nervous parents try to stop saying "be careful!" every twelve seconds. I'm less in my element, evidenced by the crispiness of my skin even under SPF 50, but the landscape is stunning, the night skies breathtakingly clear, and I've learned that coyotes howl quite melodiously.

New Mexico remains one of the states that has handled this virus the best, mainly because they have a great governor and everyone is wearing masks, even out on the trails. We will head back to Houston soon - happily so, because I'll be reunited with my espresso machine - but until then we're certainly at home in the Land Of Enchantment.

Not the most packed tourist destination.

Conquering a first peak.

Young, old, geological.

St John's College, Santa Fe, where I thought I was applying for uni.

The first stepping stones I believe I've ever come across in the USA.

Up a tree up a mountain.

Getting a bit arty.

More climbing.

No beach, but sandstone.

Found this in the middle of nowhere!?

A garter snake! It's venomous, but due to its large gums has to chew on you for some time to inject its mild toxin, so...

The landscape is covered in these crazy, fossilised trees!

Yet more climbing.

We went to a nature reserve for a hike, which looked like...most other parts of the New Mexico desert.

 Back at the cabin.

Mountain goat.

Big skies.

Mountain High, Valley Deep

Ah - mountain life. The clear air, the sweeping views, the seven-year-old complaining from ten steps behind on every walk! When I was his age I had to walk ten miles to and from school in the driving snow, uphill both ways, etc. etc.

These petitions had no effect, but it turns out that while Pete doesn't like going horizontally he'll travel vertically all day! Yes, he's a rock climber. Perhaps the fight against gravity means he has less energy to fight his well-meaning parents. Climbers not whiners!

Nearby us is Monjeau Peak, which turns out to be the perfect place to allow our boy to scale the heights. There's a fire watchtower on top of this ancient volcano and a road leading all the way up, but you can also take the direct route through scrub, trees, and many many giant eroded boulders.

I have to say, the watchtower looks lovely; a little six-foot-square room planted on top of a stone tower. It's the kind of place that appeals to my monk-like character. As long as there's fast wi-fi and an espresso machine in there, I could spend a few happy months looking out for smoke.

Sadly we had to descend to earth, so our next big hike was back on Shanks's pony as we walked down into a nearby river valley in search of some cave paintings. As it turned out there was one rock, right at the start of the walk, that someone had once carved something into. Calling it "The Petroglyph Trail" did oversell it somewhat. Pete wasn't the only one complaining on that walk.

New Mexico roads are...interesting.

 

The perfect place for some vertical tomfoolery.

 One of the small piles of rock we climbed on the way up the large pile of rock.

Neither up nor down.

But near the top.

My summer house for next year.

At the summit!

What's the point of this unless it's to take awesome action photos?

Like this one (roughly 10 inches off the ground)!

It was decided that returning via the road would be easier than trying to do all that backwards.

Another day, another hike.

Petroglyph - Greek for "you shouldn't have bothered."

Troubled water.

And no water! A picnic in a dry river bed. We were joined by many large ants.

Telling Pete - for the 1,000th time - about my tough childhood walk to school.

Checking out the incoming storm before turning home.

And at home? Elk.

Up sand downs

It was time to take social distancing to the next level. Not just six feet away from other people, but six feet away from any living thing! Thankfully New Mexico - Land Of Enchantment - once again offered the ideal solution: White Sands National Park.

This is not the biggest or most popular national park, but is probably the most aptly named. Perhaps all the stone in Yellowstone is yellow, I don't know, but I can tell you that all the sand around here is most definitely white. It's a gypsum deposit left behind when a huge prehistoric lake full of minerals washed from the surrounding hills evaporated. The US government liked it so much they decided to turn it into a missile test facility, and then double it up as a national park, because how could that possibly go wrong? It still shuts once or twice a week for things to go bang, and we were constantly buzzed by jets from the nearby Holloman Air Force Base.

The National Parks have certainly got their act together when it comes to Covid, with masks, screens, and distance markers at the ranger station. Once inside, there was nobody. We wandered among the dunes on trails marked by sticks in the shifting sand, looking for wildlife and finding none. This was extremely disappointing as the park boasts both road runners and coyotes! It turns out that Looney Tunes is scientifically accurate.

But the main reason we were here was for the sledging. Yes, for a ridiculous fee you can rent a plastic thing and a lump of wax and slide down the pristine dunes to your heart's content. The biggest challenge is finding the steepest dune, as the monochrome nature of the place makes it impossible to judge heights or distances. The second biggest challenge is keeping powdery sand out of your knickers.

Despite the personal abrasion, much sliding was done and much fun was had. Like many places in the vastness of the USA, White Sands is unlike anywhere else on the planet, a jaw-dropping natural wonder far off the beaten track. The National Parks remain central to the soul of America, a fact seemingly understood even in unlikely places. Long may that continue.

On the way home we visited the largest pistachio in the world, because wonders never cease.

No missile testing today. Fingers crossed.

We didn't see any of these either.

A nature trail.

The white stuff.

Alone in the desert.

Away we go!

Top marks for artistic interpretation.

The tough part is walking back to the top.

Off to find the next run.

 

 

What's this place called again?

Picnic lunch.

Then back to the slopes.

Hannah, still smiling whatever the world throws at her.

A proud moment for any parent: my son is sworn in as a junior ranger.

It's official! He can arrest me inside any national park now.

On the way back. These are normal sized pistachios on a pistachio tree.

And this is the largest pistachio in the world.

And these are the largest pistachio ice creams in the universe!