A Blast from the Past

Day 9: Saturday, December 1
Big Bend to Las Cruces, NM
Early risers eating breakfast in the Chisos Basin Lodge can watch the mountains around the basin catch the sun’s fire as it rises and paints them bright russet and gold for a few magic moments of morning glory.
 

We revel in the beauty of early morning high in the mountains, then must be on our way to Las Cruces--it's a long drive north, mostly on two lane roads through desert and cattle country.  

 

Settled into a kind of pleasant reverie of monotony, cruising at 78 mph on the lonely two lane highway, far from any town, we pass a little Prada shop. WHAT? Dick squeals to a stop, and we turn around for another look. 

Yes, there are what appear to be lovely Prada purses and shoes displayed inside, visible if you press your nose right up against the dusty display windows.  Later research reveals that the store is an art installation--the original glass windows had to be replaced with plexiglass when cowboys shot out the glass, repeatedly.

 

Texas has beautiful county courthouses.  This is the courthouse in Marfa, which, of course, sits resplendent on a square in the center of town.  The jail house across the street is fashioned in the same high style, almost like a guest house for the court house (although it seems to no longer be in use, at least for its original purpose).
 

 When we pass the stadium of University of Texas El Paso, Dick begins to reminisce about his past pole vaulting prowess--he broke the stadium record here back in 1960.

 
The memories flow on as we settle into our hotel in Las Cruces, and the desk clerk recommends that we dine at La Posta.  Dick has dined there before--over fifty years ago, when the team bus stopped there on the way home from that track meet in El Paso where he vaulted so well.  But the restaurant’s history runs far deeper than that.  The building dates back to the 1840s, when it was stage coach stop.  Later it became a hotel and restaurant--a sign in La Posta proudly claims, “This building is the original La Posta.  For more than a century and a quarter, these ‘dobe walls have withstood the attack of elements and man, have sheltered such personalities as Billy the Kid, Kit Carson and Pancho Villa.  Now Mesilla sleeps, but La Posta still offers its traditional hospitality to all.”

 
La Posta has had a number of expansions and additions since 1960, but we are seated in the original dining room, maybe even right where Dick sat before (although he doesn’t remember the details clearly enough to verify this, but I would like to believe it could be true.)

 

Grandeur

Day 8: Friday, November 30
Big Bend National Park
Glorious hikes--up a mountain and along the Rio Grande into a slot canyon with sides towering 1500 feet above us. Winding drives with inspiring--often surprising--vistas around just about every hairpin curve. 

Words are too small--here is our day in pictures.

The next three pictures are of the Rio Grande--with Mexico on the left shore and the United States on the right.  There are many spots where it is shallow enough to wade across without getting your knees wet.

Sunset through "The Window" at Chisos Basin.  It would be more dramatic with some clouds, but we aren't complaining.

Mostly Texas Tedium

Our Southern Winter Wonderland Adventure
Day 7:  San Antonio to Big Bend National Park
“The plains-the wonderful great big sky--makes me want to breathe so deep that I’ll break--There is so much of it.”  So wrote Georgia O’Keefe in a letter to Alfred Steglitz.  Oh, if only we could feel such rapture driving across the arid plains of Texas.

 

There is not much happening for miles and miles. Not many trees, not much wildlife, just lots of brush and barbed wire fences.  We can’t even find roadside attractions, because we can’t pick up a Verizon signal most of the time.

 

One exception is in the town of Comfort, home to the only monument to the Union erected in a state south of the Mason Dixon Line (except in National Cemeteries).  Comfort was settled by German immigrants in 1854.  This monument marks the grave of 38 German immigrant farmers who were chased and massacred by their non-immigrant neighbors in 1862, after they refused to sign a loyalty oath to the Confederacy and left town in a group of about sixty men intending to join up with Union troops camped nearby in Mexico.  The massacred men’s bodies were left unburied, and their remains were reclaimed by their families in 1865, to be buried here in a mass grave.  The words engraved on the monument are German--“Treue der Union.”  Some historians estimate that as many as 150 citizens of Comfort were killed for failing to take an oath of allegiance to the Confederacy.  The lucky ones just had their homes or farms burned.

 

Back on the road, by afternoon, the land began to roll, and then we came upon an expanse of mesas hosting a forest of wind turbines stretching for miles. Mountains in the distance began to huddle close to the plain.  Now we are at the very tip of West Texas in Big Bend National Park, staying 5,000 miles up in the Chisos Mountains. We got here just as the sun set, washing the peaks around us with warm russet tones, then leaving them as dark silhouettes against a deep pink sky.  Tomorrow we will see the mountains in a new light--literally.

A Day of Aesthetic Appreciation

Our Southern Winter Wonderland Adventure
Day 6: San Antonio
We awake to the sounds of little Eddie cooing and gurgling in the kitchen while Madonna fixes our breakfast--baked strawberries topped with cinnamon rolls, and a second course of skillet potatoes topped with an egg and bacon.  Needless to say, this is more calories than we should eat all day, but we adore it--a classic B&B overindulgence. 

 

We spend the morning visiting four of San Antonio’s five historic missions.  We skip the Alamo, which is front page news today, because the Texas Attorney General just issued a 38 page report that is very critical of the practices of the daughters of the Republic of Texas, who have been responsible for managing the Alamo for over 100 years.  He accuses their leadership of misappropriating and commingling funds and failing to take appropriate care of this Texas treasure, but he also takes care to praise the 7,000 volunteer ladies in the organization who generously donate their time to historic sites and causes, providing an invaluable service to Texas.  Custodianship of the Alamo has been transferred to a state agency, and the Daughters are in turmoil.  

 

We have been to the Alamo and the other missions before, done guided history tours and read the historic plaques, but today, we are just enjoying them as an aesthetic experience (and maybe a bit of a spiritual one, as well). 

 

Online it seemed like it might be worth an hour or two visit, but the McNay Art Museum turns out to be an extraordinary place where we spend the whole afternoon and are the last out when they lock up for the day.  The McNay Museum was the first museum of modern art in Texas, founded by local artist/school art teacher/art collector Marion McNay in the 1940s.  She turned her large home into a museum where she displayed art from her impressive collection of over 300 works (a lot of it from periods we wouldn’t consider modern).  When she died in 1950, she willed the home, her artwork and 23 acres of formally landscaped grounds around the home to a foundation that she generously funded to maintain the museum.  There have been multiple wings added to the home and thousands of pieces of art acquired since then.  Photography is allowed.  We are smitten.

 

 

 

The final aesthetic treat of the day is dinner at the Culinary Institute of America restaurant Nao, dedicated to introducing diners to the finer flavors of Mexico and South America. 

 Food is served in small exquisitely presented tasting portions--like tapas, but smaller--priced at $9 per plate.  Just about every dish includes ingredients we have never heard of. Our server recommends three to four plates per person--we end up sharing seven courses, including one sampler of four different ceviches. 

 Our taste buds are going wild trying to decode the flavors and handle the heat.  This is recreational eating on a very high plane.

 San Antonio’s famous Riverwalk is all lit up for the holidays and is supposed to be quite beautiful, but by the time we finish dinner we agree that we have reached our capacity for aesthetic stimulation today.   And, tomorrow a very long drive across Texas awaits us.

 

Count on Texas to Do It Up Big

Houston to San Antonio
November 27
We got to Houston just in time for what we imagine will be the first of many tasty Mexican meals.  We spent the morning visiting some of the city’s underappreciated unique attractions, then were on our way to San Antonio, about three hours away.

Here are our Houston highlights:

 Glenwood Cemetery:  Dick saw a photograph of a majestic oak tree at the Telfair Art Fair last month, and scrounged the internet to figure out where it was. We made a special trip to find it here.  (We also found the grave of Howard Hughes.)

 

 Catalina Coffee: You would never notice it if you weren’t looking for it, it is in a pretty undistinguished neighborhood across the street from the Goodwill Store, and the furniture inside looks like it was probably purchased at Goodwill, but this place is packed, and once our lattes arrive we understand why.  They are beautiful to look at, and the coffee is the best we can remember tasting anywhere. I hover around the espresso machine hoping to see how they make the delicate designs in the foam, and the Barrista, Max, is happy to provide a detailed demonstration of his technique (the secret is in the consistency of the foam--not too airy, so that it pours pliably, then there is the part about gently sort of painting with a thin stream of foam that I will have to practice a bit at home). 

 

More than Mount Rushmore: David Adickes has sculpted a huge collection of gigantic Presidents’ heads, and they are lying all over the place around his studio in Houston.  Some are behind a barb wire-topped fence, but Barack Obama and George Bush are right out where you can touch them if you want.  Bill Clinton is behind the fence looking over President Obama's shoulder--how symbolic is that? 

 

And, if 20 foot tall President heads aren’t enough to get excited about, at the back of the fenced in lot, the Beatles are sculpted over six times life size.

 “39,000 cans of beer on the wall, 39,000 cans of beer . . .”:  That’s right, this house is aluminum sided using beer cans.  It has a front gate made of beer can lids, a unique beer tab curtain/wind chime hanging from the eaves over the front porch, and many other whimsical design elements fashioned from beer cans.  John Milkovisch decided to decorate his home with beer cans after he retired in 1968, and he spent the next eighteen years creating this masterpiece, using cans from beer he and his neighbors consumed. He died in 1988, and the home is now owned and maintained by a folk art preservation foundation.

 There are lots of other offbeat and larger than life attractions scattered about Houston, but we must be on our way.

 
We are getting hungry around Columbus, Texas, and see a sign for Jerry Mikeska’s Famous BBQ, which doesn’t look like much on the outside, except that the parking lot is full of pick-up trucks.  Inside, WOW, the walls are covered with stuffed animal heads and big fish, and the smell is heavenly smoky.  The old guy behind the counter is Jerry--we recognize him from the many pictures of him with celebrities like Miss Texas Teen USA and politicians, including Rick Perry.  He takes a pile of bills from the register, kisses it, and heads to the back room before making the rounds of all the tables to greet his friends and neighbors and ask us where we are from.  He’s been in business 66 years, and still comes to work every day, but he has cut back to just six hours a day--“It makes a difference to have the owner on the premises,” he says.  And, no, he did not shoot all the game on the walls, he bought them.

 

Once in San Antonio our first stop is the Greenhouse Gallery, where we spend a very long time looking at very good paintings, but not buying anything--yet.

 Then it is time to check in at O’Casey’s Bed and Breakfast in the beautiful Monte Vista Historic District, where we will actually stay for two nights, a welcome respite to our daily driving routine. 

 The Australian B&B owner, Madonna, recommends a couple restaurants within a short walking distance, and later shows up to order take-out at the Italian restaurant where we are dining.  She ends up joining us for dinner, and we end up learning about her eclectic life, with grown children scattered on three continents and a six month old baby here at the B&B, but not for long, since her family is moving to West Point in two weeks, where her military husband will work for two years until he retires, and she will live amidst snow for the first time.  Her energy is enviable, and by this time, our energy is about gone.

Every Day’s a Holiday in New Orleans

November 25-26

After spending less than 24 hours in the French Quarter of New Orleans we have confirmed that this is an alien land where we may visit, but we can never assimilate.

 

But our first stop was New Orleans City Park, 1300 extraordinary acres in the middle of the city, including the largest collection of mature (600-800 years old!) live oaks in the world, plus a sculpture garden, art museum, botanical garden, and a bunch of geocaches (we are only 26 away from reaching 1,000 finds!).  In the spirit of the season, the park hosts a family friendly Celebration in the Oaks every night.  Holiday lights and displays sparkle throughout Storyland, where there are more than 25 larger-than-life storybook vignette play spaces, and Santa Gator sits out front to welcome one and all to this winter wonderland.

 

 After this tame introduction to New Orleans, we made our way to the Hotel St. Marie, our home base in the heart of the French Quarter.  Our room had a wrought iron balcony overlooking this lovely courtyard.  We left the French doors open and enjoyed the sound of the fountain below.

 

 

All was very civilized and tranquil until we walked a couple blocks to Bourbon Street, where we seemed to be the only ones not carrying super-sized buckets of beer or yard long glasses filled with intensely colored alcoholic concoctions.  Scantily clad women beckoned from some doorways, excruciatingly loud music poured out of others.  It was a LOUD crowd.  It made our foray to Beale Street in Memphis a few months ago seem terribly tame.

We found a quiet place with white tablecloths and sort of French food for dinner, then tried to find somewhere to enjoy a coffee drink afterward.  Just when we were about to give up we stumbled upon the Beignet Café, a little open air restaurant in Musical Legends Park, which is basically an alley off Bourbon Street with a bunch of statues of jazz greats scattered about.  We got our decaf lattes and settled in to enjoy the really great music of the Steamboat Willie Jazz Band, who play where every night.  We had found our perfect escape from Bourbon Street. 

 

The next morning we woke to rain, which was fine with us, because from what we saw of the area last night, we figured it could use a little clean-up.  Let the rain rinse away all that vomit and urine and sticky spilled drinks.

Breakfast was beignets and café au lait at the Café du Monde, the original coffee stand at the French Market, in operation since 1862.  All they serve is beignets and coffee, and they do it 24/7.  The coffee has a very distinctive flavor, because it is mixed with chicory, a practice brought here by Alsatians who migrated here from Nova Scotia.   We enjoyed our coffee and beignets on the café’s large covered patio, while listening to a jazz duo on the sidewalk out front.

 

Check-out was at 11, so there was not much time to meander about snapping pictures after breakfast, which we regretted, because it seemed that interesting sights abounded on every block.

 

We didn’t have to mourn leaving behind New Orleans beignets though--our very own Huey’s on the River in Savannah makes beignets that are better (lighter, with more melt-in-your-mouthiness) than the Café du Monde’s.