Econo Lodge Van Horn

... much there and the marker thats placed has seen better days. It riddled with bullets holes and covered with graffiti. Still kinda cool to see.

The rest of the day is riding hard!! I was about to give up after about 700 miles but found myself on a stretch of highway with nothing for about a 100 miles so I headed reaching my goal of Van Horn Texas against my will.

I finally made it to my hotel at 1045pm. Just about 15 hours of riding!

... dry, lots of mesquite, but buttes and mesas and lots and lots of windmills, the new kind. Miles and miles of them. Goats and cattle. Oil wells. And then miles and miles and miles of nothing but shrubs. Today not too hot at all - about 84 with a breeze. Blue sky. Great bakery in Llano, and we really liked the town of Mason (we have pictures for the Mason family!) The grocery stores have definitely gone southwestern. Shelves and shelves of tortillas ...

We spent another day on the road, sprinting across the south west again. We left Benson and before long we crossed the border into New Mexico. It is always surprising how the scenery seems to suddenly change in a new state. Firstly, we went through the Texas Canyon which was a rocky pass and then the mountains seemed to disappear and if we had thought Arizona was flat, arid and bleak we were soon to find out that it had nothing on New Mexico! It is hard to take video or ...

... I am not sure what the THING is. I also stopped at the teepee. I am not sure what it is supposed to represent. It seems to be abandoned. I did notice some junk food bags around. Maybe it is shelter for the homeless.

Up early to do a whole day of driving to Texas...and what an awakening at Dan's house for Marcos. While he was doing what needed to be done, he spotted a scorpion walking on the bathroom floor and sliding itself under the shower mat. With the expected shock of a City boy we rushed to the bedroom and told Veronika to kill it!! By the time Veronika arrived...it had disappeared. Dan said we should have crushed ...

... over the course of the 50-odd years that the fort was in use. Today, some of the buildings have been reconstructed and even refurnished to give a good idea of life in the fort. There are soldiers barracks, officers homes and servant quarters to visit. Also on site and currently undergoing restoration is the Fort's hospital where you can take a look at an old, mule-drawn ambulence and read about what it was that killed soldiers in ...

... that looked like a small airplane but it was stationary. It didn't look big enough to be a blimp. Marfa is also known for the strange lights that appear in the night sky. This was broad daylight, but don't forget this is Texas. We asked about it at the next border patrol checkpoint and were told it was used to detect low flying aircraft that shouldn't be low flying. We continued into Ft. Davis and checked into ...

... in the car and drove to the other side of the city and stayed at Grand Central Station RV park. It's pretty busy and sleeping was a challenge for us (not really me... I get so tired I can sleep anywhere.) When morning came our prayer was that dad wouldn't fall asleep on his bike. 70 miles down the road he (and I) were still on our trusty 2 wheelers. God did a huge favor for us and put the wind at our backs. It was a blast for the ...

... came after about fifteen minutes, and we were thankful that it was air conditioned. We checked into the hotel and had a shower and a quick change, before going to check out the hotel pool; unfortunately it looked a bit green, as if someone had just fished out a load of algae, so we didn't fancy a swim. Besides, it was getting quite late, and we hadn't had anything to eat yet. Unfortunately, it being a Sunday, most of the eateries in the downtown area were already ...

... rest area near Van Horn at 11:37 pm-long day and I covered a lot of territory. Not too interesting to write about but it was great to see-all unexplored territory to me, hoping to get back some day to see it at a more leisurely pace. I covered 522.7 miles. My art website and links to my artwanted portfolio http://home.earthlink.net/~greenvanartu sa/