A couple of missed opportunities before arriving in Texas

I am trying to follow the path of the Spanish explorer, Coronado, as he made his way up from Mexico, through what is now California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.  There are many legends that abound.  For example, there is a tiny town in New Mexico, on the way to Fort Sumner (where the oldest wind farm in New Mexico still stands), called Puerto de Luna.  Legend has it that Coronado had his army build a bridge, which took four days, right over the river there.  We are pretty sure he built a bridge, because we were reading the firsthand account of his journey, written about 20 years later by one of the men who accompanied the expedition (this will all be in a future blog entry), but nobody is sure where it is.  Some say there is a rock with the name "Coronatto" scrawled onto it, and we set out to see it, but I made Matt turn around right as we were about to get there, and once we got down the the Billy the Kid Museum it would have been another 45 minutes to drive back there to see it.  Missed opportunity number one.

The 19th c church at Puerto de Luna

Matt enjoyed the Billy the Kid museum

 I did not enjoy the museum, because I really wanted to go to the Bosque Redondo memorial to the Long March of the Navajo.  The people at the Billy the Kid Museum told us it was closed Monday and Tuesday, and I neglected to double check.  Turns out it was open today, just closed Tuesday.  Missed opportunity number two.  I was really mad when I found out because this was a really cool site that I had been looking forward to seeing. Check out the Bosque Redondo Memorial and see why I am mad.

We decided to continue to Amarillo without further delay.  We went right back up to Route 66 and made it to the actual midpoint of the entire road!

Our last Route 66 destination of kitch was the Cadillac Ranch, a piece of folk art just off the old highway, where half-buried Cadillacs are painted and re-painted with spray paint by tourists from all over the world.  It was definitely a Vision of America, especially the hundreds of discarded, toxic spray paint cans that people blithely threw away into the field, to seep their chemicals into the ground.

Finally, we arrived in Amarillo, home of the 72 ounce steak and the largest boot showroom in the world.  I guess the day didn't turn out so badly after all!