Where Does That Highway Go?

Day 75

I’ve seen some noteworthy caves on my trip so far. Mammoth Cave and the lava tubes were magnificently dark and isolating. Carlsbad Caverns is much more “cave-y”. This is where the stalactites and stalagmites live. It doesn’t have the primal, visceral feeling that the other caves do; it feels like an alien enclave under the Guadalupe Mountains. The extraterrestrial conspiracy grows!

One of hundreds of mind-bending angles in The Big Room, Carlsbad Caverns, NM
An underground outpost, 750 feet underground

I traipsed around the Big Room for a good chunk of the morning. All the tours sold out a month in advance, so instead of delving deeper, I returned to Carlsbad proper for some lunch. I have determined three key elements that indicate a Mexican restaurant of superlative quality:

  1. Bad tables
  2. Bad chairs
  3. Very few napkins

Check all these boxes, and you will be rewarded with a stunning meal. My carne al pastor, served with chorizo-laced beans, was gone before I could take a picture. I ate more than I should. No regrets.

I spent the next couple hours in a post-meal haze, then drove back to the desert. I found a spot with no people and many cows, unseen but very much heard. My boondocking app says they might migrate over this way in the morning. I pulled out my saxophone and kept building my chops up. Slowly but surely, they’re coming back. Tonight I’ll play the Close Encounters tune and see what happens.

4 Comments

  1. Uncle Dave

    I remember watching a PBS documentary on Teotihuacan some years ago. Seems that the Temple of the Moon is built upon some caverns which the residents considered to be the entrance to the “underworld,” or the place of dead spirits. They were probably volcanic caverns, but what’s WEIRD is that there were several Mayan cities that were just like that, with caves underneath the Temple Mayor or the Temple of the Moon. Those temples had to be aligned to precise compass points determined by where the sun rose and fell on the summer and winter solstices. So watch out when you go into those caves. If you run into Huitzlilopochtli in your travels, you’re DEAD.

  2. Uncle Dave

    Oh, BTW, Charlie Parker once took a tour out west and decided to do almost exactly what you did — he serenaded the cows in a meadow with his alto sax. At least somewhere in the good old USA there are some cows (at least) who still have some sense of TASTE.

  3. Grandma

    Wondering what happened when you played the Close Encounters music on your sax this morning. Did any cows come around to investigate? Jeff and I only walked through the non-tour room also. I don’t remember seeing any stalagmites or stalactites. Did not know about the underground room; maybe it wasn’t back then. Glad you found some good Mexican food for supper. Makes me hungry thinking about it. Hope you find more good adventures today! Love, Grandma

  4. Grandma

    PS: it probably doesn’t make much difference to your trek but just in case, I want to remind you we “fell back” to standard time yesterday.

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