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| Branson MO to Amarillo Texas |
Wednesday September 12th 2018. Plans often change when traveling by RV and
they should. Altering course and just winging it is part of the adventure out
here on the road. Our next destination is Amarillo
Texas where we will pick up Rae Anne,
Millie’s daughter who is there on business. Her conference is ending a day
early so we departed Branson and made the 580 mile drive to Amarillo in one day instead of the originally
planned two. The trip was all interstate and turnpike so it was an easy run.
Our overnight destination, Oasis RV Resort had a site for us and we settled in
late in the afternoon.
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| Amarillo Texas to Los Alamos New Mexico |
Thursday September 13th 2018. In the morning I picked up Rae Anne at her
rental car return while Millie prepped the motorhome for departure. We were
soon seated in the bus and pulling out of the park, I looked at the clock, it
was exactly 9AM. I don’t know how we do it, but it seems like nine times out of
ten, when we go thru our departure routine and pull out on the highway, it will
be 9AM.
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| I-40 west of Amarillo |
I-40 west from Amarillo
is a long series of crests. As the road passes over each one you can see the
road laid out to the horizon. It seems nearly flat but each crest is higher
than the last. You climb almost 2000 feet in about 250 miles.
About 50 miles shy of Albuquerque
we left I-40 for RT 285 and we started another climb in elevation. We would top
out at 7320 feet in Los Alamos,
New Mexico. We had to pass thru Santa Fe and it was lunch
time so we stopped at our favorite Tex/Mex restaurant called Wecks. Only open for
breakfast and lunch it’s not to be missed if you’re ever out this way.
After lunch it was a short 35+/- miles to the mountain top
town of Los Alamos,
but it may as well be a world away. Home of one of our country’s nuclear
research facilities this site was chosen for its remoteness during the Manhattan project.
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| View from the road as you go up the hill to Los Alamos |
Still an important part of our nuclear program, the town has
grown, but it is still a small exclusive community. Duped Atomic
City, it has per capita, more
doctorate degrees than any other municipality in the US. So there’s like a whole bunch
of Einstein’s running around.
As for the nuclear research facility or The Lab, as it’s
called here, there’s not much to see, I think most of it is underground. They do have a small museum in town for the
visiting tourist.
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| Los Alamos perched on Mesa'a in the remote mountains |
Los Alamos is a small place
geographically, with an eclectic mix of house designs, all perched on mesas
with rugged gorges between them. Many of them where built during the Manhattan
project and look the same as they did in the 1940’s, but just down the street
may be a contemporary design or a log cabin.
It’s an interesting place that’s for sure.
We are parked at Kamp Kolman, that’s Rae Anne's driveway. We
will be here for ten days. The boys are happy to have grandma visiting.
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| Kamp Kolman |
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