Pie Town, NM

Tuesday, September 25, 2018

Today we move from Socorro, NM to Pie Town, NM. Pie Town is known for its pies.  We plan to have our share.

 This is our last view from the Socorro rodeo grounds.  Socorro is home of the mining college.  I imagine they spend study time there.

This field of old windmills was next to the café below. Looks like a graveyard for windmills.

Pie-O-Neer is another pie café. However as you can tell, it is closed.

 We headed to the Gatherin' Place to have pie. This was the only café open in Pie Town. Apparently they practice cooperative capitalism. When one café is open the others close. In other words, they trade off days being open. Interesting!

This truck was parked our front of The Gatherin' Place.

This is where the pies are made. Both ladies are making different batches of pies.

 Here are the current pies ready to sell. As you can see they are smaller pies and most people share the pie eating the whole pie. The board below lists all the pies they make. However they don't make all of them all the time.  And they don't make sweet potato peach pie at all!

This is the small eating area with several tables that seat about 8 people. Most people share a table.

This is the NM apple pie which has green chilies and pine nuts in it. Of course we had to have ice cream with it. We also bought a regular apple pie and a very berry pie to take with us.

The following pictures are of our progressing sunset this evening.

It is supposed to rain tonight and tomorrow morning.  
     We leave for Show Low, AZ in the morning.

Bosque del Apache NWR just south of San Antonio, NM

Monday, September 24, 2018

Today we leave the Los Alamos area after visiting our daughter and family after 2+ months. We will miss all of them.

We are headed to Socorro, NM for the night. We plan to arrive by noon.

We are parked in Socorro at the Socorro Rodeo Grounds RV park.

We are the only RV in the park. This is looking from behind the coach. Below is looking from the front of the coach. Nothing special, but only $25 with full hookups.

We are going to meet our friends, Bob and Kathi Hailey for lunch then head to the NWR. The Haileys are volunteering for 2+ months at Bosque del Apache NWR. We are blessed to have them give us a private guided tour of the refuge. This is basically a bird refuge. In October the crane start arriving for the winter.  Unfortunately we are a few weeks too early to see the cranes. However we did get to see other types of birds etc.

 Some of the pelicans had arrived.

 It was a nice warm day and there were lots of turtles enjoying the sun. 

 Based on my bird app on my phone I think this is a black phoebe.  It was small.

 Tic even got this close-up of this dragonfly. Pretty cool!

We thought it was funny to see this turtle stretching.

 This little doe was out grazing in the middle of the afternoon.

From this road in the park, we had beautiful views of the mountains.

 I believe Kathi and Bob called these a Night Crane.

 There are several ponds in the refuge. We got some great pictures!

This blue heron just landed near the pelicans. Beautiful birds!

 Another beautiful pond area. This is early evening in Bosque del Apache.

This bird was sitting posed like this.

In the evening we saw these killdeers.

Isn't this blue heron magnificent?

There were a few large white herons also.

You can't tell the legs are yellow but they are. These birds above and below are named Yellowlegs.

The sun came out briefly and highlighted the pelicans.

Above and below are some pretty sunset pictures Tic got at the refuge.

Bob and Tic are taking pictures as I watch.  Kathi took both the above and below pictures.

It was a wonderful afternoon and evening.  We can't thank Kathi and Bob enough! We are going to have to plan a trip to Bosque del Apache in late October sometime.  Tomorrow we head to Pie Town, NM.  

Golden Aspens along Colorado - New Mexico border

Saturday, September 22, 2018

Tic and I wanted to see the fall golden aspens. We considered taking the steam train from Chama, NM to Antonito, CO. The price was nearly $250 for the 2 of us.  We decided that we would drive from Los Alamos, NM to Antonio, CO to Chama, NM back to Los Alamos, NM, which would be about 6 to 7 hours including a lunch stop at the Osier Train stop.  

 This is the road north of Espanola headed towards Antonito, Colorado.

This is the Cumbres-Toltec train getting ready to leave from Antonito, CO headed to Osier train station.

We are headed out of Antonito, CO to the Osier train station also via the roadways.

At the western edge of Antonito we saw this skeleton of a church.  We stopped and learned that it was the San Isidro Catholic Church of the San Luis Valley.  In 1973 it was gutted by fire and never restored.

 After taking CO-7 west a certain distance we needed to follow a dirt/gravel road to the Osier train station.  Not far into our drive these cattle suddenly appeared on the road.

We stopped so the cattle could pass.  We finally see the cowboys driving the cattle. Below is one of the cowboys.

 Above is the start of the aspens changing colors. Below are more along the same road.

Above and the 2 pics below are views we saw of the canyon below. The train from Antonito travels through this canyon. WOW gorgeous views!!!

Suddenly in an open high meadow, we saw these antelope.

This is our first view of the Osier train station. See the train track in the middle right side of the picture.  The train from Chama will come from that direction.

 Most of these are original buildings. The water tank is still functional and both trains refill at this tank before taking off again. Below is a close-up of the newer building in the picture.

This is the Osier train station. The train stops here and a huge buffet lunch is served to the passengers. Anyone is allowed to drive up and buy lunch. We saw several hunters come in for lunch.

This is the lunch room before everyone gets here.  There is another dining room below this one.

 She's coming around the mountain now.

 And then he grabbed her. And then he tied her up.  And then he put her on the railroad track. And then train 463 was coming. And then.....along came John - I mean Tic.  Ha Ha

 Look at all the people that got off the train.  I'm glad we got to eat before they arrived. They were supposed to arrive between 12:15 & 12:30 pm and didn't arrive until 1:15 pm.

 Above and below are more beautiful views along our way headed to Chama.

Before getting to Chama we passed through La Manga Pass. Below are 2 pictures of the gorgeous views from the pullout up there.

 We had a wonderful day and saw so much fall colors! We felt blessed.  
Then after dinner at our daughter & son-in-law's in White Rock, NM we were in their back yard. Our son-in-law pointed out something bright that looked like it was near the moon in the sky. We could tell it was not round and appeared oblong. Our daughter suggested it was a weather balloon.  Tic zoomed in with his camera and voila ….. 

...it is a weather balloon.  Jessica submitted the picture to one of the local TV stations for Tic. The picture was on the 10pm news. They said the weather balloon had been launched from Fort Sumner, NM.