The first destination on today's agenda was Guadalupe Mountains National Park, which is home to Texas' highest mountain (Guadalupe Peak). But before we got going, we had another opportunity to drive around Van Horn (which takes about ten minutes). It is a bizarre town. Laid out in a very grid fashion with both the interstate and the railroad running east-west about quarter-of-a-mile apart and trisecting the town. It is definitely a traveler's oasis on the I-10 corridor between El Paso and San Antonio - perhaps the best place for a hotel for hundreds of miles in either direction besides Fort Stockton. One of the most unique places to stay in town is a real hotel called the El Capitan. It is a landmark that was originally built in 1930. Apparently, the hotel was renovated in 2009 and it looks really good. The rest of the town... well not so much. Lots of trailers and abandoned homes on the land between the interstate and the railroad. A bit better north of the railroad.
But here's something really interesting about Van Horn. About 25 miles north of town is the location of the Blue Origin Suborbital Launch Facility. Blue Origin is the space rocket company created by the amazon.com founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos. He purchased 290,000 acres (453 square miles) of land near Van Horn to launch rockets. To put that area in context, it is slightly more than half the size of Rhode Island. It is twice the size of the Isle of Man. And it is from this facility that they are launching rockets and bringing them back down in a controlled fashion. I could explain it in detail, but it is far easier to just watch this brief video:
https://www.blueorigin.com/gallery#youtubeYU3J-jKb75g
FYI: they have about 50+ people employed at the facility and are looking for more - but you need to be a rocket scientist type. I assume that all the employees at that facility live in Van Horn (as there is nothing else nearby), which is apt given that living in Van Horn is a bit like living on another planet.
Once we finished with our tour of Van Horn (in reality we actually just missed a turn to get out of town and had to cruise back around to find it), we headed 63 miles up the road to Guadalupe Mountains National Park. A phrase I will undoubtedly use throughout this blog is "desolate stretch of road" and this is the perfect descriptor for this drive. I believe we passed the Blue Origin facility, but did not see any signs of it. There were no billboards advertising Space Travel! - Two Miles Ahead (clean restrooms). In any event, it is gorgeous out here.
The road has next to no traffic - you drive miles and miles without seeing another vehicle. But given the lack of cars, there is a disproportionate amount of roadkill; and I found out why. Twice I had to slam on brakes to avoid hitting an animal; first a suicidal rabbit and then a daredevil roadrunner. Those things will actually take wing and fly if the situation calls for it. For example, they can seriously move if they are about to be hit by a 90-mph Beemer or chased by a rocket-propelled coyote on roller skates.
From Google Earth and Google Road View, I knew this road fairly well. However, those applications don't give a good representation of the change in elevation. We had rolling hills until we got close to the park, and then we climbed abruptly to the base of the mountains, which are at 5700 feet. Today's climb was to the top of Guadalupe Peak, which is at 8700 feet. That is 2000 feet of climbing starting at a mile of elevation. Round trip is about 8 miles and average time is given at close to 8 hours.
It was a weekend and the park was somewhat crowded. The park bills itself as a hikers paradise with dozens of trails; but the Guadalupe hike appears to have been the most popular. The camping area a the bottom was completely full as was the parking area near the Guadalupe trail-head. We parked at the visitor center and hiked about a quarter-of-a-mile to the start of the climb. Right off the bat, I knew I had made a mistake. Briggs was bounding up the trail like an adolescent mountain goat raised on ephedrine and Mountain Dew; I was lagging behind like Eeyore. Well if I got to die, this is as good a place as any. We were passing other hikers going up. Most were early-twenty-something groups enthusiastically talking among themselves about internships, the interweb, iPhones, Bernie Sanders and all that other new-fangled stuff that kids go on about.
It is a gorgeous hike, but strenuous. Briggs made it to the top nearly an hour before I did. Few of those hikers who had started were going the entire way; it was a very limited number of people at the summit. But what a view.
The hike down was easier, but far from easy. For me, the round trip was about 6.5 hours - 5.25 hours for Briggs. I had a hard time squeezing back into the car - my legs and back were refusing to cooperate.
From Guadalupe Mountains, we headed to Las Cruces NM via El Paso TX. Most of the route to El Paso was country roads, but we did get on I-10 for the last bit to I-25. It is this section that parallels the border with Mexico and you get a clear view of Ciudad Juarez. El Paso has a population of about 680,000; Ciudad Juarez is about 1.5 million. It is such a different world across the Rio Grande. So glad we got to see it before that giant wall is built (I don't know how they are going to afford it).
Dinner was at a Cracker Barrel, and we both ate somewhat healthy (lots of veggies). Tomorrow is a cake walk compared to today.
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