Tularosa Basin

After dropping my dad off at the airport early Thursday morning, I started making my way back toward Texas. Driving south from Albuquerque, I headed into New Mexico's strange and historic Tularosa Basin.

Just after passing through San Antonio, New Mexico, I saw flashing lights and signs indicating the road ahead was closed. Confused, I turned back to the small town and got a cup of coffee. 

The woman behind the counter said it was a missile test at the White Sands Range. The road would reopen in an hour or two. She suggested I visit the Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge eight miles away. I followed her advice and did some birdwatching in the marshes while I imagined missiles soaring overhead.

Once the road had reopened, I continued east past the Trinity Site, where the first atomic bomb was detonated, to Valley of Fires Recreation Area. A pitch black lava flow dominates the landscape, accented with sharp green leaves adept at finding ways to survive. It was the maximum contrast with White Sands National Monument, my last stop of the night, where everything glowed with an ethereal brightness.

In between the black and the white landscapes, I stopped at the Three Rivers Petroglyph site, home to over ten thousand etchings made by Mogollon Indians. No one knows exactly what they say or mean, but the site host told me a number of theories. Her theory is that the etchings are an ancient version of Facebook--people telling stories about who they see and what they do on a daily basis.