Theater, a caldera, a boarding school and bombs

Theater, a caldera, a boarding school and bombs

Thingamajig Players in Pagosa Springs entertains us with the musical “Jeckyl & Hyde”, based on R.L. Stevenson’s 19^th Century novel about a scientist who believes he can separate the good and bad parts of a person’s personality.  When his research proposal is rejected by a committee of academics he performs experiments on himself, producing the homicidal Mr. Edward Hyde, who proceeds to murder most of the committee.

The musical adds not one, but two romantic interests to Stevenson’s’ story – a girl who Jeckyl is engaged to marry, and a prostitute who he befriends.  Not exactly a happy “Rodgers & Hammerstein” type musical, but a very entertaining and well-acted production.  This is the second show we’ve seen from this company, and if you find yourself in Pagosa, I recommend you check them out.

We spend 4 days in the national forest campground, enjoying a couple of meals in town but otherwise just relaxing, after which we forge a new (for us) route to Bandelier National Monument in New Mexico, traveling through the village of Chama (one end of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad), where we savor huge (and delicious) hamburgers and fries for lunch at the High Country restaurant – another strong recommendation.  This route is much more scenic than the one we took last year.  We follow US84 all the way from Pagosa Springs to Espanola, NM, enjoying high desert scenery, and little traffic.

I get a nasty shock as we’re heading to our campsite at Bandelier National Monument – you can’t reserve sites there.  I probably knew this last year but have forgotten.  Vicky does know this but, as she puts it “It’s never full”.  Well, she’s right that it isn’t full, but it has no sites that will fit our RV. Unless you’re camping, Bandelier can only be reached by a free shuttle bus from the town of White Rock, but we’ve driven the 8 miles of winding, steep mountain roads to the campsite, and have to retrace our steps.  I’m not too gracious about this.  Fortunately, there are sites at the Visitor Center in White Rock with electric hookups, and we’re able to spend 2 nights there.

Next morning we get an early start to drive to the Valdes Caldera National Monument, where we arrived last year after closing time.  It’s a huge extinct volcano and they only allow 35 cars to follow the roads each day, so you have to get there early (or so we’d been told!).  On the way, after climbing up a steep cliff in the car, we pass a sign saying “Elk” and showing an elk standing still (as opposed to the deer signs that show them leaping!).  I comment to Vicky that I’ve never seen an elk standing in the road, drive round a curve and stop for – you guessed it – two elk standing in the road!  They unconcernedly walk off to join their buddies at the side of the road – some very impressive racks of antlers on the stags.  A great start to the day!

Turns out we’re car number 5 at the Monument and the ranger tells us they’ve never run out of permits so far this year as they re-issue them after people check back in at the Visitor Center!

The parking lot is full of cute prairie dogs which gives us an entertaining half hour, after which we do drive to the end of the road and back.  This takes us past some cabins (they were part of a ranch before the government took over the land), though the caldera to the point where we can see the opposite (north) rim.  We have the place virtually to ourselves, but meet ground squirrels, prairie dogs, a coyote, a hawk (very close to the road and not at all afraid of us) and perhaps most surprisingly, a herd of cows which, as we find out later, is left over from ranching days.

When we reach the end of the road a light rain starts, and as we’d seen forecasts of storms later in the day, we don’t stop long.  We make it back to the Visitor Center (sunny, of course) in late morning and visit with the prairie dogs for a time, then head down the hill  to Los Alamos for the second time in 2 years.

Last year we spent almost all our time in the Bradbury Museum, which details the development of the atomic bombs during World War II.  It’s fascinating, so we spent hours there, pausing only for lunch and a walk around the historic buildings.  This year we start with the National Park Visitor Center, enjoying a film detailing the inhabitants of the area from prehistoric times to the present day, and after a passable lunch at a Thai fast food joint we visit the museums in town, learning more about the pueblo people, the day to day life of the people in the days of the “secret city”, and more recent developments.  There are plenty of artifacts and stories.  In particular I’m fascinated by the history of the boys’ boarding school that was dispossessed in 1942 to make room for the scientists.  The boys got a superb education from recent graduates, and survived a rugged lifestyle including sleeping outside on the porch all year.  (This area has lots of snow in winter and very hot summers!).  Better them than me!  We also learn of fast friendships that developed between the pueblo people and the Manhattan Project staff – a great bridge across vastly different cultures.

We return to Quill and the RV in White Rock, and next morning take the short trip to Roadrunner RV in Pojoaque, north of Santa Fe, our home for the next 7 days as we enjoy the opera.  This post is getting long, so I’ll add start a new