Day 18: Santa Fe, NM to Las Cruces, NM

Stops:

Madrid, NM

Albuquerque, NM

Very Large Array near Magdalena, NM

Truth or Consequences, NM

We were suppose to met some coworkers of mine from the F11X Intel manufacturing site for lunch in Albuquerque, so we decided to get there via the Turquoise Trail, aka NM-14 with a brief stop in Madrid, NM. Madrid isn't much of a town, but it is a strong artist community and a great little park with painted cutouts for plenty of photo ops.  For you Timbers fans, they even have a No Pity Cafe.  Also, there is the Mine Shaft Tavern where they filmed part of the Wild Hogs movie with Tim Allen and John Travolta. It is worth an hour of your time, and even longer if you want to visit all the art galleries. Some amazing work to be seen for sure.

Continuing onward, we arrived in Albuquerque to a restaurant called Mary and Tito's Cafe, which is suppose to be authentic New Mexican food.  The good restaurants are in the South Valley, where the sketchy neighborhoods are.  You should be ok though in the daytime.  We ordered the chile rellenos which were delicious with a kick.  If you like it hot, get the red sauce.

Our next stop was near Magdalena, NM where there was a very large array (VLA) of radio telescopes.  The array consisted of 27 radio telescopes in a Y shape, that can be rotated simultaneously.   They can also be moved along railroad tracks.  Each telescope weighs 270,000 tons.  The radio images each one captures is processed by a supercomputer and transported on fiber optic lines.  If you want to be able to borrow some time for the VLA, you must get your project approved, which is very difficult due to the huge amount of requests.

The VLA is also home to antelopes and jackrabbits.  Everywhere we walked we saw these strange hares with tall ears and huge hind legs. 

The VLA was also shown in the opening shot of the movie 2010 and in a Bon Jovi video and the movie, Contact.

Our next stop was in the town called, Truth or Consequences.  The town used to be called Hot Springs, NM, but there was a game show called Truth or Consequences and the they had a contest.  The first town to change their name to the name of the game show, would get the show aired from their town.  Well, Hot Springs won! The game show host came down to the town as promised an aired an episode.  For a while, the game show host came every year and eventually, the town turned it n a festival called Fiesta, which happens in the first week of May and still happens to this day, even without the game show host.

Finally, we headed out to Las Cruces. We caught a beautiful sunset, but after it was dark, we could see a huge forest fire burning on the Gila Mountains.  Think about that campfire you are the last time you went camping times 1000000.   It was crazy and lit up the sky around it.

Ahhh, finally arrived at the Wal-Mart in Las Cruces and off to bed...