Road Trip Tally States: TX NM Miles: 700 Total_Miles: 3900 Keeper Photos: 250 Total: 1850 New Species Added: 9 Total Road Trip Bird List: 93 Added to Life List So Far This Trip: 8

This drive day began at the Texas/New Mexico Border, passing from one surreal scene to the next. First there were golden undulating grasslands. Approaching the Continental Divide, larger hills required road cuts in the rock, revealing multicolored striped layers. Periodically I passed various ramshackle bungalows, often corrugated tin and stucco panels arranged roughly into a house-like structure. Some were occupied, others abandoned. Then there was Roswell, New Mexico. It was as otherworldly as one might expect, a tourist magnet with an extraterrestrial theme.


At the crossroads of what were once the main highways, there were sometimes the remnants of old businesses or storage buildings, perhaps gas stations or general stores with windows broken, roofs collapsed, or desert vegetation slowly reclaiming the terrain, growing from the rooftops and cracks in the concrete. With water such a commodity here, Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge stood out as an unspoiled oasis. Moving north towards Rt. 66, the dry grasslands and high deserts once again dominated the terrain.


I have a fascination with abandoned buildings and mid-century roadside relics, especially those that are reflective of a whimsical era of roadtrips from an earlier time. Old motels with their “deco-esque” signs once illuminated the night with flashing colors, beckoning road-weary commercial drivers transporting goods from Chicago to the West Coast, as well as attracting tourists in their finned and chromed sedans as they made their way to some tourist destination.

These now rusted scenes evoke emotion for me, although I’m not quite sure why. It isn’t nostalgia, as the heyday of Route 66 was before I was born. I will have “over-baked” some of the photos from this part of my road trip, attempting to use color, lack of color, contrast, softness, shadows, etc. to communicate a feeling. I feel no particular obligation to render these particular images with accuracy. I’m not a photojournalist. In fact, there are dozens of alternate versions of some of these photographs, some in black and white, some with painterly, Ortonesque, or infrared film-like renderings, all attempts to elicit an interpretation or an emotion.

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OLD STUFF GALLERY

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Bitter Lake NM Slide Show

Bird List Species Added April 15

April 15 Lamesa Hwy, Bitterlake NWR: 9 Additional Species

Swainson’s Hawk (life species)
American Kestrel
Cinnamon Teal (life species)

Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Scaled Quail (life species)

American Coot
Western Kingbird
Western Meadowlark