My wife's mother was born in Carizozo in 1923.  A few years later the family moved to Texas and eventually migrated to Northern California during the Great Depression.  We decided to take my wife's nephew to see his roots last week.

If you've followed any of my previous stories you know that I have covered alot of this territory in the past but, I wanted to share our latest adventure with you anyway.

Our ultimate destination was the Cozy Bear Cabins in Ruidoso.  We had never stayed there before and booked a cabin for two nights. 

We had a destination in mind (Ruidoso) but we made everything else up along the way.  So, southeastward we went through Abo Pass and the Ancient Way.....  In a previous trip we had shown my wife's nephew the other two Salinas Pueblo Missions but he hadn't seen Gran Quivira and it's along the way to Carizozo from Mountainair.  (Theme music from one of my favorite travel shows just seems to fit...

Gran Quivira no longer has any permanent human residents but there is plenty of wildlife.  No he wasn't a rattler even though there are plenty of signs along the trail warning you about them.

To get from Mountainair to NM Highway 54 (the direct route from the north into Carizozo) you get on NM Highway 55.  Who would have guessed that being just one number off, Highway 55 would be so different.  Instead of a straight shot through the wind swept cattle country you have to slow down for several left and right turns if you're heading southeast.  Eventually you end up in downtown Claunch.

As we rolled out of Claunch the wind picked up significantly.  Not surprising this year with the drought we're in.  But to the south of Claunch we could see a huge dust and gypsum storm coming our way.  A few miles outside of Claunch we were reminded of that famous song....(in the picture, a bit to the right of the cactus, where the deer and the........ play)

Once we connected up with Highway 54, we decided to finally take a look at White Oaks north of Carizozo.  I wanted to get a cold one a the No Scum Allowed Saloon but it isn't open on Mondays.  Nuts!  So, we drove around town to look at the buildings.

I thought I had seen it all until we came across the Tuff Shed church.

After our brief visit in White Oaks, we connected back up with Highway 54 and drove into the dust/gypsum storm engulfing Carizozo.  We eventually blew our way into the Outpost for a green chile cheeseburger.  And it was good!  We stopped at the Buckhorn in San Antonio, on the way home a few days later, and the Outpost beat their burger by a mile and a half.

And of course we went to Capitan to pay our respects to Smokey.  (Don't you hate it when your relatives insist on pictures like these?)

My relatives in Ruidoso have told me stories about the gypsum storms they get all the way up there from White Sands National Monument.  I didn't believe them until now.  We thought we were climbing up and away from the storm that was engulfing Carizozo but it wasn't any better.  We couldn't see any of the mountains surrounding Ruidoso when we arrived.  I couldn't believe it!

That night in Ruidoso, the forecast for next day was just as bad - wind and dirt!  I wondered if we had come this far just to spend a full day in Ruidoso  (not a bad idea but we had White Sands on our minds).  However my wife had a theory and we awoke early the next day and headed down the slope to White Sands.  Her theory was right.  The winds didn't whip up the gypsum until around 10:30am when we were leaving so we had a great time.

After leaving White Sands we headed to Heart of the Desert for some wine tasting and pistachios.  Then we thought we could make it further north to Three Rivers site but the gypsum (now mixed with dirt) storm engulfed the entire Tularosa Valley.  It was time to head up into the hills and back home to our Cozy Bear cabin via Cloudcroft.

The next day we headed back home and stopped at Valley of Fires.

I never get tired of visiting Carizozo, the Tularosa Valley or Ruidoso.  It has so much to offer in terms of history, attractions, open country and mountains.  I know I'll be making many more tracks in that direction in the future.

Pictures taken by Pamela Rietz