In the summertime...

Not too much news this week, but thought I would post anyway just for good practice.

Went flying. Loved it.

This is the plane I flew. Its really small, and probably lighter than - certainly not heavier than a car. We took off from Wellington airport facing south and were airborne almost immediately after going full-throtle. Climbed to about 1500ft and headed for Turakarau Head. Here the controlled airspace around the airport ended and I was free to climb higher and dork around over Lake Ferry and South Wairarapa. Flew over a really swanky looking $4000/night lodge and looked down at a helicopter flying tourists there way below us. Then turned around and went back around Turakarau, then up the Eastbourne coast past Somes Island to the Petone Esplanade, then rejoined the airport traffic pattern and headed for Mirimar Peninsula before completing final turns to a perfect touchdown at the airport (handled beautifuly by my instructor). We cleared the runway pretty quick as there was a 767 coming in right behind us. I'm doing another lesson on Wednesday, this time logging my first flying-time towards getting a pilots licence.

Went to a couple of Christmas parties, which i enjoyed probably a bit too much. At one I was grabbed by four women and thrown into a spa pool fully clothed. It seems they were unhappy about an incident involving me and a high-powered water gun moments earlier.

Also had a good day on Tuesday, ending with a couple of beers out in the sun on the street at the Dog and Bone, where there was standing room only and we shared our table with a couple of friendly tourists who were in town to see Elton John.

flying into the future

Happy December 1st everybody! It is officially the first day of summer. It is my first real summer in a long time - i managed to skip last years by being in the wrong hemisphere. Should have picked my travel dates better - i'm definately a summer person.

It is hard to imagine that one year ago i was in the midst of my big adventure, the happenings of which are perminantly etched in the pages that precede this scroll. Sometimes it feels like just yesterday, sometimes it feels like a lifetime ago. Sometimes I wish it was now, sometimes I'm glad it's over. Most of the time now I am happy about it. It didn't work out the way I had planned, but that is not necessary for it to have been a wild success. Did I grow for it all? Undoubtedly. It was the most intensely interesting, fun, amazing, wonderful, terrifying, exhilerating and satisfying time... it is but another building block of the person I am today.

I found out a new colleague at work used to manage one of the sites of a restaurant i worked at for a brief stint back in '03. I came clean and confessed that for 3 weeks I was a waiter. I told her how i quit because waitering was too stressful for me and I hated it. She interrupted me at this point and said "hang on a second... being a waiter is too stressful for you and now you work in an emergency communications center?". Made me think maybe I have grown up in the past few years afterall. I'm all about life and death now ;).

Actually I've been thinking about my work situation... and as much as I enjoy it and thrive on the chaos and strangeness of it all, it is one of those jobs that has a tendency to take over one's life. It is never healthy to have work constantly swirling through your head. So for some time now I have been seeking a hobby... i mean other than movies, xbox and drinking. I considered learning to sail or something... but then the other night i had a dream that i died in a plane crash. Far from being distressing it simply put flying on my mind, and i thought maybe flying would be more fun than sailing. So i've booked myself in for a lesson on Tuesday! I will be flying a two-seater Cessna 152 from Wellington Airport, touring the skies above the city and harbor for 40 minutes, before coming back to land. If I like it i'll make flying lessons a regular thing and set out to go solo and get my pilots licence.

Also this coming extended weekend (i'm off saturday thru tuesday) - Visiting parents on Saturday to view house renovations, 'farewell' party at Log Central on Saturday night (he's moving to Whitby), bowling on sunday with work group, followed by a 'uge barbeque with my colleuges for our group's christmas party. And on Thursday, which is not officially part of the extended weekend is the center-wide christmas party at zebo's. Its gonna be non-stop this summer, i'm going to make sure of it.

30 percent bro

Today at work I completed a 30 question 'bro' test. The idea was to find out how much of a bro i really am. Turns out, due to vast inconsistencies in the test criteria, I am only 30 percent bro - well below failure level.

Now I know what you're thinking, niggahs: there ain't no way that homeboy's only 30 peecee bro. And I have to agree with you. I henceforth accuse the 30 question bro test of outright blatant racism. The 30 questions were heaviy skewed towards traditional bros, for example: "have you ever had more than 6 people in your vehicle at once?" and "have you ever spent a day at the beach with a bus load of family?" It subtracted 3 percentage points if you answered yes to the question "have you ever been skiing?". These kinds of questions are unfair and exclusionist to today's modern bro.

Those who know me know that i'm way more bro than hoe, and I'm sure this disappointing result won't effect my standing with you.

In other news I went to the Brooklyn festival yesterday and enjoyed the day down on the streets while devouring a huge bag of cotton candy. You've only got one chance to ruin your teeth right?

Also this weekend I viewed Borat at the movies, and have to recommend it to anyone else who has a slightly insane, bordering on obscene sense of humor. Favorite part: when they put a grizly bear in the back of an ice cream truck, take the truck to a playground and turn on the music, then open the window just as a parkload of kids rushes over revealing a very grouchy grizly and no ice cream. Actually there were lots of favorite parts. But just don't waste your money on it if you are easily offended.

Following the movie I hosted a small gathering for an evening of electronic monopoly and beer/wine/rum appreciation. Have you heard of electronic monopoly? If you haven't played it, you haven't lived. It's not as electronic as it sounds, but there is a battery powered banking machine and all your money is stored on these little credit cards!

Well worth getting out of bed for

It has been a beautiful day weather wise and i had the day off. I lunched at Astoria at high noon, went shopping, visited the film archive, and wandered the streets soaking up the rays.

While in my travels a bus that was out of service slowly smoked past me. The electronic destination display was too small to fit the whole message in, so it displayed "Driver Under", for 10 seconds, before scrolling to finish the statement. As I waited for the screen to change i had a wager with myself over what the next word would be. Being a Stagecoach bus i thought there was about a 50/50 chance the next word would be "Influence". It finally revealed itself to be "instruction".

I bought the coolest Christmas present, something i have been hunting down for years. I finally found it in a shop a couple of days ago, but thought i would come back and buy it the next day. When i went back to buy it yesterday, the shop was nowhere to be seen. I had totally forgotten where it was. Sometimes i think i walk around and i am not fully conscious. I'm not even blond. I went back to where i thought the shop was, and it wasn't there. However, today i stumbled across it again. Unfortunately i cannot reveal what the item is as the intended recipient may be reading this blog. All you need to know is that it is the ultimate cool.

At the film center i watched a doco about the commercial building boom of the 1980s. The doco was made during the boom as well so it was a really interesting perspective. The boom began when the council wrote off the majority of the buildings along the golden mile as earthquake hazards and gave the owners 15 years to either strengthen or demolish. Baring in mind that the owners and developers of the time were the likes of Sir Robert Jones, not many of them were interested in spending money on low-rise high maintenence historic buildings, and so these buildings were demolished by the dozen. Hundreds of them met the wrecking ball before being replaced with the high rise glass towers of today.

It was an interesting perspective because it pointed out that the council was using earthquake safety as a guise to ignite the largest commercial building boom in New Zealand's history. The film quite correctly pointed out that the building styles used during the renewal create a new hazard: glass. When 'the big one' strikes (which the film said was overdue and it was made in 1983!) it is predicted The Terrace and parts of the golden mile will be about a foot deep in broken glass.

It is also interesting because one of the arguments against the renewal was all the inner city residential suburbs that were lost to all the commercial construction, and the construction of the urban motorway. Inner city residents, it was argued, are the lifeblood of the city, and that rigid commercial and residential zoning rules were to the detriment of the city's unique character. Today the city is in the midst of another building boom - this time almost exclusively apartment construction. Is this the best of both worlds? I think maybe. (Except i wish the apartments were cheaper...)

Regardless i mustn't be thinking too much! Today, if nothing more, has been a magnificent day to kick back, relax in the sunshine and take the lid off that first summer ale of the season.

Taranaki

Been in the 'naki for a few days on a work trip / glorified pissup. Thoroughly enjoyed myself. So much so that i have no photos. Visited New Plymouth and Wanganui and a variety of smaller townships: Hawera, Stratford, Waitara, Opunake and Manaia.

The mountain, viewed in a file photo below, looked magnificent as I drove up there on Monday.

Firewatching

So I was nearly asleep late last night when I caught wind of a 2nd alarm scrub fire burning out of control on the Eastern Hills out in the Hutt Valley. I ummed and ahh'ed about whether it was worth driving out there or not... but when i got word that the fire was close to skuttling the Anderson residence, thereby correcting a lifetime of bastardry, i thought this i had to see.

I scrambled out of bed and ran down to the car, scanner in one hand, shoes in the other. As I hit the motorway, still some kilometers from the fireground, I could see a wrath of fire lighting up a beacon right across the city. By the time I got to Waterloo the flames pierced the night-sky rising to mammoth heights over the hills. I, like every other nutjob in town, drove directly to the fire, seeking the best vantage point possible. As I turned on to Riverside Drive, traffic came to a screeching gridlocked halt. There was nowhere to go. Cars to the left of me, cars to the right... everyone's bonnets facing different directions while everyone's eyes were fixated on the best show in town. As the novelty of the situation wore off and people slowly realised that this traffic jam wasn't going to fix itself, the people in the cars started to look at each other... each one as embarrassed to be there as me.

With the cars not moving there was little else to do but to get out and mingle with the people on the street. I've been to many a bush fire in my time, and what is really striking is the way that these events bring out the community. People come out of their houses, people drive, cycle and run from all directions just to get a better look at it. And people actually talk to one another. It reminded me of a fire I went to in Cannons Creek one year. A Samoan family had opened up their lawn, with the best view of the fire, so that rubber neckers could get a good look at the action as the helicopters whirled overhead. The atmosphere last night made me wish i'd called into the grocery store on the way down there and bought a big bag of marshmallows for everyone to roast.

Oh yeah and in case anybody wondered - the Anderson residence survived.

Lumbergh dies in Office Space

Office Space is one of my favorite movies. I have seen it an estimated 30-40 times since striking its gold on the video store shelves in 2001. I gotta level with ya, I am an Office Space fan.

I have only just clicked that Lumbergh dies at the end.

I recently took posession of a dvd entitled "Office Space - Special Edition - With Flair". One of the deleted scenes shows Peter, Michael and Samir talking about Lumbergh's funeral.

Michael: "So are you guys going to Lumbergh's funeral?"
Samir: "No way"
Peter: "Shit no!"

Closer inspection of the fire scene in the original movie shows that Lumbergh's Porche is parked outside the building, with no sign of Lumbergh. Leading to the logical conclusion that he perishes in the fire.

Welcome to Northland - the new 'hood

Well i took the big step and moved into Wellington. Closer to work, and closer to the action. I am living on Crieff St, in the suburb of Northland. Pictured is the Northland Fire Station, which is at the very top of my street, although not accessible directly from my street by road. Crieff Street is one of several streets in Wellington affected by Colonial Idiocy Syndrome. Much of Wellington's street layout was designed in London by a bunch of beard sprouting, cigar smoking, top-hat wearing colonialists looking at maps. Maps are flat. Land in Wellington is not. Consequently, to reach the rest of Northland from Crieff St, you drive half way up and then walk a killer zig zag track up the hill. The fact that there is no direct road route to the fire station from my place is of little concern, as it has now been closed and converted to apartments.


Other interesting features in the 'hood include the Kelburn Viaduct (constructed 1934)...












..and the Northland Tunnel (constructed 1929).


Both of these were constructed to level out the gradient of the climbs for different tramways. The Northland tramline went through this tunnel and connected with the Karori line, which went downtown via Glenmore Street, which is the street that Crieff St intersects with at the base of the hill.




The tramlines have long since disappeared from Welington, wrapped up and replaced by trolley buses in 1964. However, Glenmore Street residents are unusually fond of the historic bus shelters left behind from the old Karori line. The one pictured is not in fact the original, but a replica constructed at much greater expense to the community than the plastic-fantastic adshell model after the original shelter was destroyed by an out-of-control trolley bus one tragic day in 1989. A memorial plaque on the replica shelter commemorates the work of area residents who so flagrantly wasted money which could have been spent feeding starving children.



This is the Chinese embassy, where most mornings a hardy group of falon gong practitioners gather across the road and silently do some wicked kung fu moves with their eyes closed.

And the Botanic Gardens. Perhaps the new 'hood's best attraction. In summer there are a whole lot of free concerts and movie screenings in the gardens. I have had a lot of fun there previous years and i can't wait for it to start up again this summer.

On the road again...

Well, in the air again really. Just got back from a quick trip to Sydney. Here are my photos:

It's me in front of the Opera House.









It's me somewhere... i can't remember where but t was near the water.













Leonie and I outside a bar being silly.








The Three Sisters in the Blue mountains. The sisters are those three rock structures to the right of centre, and the brother on the left is me.







A couple more pics from the Blue Mountains.








Me at Bondi Beach. Also visited were Manly and Coogee beaches. I actually went swimming at Coogee Beach and had a marvellous time getting slammed by rather large waves.







Some cool guy standing in front of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. I also got an autograph.







Down at the pub in Newtown one evening.

From left: Rangi, Mike, Raych, and Leonie - Thanks guys for an amazing time!





The inevitable airport shot just before leaving.
Sydney was full of suprises and a whole lot of fun. Learnt heaps and enjoyed myself even more. If i get a chance/feel motivated enough i will post more of a written blogpost about the trip.

Readers still monitoring movements (or lack thereof) on this site are strongly encouraged to visit newyorkdorks.blogspot.com - a Beggsblog(TM) affiliate blog - detailing my brother and his fiance's journey to the big apple.

Last Post

My last night in the States was spent in Sonoma County north of San Francisco visiting some friends. Friends who make wine. Lots of wine. :) I had a great time up there. I had rented a car and driven up there, it only took a couple of hours to get there from San Francisco and it was completely different. Northern California is really beautiful and green.

In the morning i struck the rush "hour" and it took me a little over 3 hours to get back to San Francisco. There was no real time pressure anyway, except that i had to check out of my hotel. My flight didn't depart til evening. So i just sat there in the very slow moving traffic trying to enjoy my last few hours in the US.








On the way back into the city I got to drive across the golden gate bridge - a lifelong dream! Parking in San Francisco cost me $2.50 every 15 minutes, so i only parked for a short time while i was checking out of the hotel. Then i hit the roads, cruising the streets, flanked by cable cars and such. I went down to South San Francisco and sat on a beach with the airport flight path in front of me knowing that soon i would be on one of those planes.

I went to the airport far to early, thinking i could check my bags in and do some shopping, but the airline checkin desk wsan't open yet and i got really bored at the airport. When it was time to check in i quickly and quietly checked my bags and disappeared into the terminal shopping areas. Air New Zealand gate lounges quickly make you feel like you're already home. Not that it wasn't nice to be home, i just wanted to spend my last few hours in America. The plane was one of the brand new 777s which was exciting for about 10 minutes until the pilot announced a one hour delay due to someone spilling hydraulic fluid on the taxiway.

I know I did the right thing coming home, it just wasn't working out the way i had planned employment-wise and i wanted to go travel around too much. I'm really looking forward to all the possibilities here now too, i just need to find a job! Since turning my trip into more of a tour i had an amazing time and was able to see so many sights and do so much. Still, at the end i'm not sure if traveling really satisfied me or if it just left me hungry for more.

I have gotten better at not leaving my camera behind, but even after three months I still have to kick myself sometimes. Tonight was one of those times. I thought I would just stroll down the street and have dinner so i left my camera at the hotel. Of course after dinner i felt fat and thought i should go for a bit of a walk. Of course on my walk i decided to hop on a cable car. Of course the cable car went up and down the hills, the peaks of which presented fantastic vistas across the city. And of course the sun was setting behind the golden gate bridge as my cable car approached the top of Hyde Street. And of course, my camera was back at the hotel. Take my word for it: it was magnificant!

I ended up at Fisherman's Wharf again. My guidebook vomits some less than admiring words about Fisherman's Wharf but i really like the place. Particularly at night. Tonight I came across these artists on the sidewalk. A crowd had assembled around them as one of them painted using spraypaint, scrapers and fire! He would cover the painting in spraypaint and then scrape out his art on them, if he wanted a slightly different texture or color he would set the paint on fire on the canvas and then put it out just at the right time. The result was quite stunning. They were selling the paintings really cheap. I'm not an arty farty person and i'm fairly sure these will never be collectors items, but i know what i like. I ended up with three brilliant paintings of San Francisco.

I'm gonna go down and ride a different cable car line now!

Some observations from San Francisco

I'll start this post with some observations of the obscurities of San Francisco and conclude with some recently captured images.

The cable cars here are pretty cool. I think there are only 2 or 3 lines remaining out of dozens that once cut through the streets, but the tracks that do remain are protected by the city and are here for a long time to come. They run differently to Wellington's cable car, which has two cars attatched to each other by cable running through a motor at the top. In San Francisco the cables lie beneath the roadway and are constantly in motion. To move the cable car reaches down and grips the cable and releases it to brake and stop.

The cars are invariably busy with commuters and tourists alike, some standing on the outside ledge. As they roll past, the conductors ring a bell to alert oncoming traffic. I have seen some conductors get a pretty funky rythm going with that bell. Some play real beats with the bell, ding ding ding, ding ding ding ding ding... I'm told that in July each year they actually have a big tournament in Union Square where conductors compete with each other for the citywide title of best cable car bell ringer.

Observation 2: The fire engines in San Francisco are so long they have two drivers. One sits at the front where you would expect and the other sits at the back and steers the back wheels, ensuring that the trucks can navigate the tight city streets. I should know this because their whaling sirens and airhorns keep me up all night.

Observation 3: The homeless folks in San Francisco are much more in-your-face than elsewhere. There also seems to be many more of them. Word has it in the 1990s the city shutdown a mental hospital and released the inhabitants on to the streets. Nice. But the other thing about the homeless here is that they are much cooler than in other cities. If someone is just sitting there shaking their cup around and asking for money, i won't ever give money to them. I think of it as feeding the rodents. But if they're being entertaining i'm slightly more likely to. This morning i walked past as a guy sang a song he'd made up "Just a nickle and a smile'll last a little while". I thought that was quite cool, so i gave him a smile.

Observation 4: While i was riding the train out to Ocean Beach today, i witnessed a hippy bitchin' session. A group of guitar-toting long haired hippy types boarded the train and began a heated discussion on the politics of being a hippy in San Francisco. "Some of dem kids these days, you know they think you're not a hippy because you don't have your hair in dreadlocks. Those dreadlocked types are some of the phoniest hippies out there, man. " Humans are funny. We invent a word for a movement and a group of people, then decades after that movement has died and gone to heaven in an LSD hallucination people are still striving to meet the definition of that word. But those who try too hard to meet the definition are 'phonies'... I don't know i just found it funny and couldn't help but think the world would be a nicer place if everyone found the freedom to just be themselves.

Heres a mall i went to. it was eight stories high!


















Here's me, sampling the local brew (an important part of any travel) in my hotel room.












This is Ocean Beach in San Francisco. I began a 5 mile hike to the Golden Gate Bridge from here.












along which i captured this photo, finally the golden gate bridge without the fog! The hike was cool and i collected lots of fire ant lavae on my shoes that i will introduce to New Zealand on Thursday.

Chinatown, then Alcatraz

Last night the bomb squad taped off the area around my hotel and blew up a suspicious package across the street. It made a really loud bang, but i think it turned out to be nothing, and i was finally allowed out of the building to go get some dinner.

This morning i rode a ferry out to Alcatraz to have a look. It was really cool and it actually wasn't as pricey as i thought - only $11! The history of the place is kind of creepy, which i like!

Its actually really close to fishermans wharf, the ferry only took 10 minutes. I could have swam it if they locked me up there.

From the jail the prisoners were able to see the golden gate bridge and back into the city and financial district. Several of them tried to escape but it is unlikely that any were successful. A couple of them were never seen again, but the assumption is that they got washed away in the strong currents that surround the island. During the worst escape attempt 11 guards were held hostage and several killed, and it all happened in this one building i walked around. Thats why it was kind of creepy.

The Coit Tower, built in commemoration of San Francisco's firefighters.

Chinatown.

This afternoon i'm off to the Haight, where many consider the hippy movement to have been born.

***LATEST***

'da na na na na na, na na na na na, cruising down the 101, California here we come, right back where we started from, Cal-if-ornia, Cal-if-orniaaaaaaaaa'

I'm sure you guys can all imagine me singing that song beautifully. Today has been pretty cool!! This morning i rode a subway out to Berkeley, walked the streets there and then walked around the campus of UC Berkely. I could totally imagine how it was during the 60s. Its changed a bit, but hippy-types still walk the campus and beetniks sleep on the streets.









MmmmK so then I went to the Golden Gate Bridge. It took me a while to find, but it was well worth the journey! Somewhat unfortunately it was extremely foggy and for much of the time you could see neither the end of the bridge or the tops of the bridge towers. Well i figured if i couldn't see them from the shore, i should get up close and personal, so i walked across the bridge.






OooooOooo look, theres me.














Each of the towers that hold the bridge in suspension are the equivelent height of a 65 storey building.










Well the walk across the bridge was really long and i got really tired on the way back. This was never meant to be a return journey, but after a little chat with these guys, i decided to push on.










This is Union Square, just a few blocks from my hotel. The monument in the middle is in celebration of victory in the Philippine war. I haven't looked into it much, but will... i think they were fighting the portugese? I don't know.

Right now i'm back at my hotel sampling the local brew, currently i'm enjoying a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, and I rate it 4 stars (out of 5 on the beggs scale)

More photos!

Goodafternoon homies. I have been out on the streets again, and have captured the following images.

A very goodmorning to you all. Just a quick update before i get back out there on the streets.

There was to be picture of the Golden Gate bridge gracing my blog this morning, but i haven't found it yet. This is the Bay Bridge which is closer to my hotel. The Bay Bridge is actually busier than the Golden Gate, with more than 100 million vehicles crossing it annually. The bridge has two levels, as do many freeways in this squashed city. Actually the Golden Gate was originally doomed to be painted this dull gray too, but the orange colored undercoat was liked so much it was kept.

These fellas wish to say hello. Actually just after i put my camera back in my bag (always happens) a seal snorted up from under the water, rolled over a couple of time before diving back under when he saw my camera coming out again. Pretty cool!

This is Alcatraz. I'm not sure if i'll take the tour or not, its pricey.... but might be worth it.

In 1969 native Americans occupied the island after the closure of the jail, citing a treaty with the federal government that any unused federal land would automatically fall back into their ownership. In 1971 they were evicted, with the government claiming that the operational lighthouse (visible in this photo) meant the island was not unused.

Here's me looking like a goober aboard a cable car! It is raining quite profusely here this morning, i had to come back to the hotel and change because i was soaked. It feels really nice on my skin after Denver's tinder-dry weather, but it would be nice to have better visibility. Lucky i have all week!

I'm going to San Francisco

Hello!

Well today is my last full day in Denver. I have been downtown this morning to close my bank account etc, and am now at home starting to pack and clean up my apartment.

My flight leaves for San Francisco tomorrow at about 12.15. It has a stopover in Las Vegas but only for about 20 minutes so i won't be able to make it back to the casinos!

Its a bit sad leaving, i bought all these souvineers at the visitor center downtown so that i never forget this place, as if that was likely anyway. I'm really looking forward to seeing San Francisco though and the next time I post, thats where i'll be!

Important anouncement

Attention Blogreaders:

There is to be a Boomerang Beggs(tm) Barbeque on Saturday Feburary 11 and YOU are invited.

Festivities will begin around 6pm at the Beggs residence.

Hope to see you there.

New Mexico Ahoy

I woke up at about 5.30am and left El Paso while it was still dark, thanks to my all night drive the previous night making my body forget i should have been sleeping. I watched the sunrise over the delta of the Rio Grande before slipping out of Texas into the state of New Mexico. There was alot to see so I just took my time (except for a short stretch where i gassed it a biit, but you'll hear about that later) and stopped at every attraction along the way.


This is me in front of Lake Caballo in southern New Mexico. This was my first stop. The lake is very beautiful and seems kind of strange, given that its surroundings are pretty much desert. Texas and this part of New Mexico were really warm - even though this was at about 8.30am.

Sadly i was unsuccessful finding the next place i wanted to find. I stopped in a town called Socorro looking for the worlds largest array of radio telescopes. Clever blogreaders will remember that array from the 1997 movie 'Contact'. Despite following all the signs on the highway correctly, I was only able to find their lab at New Mexico Tech. After 45 minutes of trying, and driving around the backroads of the desert near Socorro, i decided to give up.

I passed through Albuquerque, and spent some time driving around Santa Fe. The houses and buildings in Santa Fe are amazing - they are without exception all in the style of the old Spanish missions. Not just the old buildings, even the new condominium buildings follow the same flat-roof and clay exterior style.

A little way north of Santa Fe, I got off the interstate to do some driving along historic Route 66. This part of the old highway made up part of route 66 prior to 1937 when it was moved closer to Albuquerque.
It has obviously been resealed, but it is still an amazing road to drive down and it was nice to get off the interstate for a while.






This is some remains of something alongside Route 66. I'm not sure exactly what it is, there is no information about it, its just sitting there rotting. It looks to me kind of like an old trading post or something.








This is some ruins in the Pecos, New Mexico National Historical Park. The park itself is actually quite cool in that not only does it have these ancient Spanish ruins, but it also encompasses histotical sites from the Sata Fe Trail and a civil war battlefield.

This is the remains of the Mission de Nuestra Senora de los Angeles, built in the late 16th century.




The wide open spaces of central New Mexico. It was shortly after taking this photo that I was pulled over by a New Mexico state trooper who seemed to think I might have been speeding. I remained in the vehicle and made no sudden movements. After checking my license and registration he kindly informed me what the fine was for going the speed i was going. Then he was kind enough to share his experience with me of just last week scraping a 19 year-old off the road 'just up there' who was also speeding. For a brief moment i contemplated whether the 19 year-old had crashed or been shot for speeding. In the end he let me off with a warning, and in return for his generosity i kept my speed down until I reached the state line.