The Post for this day on the Shelley Brothers Cycling Adventures Facebook Page:
Greetings from Route 66!
Greetings from Route 66!
Today on Day 7 of our ride we pedalled 52 miles (84 km), climbed over 3,000 ft (915 metres), and reached a new high elevation of 7,566 ft (2,300 m).
We are tired. Need to rest.
Internet poor in this area.
We’ll be in reasonable civilization tomorrow and will provide the stories and photos you all breathlessly await!
We are tired. Need to rest.
Internet poor in this area.
We’ll be in reasonable civilization tomorrow and will provide the stories and photos you all breathlessly await!
**************************************
That was then. This is now, a year later. Here's the day as I mostly remember it..........
Within minutes of leaving our warm KOA cabin, we find ourselves climbing through the "foothills" of the southern tip of the Rocky Mountains.
(*Foothills* my asterisks! If it looks like a mountain range, feels like a mountain range, and smells like a mountain range, then it is a mountain range.)
Very steep climbs on Interstate 25 on this sunny but chilly morning. (This stretch of road is a lot steeper than it looks!)
After "enjoying" the Interstate for awhile, we gratefully return to historic Route 66, and find ourselves crossing Glorieta Pass at 7,500 ft (2,250 m), about the same elevation as the Continental Divide crossed between Gallup and Grant a few days ago.
This peaceful segment of highway once echoed with the ugly sounds of war for two days in March 1882.
Many historians consider this a game-changing battle of the American Civil War Between the States.
Confederate troops from south in Texas literally shot their way northward through New Mexico with the goal of capturing the gold and silver mines in the territories of Colorado, Utah, and Nevada which would nicely feed, clothe, and weaponize their troops in "The War Against Northern Aggression" as they called it.
Significantly outnumbered and out gunned, the sparse Union troops in the New Mexico didn't stand a chance clashing with the Rebel Army head on and nose to nose.
Very steep climbs on Interstate 25 on this sunny but chilly morning. (This stretch of road is a lot steeper than it looks!)
After "enjoying" the Interstate for awhile, we gratefully return to historic Route 66, and find ourselves crossing Glorieta Pass at 7,500 ft (2,250 m), about the same elevation as the Continental Divide crossed between Gallup and Grant a few days ago.
This peaceful segment of highway once echoed with the ugly sounds of war for two days in March 1882.
Many historians consider this a game-changing battle of the American Civil War Between the States.
Confederate troops from south in Texas literally shot their way northward through New Mexico with the goal of capturing the gold and silver mines in the territories of Colorado, Utah, and Nevada which would nicely feed, clothe, and weaponize their troops in "The War Against Northern Aggression" as they called it.
Significantly outnumbered and out gunned, the sparse Union troops in the New Mexico didn't stand a chance clashing with the Rebel Army head on and nose to nose.
Union leadership realizing the deck was stacked against them, they answered the brute force of the Southern Army with clever strategy.
Rather than being slaughtered by huge Confederate Army, the Union Army quietly sent most of its troops around and then behind the sizable Confederate Army. For appearance sake, a smaller Union Army contingent remained in front of the Confederate, probably to give the Rebels someone to shoot at!
Meanwhile, the Union soldiers well behind the Rebel forces started attacking their supply wagons and dismantling the supply lines connecting the advancing Confederate Army with Texas.
Currently unaware of this tactical kick in their butt, Southern soldiers enjoyed crushing the seemly diminished Federal troops blocking their march towards the mines.
But soon the Confederates started running out of ammunition, and breakfast lunch and dinner couldn't and wasn't being served. Oops. They discovered their tail got cut off.
Overnight, the hungry and ill supplied Rebs became the pursued, not the pursuers. They literally ran for their lives hightailing it back to Texas. In the true spirit of spiteful war, Yankee troops mercilessly chased and slaughtered the desperate Confederates.
Not a fun story for either side to tell or be proud of.
The defeat was so decisive, the Confederacy abandoned its plan to capture the wealth just north of New Mexico.
Some historians speculate the outcome of the entire North and South conflict could have gone the other way had the Confederate States secured and leveraged the vast quantities of Union gold and silver to finance their troops against the North.
We rode through the middle of the battlefield at Glorieta Pass.
Just over the Pass, I'm getting hungry and thirsty.
I thought I was getting delusional.
But this huge Coca Cola can is real.
Just not filled with Coke.
Rather than being slaughtered by huge Confederate Army, the Union Army quietly sent most of its troops around and then behind the sizable Confederate Army. For appearance sake, a smaller Union Army contingent remained in front of the Confederate, probably to give the Rebels someone to shoot at!
Meanwhile, the Union soldiers well behind the Rebel forces started attacking their supply wagons and dismantling the supply lines connecting the advancing Confederate Army with Texas.
Currently unaware of this tactical kick in their butt, Southern soldiers enjoyed crushing the seemly diminished Federal troops blocking their march towards the mines.
But soon the Confederates started running out of ammunition, and breakfast lunch and dinner couldn't and wasn't being served. Oops. They discovered their tail got cut off.
Overnight, the hungry and ill supplied Rebs became the pursued, not the pursuers. They literally ran for their lives hightailing it back to Texas. In the true spirit of spiteful war, Yankee troops mercilessly chased and slaughtered the desperate Confederates.
Not a fun story for either side to tell or be proud of.
The defeat was so decisive, the Confederacy abandoned its plan to capture the wealth just north of New Mexico.
Some historians speculate the outcome of the entire North and South conflict could have gone the other way had the Confederate States secured and leveraged the vast quantities of Union gold and silver to finance their troops against the North.
We rode through the middle of the battlefield at Glorieta Pass.
Just over the Pass, I'm getting hungry and thirsty.
I thought I was getting delusional.
But this huge Coca Cola can is real.
Just not filled with Coke.
But some real Coca Cola was literally just down the road around the bend.
Nothing more enjoyable after visiting the blood and guts of a battlefield site than to eat a delicious breakfast of hamburgers and fries.
We figured if we were lucky we might find a gas station with a convenience store where we could buy some of those stale miniature chocolate donuts for breakfast.
But hallelujah, rounding a curve in the mountain road a Dairy Queen called our name. Such an awesome and thoroughly American Experience.
And as if eating delicious hamburgers for breakfast weren't thrilling enough, for they truly were delicious, we also had the opportunity to help the Avengers save the Universe from Thanos.
This DQ is more than just a regular fast food joint.
While we were the only customers present on this rather early pre-tourist season morning, the layout and furniture of this establishment indicates it serves as a solace of sanity for the teen and young adult population in this relatively remote mountain community.
Video games, large screen TV, lots of seating and lots of relatively inexpensive tasty food suggests this DQ is the social center and preferred destination of the region's youth.
(But all the youth were apparently all sleeping in this morning. We had the entire place to ourselves.)
Felt like the perfect blend of capitalism and drop in center.
Though I only have one photo to share, our brief tour of the remains of the extensive pueblo in the Pecos National Park near the town of Pecos, was a highlight of the trip for me.
Like Route 66, one steps into a Time Machine on this location. Impressive. Breath-taking. Inspiring. Humiliating (as yet another story of European and American imperialistic arrogance, greed, and cultural insensitivity. We are slow learners sometimes).
Like the huge structure in photo above indicates, a sophisticated culture and society thrived here long before, and for a short while after, the Spanish, Mexican, and Americans arrived.
This introduction from the Park's website captures the cultural, economic, and military significant of this civilization:
Between the towering Sangre de Cristo mountains and the flat-topped Glorieta mesa lies the Glorieta Pass, through which a continuously unfolding story of human culture has traveled to and from the Pecos Valley for thousands of years.
Cicuye, later Pecos, became known as one of the most powerful of the northern New Mexico pueblos. Why? Location, location, location. For one thing, it was at a higher elevation, 7,000 feet, where the growing season was shorter but the position more defensive. The Great Plains lay to the east of Glorieta Pass, while to the west there is the Rio Grande Valley and the Colorado Plateau, which in turn led to the Gulf of California, Old Mexico, and lands beyond. Whoever controlled the pass controlled the migration and trade routes of a vast region.
Pueblo and Plains Indians, Spanish conquerors and missionaries, Mexican and Anglo armies, Santa Fe Trail settlers and adventurers, tourists on the railroad, Route 66 and Interstate 25...the Pecos Valley has long been a backdrop that invites contemplation about where our civilization comes from and where it is going.
Keep your eyes open and be careful where you step!
Between the high mountains around Glorieta Pass and the seemingly endless expanse of the Great Plains still ahead of us, we encounter the "Razorbacks."
That's razorback as in a wild hog with a series of pointy ridge-like bumps on its back.
We didn't see any hogs.
The Road is informally referred to as the Razorback because of the multitude of repeated series of steep descents and ascents comprising part of the slow over-all descent towards the Plains.
I've never pedalled uphill so much to accumulate an overall decline in elevation!
But it was, even in its challenging and slightly psychologically maddening way, kind of fun. (At least at the end of the day when you can say to yourself, "Wow. I actually rode that!"
Another glimpse of the Razorback.
That's Interstate 25 humming along beside us.
We had opportunity to meet two other cyclists on this trip.
(Not many cyclists seemed to be pedalling our route.)
You see me, brother Mark, and Matt.
As soon as I saw Matt coming towards me while gaining speed pedelling UPHILL, I knew he was an athlete. He is. Runs marathons. Attends university on a track scholarship.
He's heading west with California as his destination. He's hoping to get to Santa Fe tonight.
That's where we stayed two nights ago.
He might make it. He's fast enough.
But we told him about last night's KOA Campground with the clean cabins :-)
He might stay there.
We admired his energy.
We finally arrive at today's destination.
This photo was taken the following morning, but it gives you an idea of our KOA clean (but this cabin aged a bit more than last night's) cabin.
The entire campground manifested a bit more age and wear and tear than our five star stop last night, but the accommodations were appreciated.
Supper featured dehydrated pasta once again raised from dead by the application of life-giving water, supplemented by potato chips and sugary things for dessert.
I had to run around in the shower stall to get all wet from the pencil sized single "torrent" (Not!) of water dripping from the shower head. But no complaints. Just great to get the layers of dirt, dust, sweat and sunscreen off my body.
We fell asleep happy and tired and eager for tomorrow's adventure.
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