All right, Edenites! The following is my account – 1/7 of the total experience – of the EvacPod Con trip to New Mexico.
The EvacPod Con members were:
- Char Haguewood (Iguana Girl)
- Maddie Sieraski (The Mad Doctor Mad)
- Cathy Bolton
- Mary R.
- Mary Brick (the original RHM)
- Cheryl Howie (RCC #5)
- Doug Neman (that's me)
We all arrived Saturday, April 19, except for Mary Brick and Cheryl, who flew in three nights later.
Char had advised me to dress warmly, that it would be very cold at times. So I brought some pants and long-sleeve shirts, but I left my jacket at home. I thought to myself, "There's no way any place in the United States can be cold in April! It's spring, for crying out loud!"
I will pause now for everyone to laugh.
Finished? All right, we can go on now.
While everyone else flew in, I elected to drive from my home in Dallas, Texas to Santa Fe. It took about 13 hours, including stops. I was so excited the last 100 miles. I got in too late to meet the others that night – I would have to wait until morning.
I hadn't bothered to go look at comet Hale-Bopp yet. But as I was driving north to Santa Fe, I just happened to glance out my driver's side window and there it was! I couldn't have missed it! The stars were so clear – not only because of the higher elevation, but the lack of lights. The highways were darker than what I was used to, and even though it was 9 o'clock on a Saturday night, hardly anyone was about. At times, I felt like there was not another human being between me and the horizon, in all directions. It was very eerie.
In Texas, highways go everywhere and connect everything. (I was stunned to find there wasn't an interstate going straight from Dallas to Santa Fe. I must be spoiled.)
In New Mexico, this isn't the case. I suspect it's because of the topography (very mountainous country) and the lower population a little bit, but mostly, I think it's because of the Native American reservations, of which there are many. In New Mexico, highways do not go direct. To get from point A to point B, a person sometimes has to go up and around a reservation, and curve around and around mountains, or go all the way back around a lake.
We had three cars – mine, the one Char rented, and the four-wheeler Cathy rented. (I don't often have passengers in my car. Until I drove it on Friday with two other people in it, I never knew how small it really was!) Every day, we loaded food (mostly light munchies) and drinks into ice chests. A bag of candy, however, was always kept up front!
I was neither the navigator nor the planner of any of these things – I am writing this account from memory, the itinerary Char sent me in the mail, and my 10 rolls of pictures. I may get a canyon or trail name wrong, or mess up on which day we went where. Mostly, it's fairly accurate.
Sunday, April 20
I met Char, Maddie, and Mary R. for the first time in person this morning. We drove to Albuquerque to the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center. (We didn't want to visit very many Earth 2 sites until the others arrived – especially anything concerning Morgan!) Cathy had left at 3:00 AM. that morning on a rafting trip; I would not meet her until that evening.
At the Center we shopped and toured the museum. We read up on the history of the Pueblo. I don't remember all of it, but I do remember there were 19 tribes and three language groups, and they all shared a similar mythology of their ancestors coming from a cave, or hole in the earth, and their people felt a great connection to the land.
The history also told of their conflicts with Spain in the 16th century – about the Spanish forcing Catholicism on them and forcing them into slavery to build their churches, and the war which ensued when the tribes united and rebelled.
Today, from what I understand, many Pueblo are Catholic, yet have a lot of their own mythology and traditions still mixed in with this religion.
We also saw filmstrips and other material showing how they made pottery and bread.
We then saw the traditional Pueblo Dances, performed by groups of four to eight dancers and four drummers/singers. They were from different tribes, and appeared in gorgeous, colorful costumes of beads and feathers. They performed the Basket Dance, the Rainbow Dance, and the Buffalo Dance. They then invited people from the audience to dance with them in the Friendship Dance. Maddie and I both did this!
(I sent a postcard of the dancers to my coworkers. On the back of this card, I wrote that I had taken part in one of the dances. When I got back, I was told that one of my coworkers, upon reading this, turned the card over and said in all seriousness, "Gee – that doesn't look like Doug.")
We sampled some New Mexican cuisine for lunch. It's slightly different from Mexican food, but I honestly couldn't tell you how. (I know very little about food, except that I eat it.)
We then went to Acoma Pueblo. (Acoma is stressed on the first syllable, not the second – A'-kuh-muh.) It was amazing!
It was on the top of a plateau in the middle of a wide plain, with steep walls on all sides which were virtually unclimbable. No one could have approached for miles without them knowing. A bus took us to the top, and we were given the tour.
Video cameras were not allowed, and pictures could only be taken if one paid a $10.00 camera fee. (The others took theirs. I left mine behind, which I now regret.) The reason for this is because it's where they live – as Char pointed out, imagine people coming to your neighborhood every day and taking pictures of your home!
The Acoma Pueblo claims to be the longest continuously-inhabited city in the United States. I believe the tribe has lived there since about 700-800 A.D. The wind was brisk, sand was everywhere. To this day, they do not have running water or electricity, choosing instead to live as they always have. Their water comes from several large catch-basins in the rock, collecting about 13 inches of rain a year, and they still plant crops on the surrounding plain.
A lot of them made their money by selling pottery and jewelry to the tourists. They had their wares displayed on tables right outside their front doors. They also sold bread baked in their clay ovens.
Our tour guide was great! I must have asked him about 15 or 20 questions, and he answered every single one. He showed us the church and the graveyard (and no pictures at all in either place), and gave us further history of his people's conflict with the Spaniards who, as he put it, "came bearing the cross in one hand and a sword in the other." He was not disrespectful at all to the Catholicism of today – in fact, quite the opposite. But he did make sure we knew the history of his people's enslavement.
He also said that many Native American tribes have their own religion, which is extremely private. He said he would not discuss it, and advised us never to ask a Native American about his or her religion, as it was a very private matter.
When I asked him if it was possible for someone to move into Acoma, he said no. Residents of Acoma had to be born into the tribe. I think the population of the town was about 85.
He also said that in addition to the tourism and the crops (which they sold), a lot of people in the town worked in the nearby casino.
Casinos are everywhere in New Mexico. He said he didn't like it, but couldn't argue against the fact that the nearby casino provided jobs to a lot of his tribespeople.
After the tour, we were given the option of returning by the bus – or the stairwell! We took the stairs. It had been carved out of the rock centuries before, as the only means of getting to the top of the plateau, before the road was built. It led down the mountainside, twisting and turning, going under overhangs and through clefts, often getting quite steep. Sometimes there were natural handholds – and sometimes there weren't! This is one reason why I wish I'd taken my camera.
Mary R. bought a gorgeous piece of pottery, and we kept handing it down, promising that if she fell off the cliff, we'd catch her pottery for her!
We drove back to Santa Fe, and I met Cathy for the first time. She'd had a very successful rafting trip.
One final note – starting today, a curse descended upon me which was to plague me throughout the entire trip. At least once a day, I accidentally did something to ruin one of Maddie's photos. Either I stood up in front of her, turned around at the wrong moment, walked in front of her, or stuck a hand, a foot, or my head in her picture just as she clicked the shutter. I got better about this as time went on, but I never fully rid myself of this strange affliction.
Maddie tells me, however, that most of her shots still turned out fine. I didn't ruin them all that much.
Monday, April 21
We traveled a long ways away to Chaco Canyon. On the way, we saw a dead animal by the side of the road. Someone said, "Nature took its course." Char said, "Or a truck." Cathy thought that was so funny she spit her soft drink all over the dashboard and the windshield! That was the part the rest of us thought was funny!
Ehh, I guess you had to be there.
Chaco Canyon has many Pueblo ruins scattered along its length. We visited some of the more accessible ruins, and hiked a trail nearly to the top of a mountain and saw petroglyphs, drawn by the Pueblo many years before. The main attraction of this canyon, however, is Pueblo Bonito.
Pueblo Bonito is built up against a cliff, and for centuries, a column of rock jutting up from the edge of the cliff towered over it. This rock was tall, skinny, and weighed about 90,000 tons. In the early 1940s, it finally fell, crushing about 20 rooms of the pueblo and an oil tank. (No one was hurt.)
The pueblo itself is about the size of two or three football fields (my own estimation). The trail leads around and through the rubble and huge boulders from the collapsed rock, and then into the Pueblo. Some of the rooms are still intact, but mostly, it now consists of low-lying walls which form a latticework of stone over the ground, looking like a maze.
There are also about 15 or 20 pits dug into the ground, of varying sizes. These are called kivas, and were used for religious purposes.
The trail leads through all these things and then through some of the intact rooms. The doorways were really small! Windows were built in room corners, designed to let sunlight into the Pueblo in certain ways. (The pamphlet which accompanied the tour said these windows were actually doors, but I just don't see how they could have been. The people who lived there would have had to be smaller than midgets to get through them.)
We also learned that there was a problem with thieves. Original Pueblo pottery, several hundred years old, is quite expensive, and there are people who loot Pueblo ruins, evidently not caring what they damage in the process.
The wind was incredibly strong!
We took lots of pictures of the scenery, spending more time there than we'd planned. Because of this, we decided to skip Bisti Wilderness and head back to Santa Fe.
That night, we had a wonderful little late dinner at Austin's, across the street from the girls' motel. The next time anyone is in Santa Fe, I highly recommend this place.
I had brought my VCR from Dallas specifically to copy tapes. My Earth 2 collection, except for a few missing minutes from the very beginning of some episodes, is now complete. I got to see how "Flower Child" ends for the first time!
Tuesday, April 22
We took two cars today, because Cathy wanted to spend the second half of the day traveling on to Bisti Wilderness, as she'd been disappointed we couldn't go the day before. I elected to go with her.
The first stop of the morning was Abiqui Reservoir (where Char says she jumped up and down excitedly when no one was looking!). We believed at first that we'd found the place where the Terrians can be seen recharging their staffs in "Water" (we've since learned otherwise), but we all doubted any scenes with Devon or Danziger were filmed there.
For a while, we did think Devon and Danziger scenes had been filmed there. Char wanted me to dangle my canteen over the edge of a cliff, looking like I was trying to get some water, so she could get a picture! But when we realized this wasn't the place, she dropped that idea. Much to my relief.
Again, the wind was incredibly strong.
We then went on to Ghost Ranch. It had a small zoo, and we saw many examples of the local wildlife. Some of the animals had sad stories. The grizzly bear had been found as a cub by the side of the road – it's mother had been killed by a car.
I saw my very first Bald Eagle up close and personal. It was beautiful! It had been shot, and would never fly again. (For those of you who don't live in the United States, the Bald Eagle is our country's National Bird, and is therefore illegal to shoot. It is also an endangered species.)
We also saw a bobcat, hawks, owls, an elk, a coyote, badgers, and squirrels. Most of these animals are night-creatures, and weren't all that friendly. When I tried to take a picture of the badger, it hissed at me – like he meant it! I supposed I would have, too, in the same position.
Then we went to the Echo Amphitheater. People, this thing is huge! The pictures I took don't show how big it is. It's a natural half-bowl indentation in the side of a cliff, and throws back a perfect echo! There are several pretty walks leading from the parking area to the ampitheater.
Cathy and I put our cameras on timer, and we took a group shot of the five of us by the sign.
At this point, we split up. Cathy and I went on to Bisti Wilderness (pronounced "Bist-eye"), and the others went back to Santa Fe to shop.
It took several hours to get to Bisti, partly because we had to go around a Navajo reservation. But it was worth it. The sand and clay in this tiny area is formed into the oddest shapes by the wind. It's almost like being on a different planet. The land was formed into huge lumps that resembled turtles, or large mushrooms, and there were large dunes and miniature canyons. It was all a light grey to off-white color. The ground looked soft and muddy, but was quite hard. I climbed to the top of some dunes to get a good view of the surrounding area, and I had to be very careful that the wind didn't blow me off.
Then Cathy discovered a cave. I went in. It curved sharply to the right, then left again. I could have followed it down a little ways more, but it got tiny very quickly, and a standing mud-pool was in my way, and I didn't want it that badly.
I ran out of film. (A cardinal sin in New Mexico – NEVER do this! You will always regret it.) On the way back, I saw a scene straight out of a calendar – a windmill on a wide plain, mountains on the horizon, against a setting sun. But I couldn't take the shot, because I didn't have the film.
On the interstate headed back to Santa Fe, it happened again! There is a huge mountain just east of Albuquerque called Sandia, and a full moon was rising over this mountain. This time we just had to stop – it was gorgeous. Cathy loaded her camera with one extra roll she had and took some pictures of it. (She tells me they came out a little blurry because the film wasn't fast enough. Oh, well! We tried.)
(Sandia Mountain has a tram ride going to a restaurant at the top. We were all looking forward to this as one of the highlights of the trip, but the ride was closed for a few weeks, during that part of the year only.)
We got back to the motel just as the others were leaving to go back to Albuquerque to pick up Cheryl and Mary Brick.
I stayed with Cathy for a while, talking and watching videos, hoping to meet Mary and Cheryl. But I got tired, and the girls were late coming back because their plane landed late, so I went back to my motel.
Wednesday, April 23
I met Mary Brick and Cheryl for the first time this morning. I spotted two girls heading towards Char's room, one of whom had bright red hair, so I said, "Are you Mary and Cheryl?"
(I wanted to say, "Are you the Original Red-Hot Morganite and RCC #5?" But if I'd said that and they turned out not to be them, I don't think I could have lived down my embarrassment.)
Mary said, "Are you Doug?" I told her I was, and before I knew it, she had wrapped her arms around me in a big, friendly hug. For those of you who know her – that's Mary Brick!
We all headed for Chamisa Trail, high in the mountains. Snow was everywhere. We now had to take two cars because all 7 of us were there.
After a bit of walking, we found the place at the beginning of the trail where the biodome was. It was so exciting! Mary and I kept making remarks like, "I feel shivers – Debrah was here!" or, "John was here!"
Cathy found an electrical box, labeled with "Office," "Diesel," "Gas," "Trailer," and "Lab." We suspect it's where the filming crew hooked up to get their electricity.
From there, we drove to Santa Clara – the Morgan dream tree! We discovered the river, cottonwoods, and the mesa which appears over Morgan's shoulder. It's Black Mesa, a famous local landmark, and it should be listed on any New Mexico map worth its salt.
But we couldn't get there – it was on Native American land. So we took pictures from a distance.
We then headed to the DAV Vietnam Veterans National Memorial, in Angel Fire, NM.
On the way there, though, we visited a bridge spanning a huge canyon. This was on the Taos Plateau. Below – faaaaarrrr below! – was the Rio Grande river, which Cathy had rafted on Sunday. The canyon was gorgeous. I think we all took about a million pictures there. (Incidentally, the river the Edenites were camped at in "Church of Morgan" was the Rio Grande.)
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial was extremely moving for all of us, and very well put together. It was built by a man whose son had been killed in Vietnam. The photographs and quotes were very powerful, and there's a chapel with candles where people can pay respects. This is another site I would highly recommend to anyone visiting the area.
We ate dinner there in Angel Falls. This was not the tourist season, and some restaurants were closed, the owners on vacation. We found one that was open, but practically deserted. We had another lovely dinner, and raised a toast since we were all there.
It was a pretty special day – even if Mary Brick didn't get to faint under the Morgan dream tree!
Back at the motel, I taped off the Earth 2 music videos made by Gina Todd. (They were fantastic!) Until earlier in the week, I didn't even know these things existed! I was finding out so much.
Thursday, April 24th
We went to the College of Santa Fe (which later became the Santa Fe University of Art and Design and is now closed) to visit Garson Studios, where all the studio work for Earth 2 had been done. Char had made the phone calls, arranging for someone to meet us.
A young man named Chris gave us a tour of the place. (I had to put up with my six podmates gushing, "He's so cute!") We learned that Garson Studios was named after Greer Garson, who founded it. Greer Garson was a famous actress several decades ago. I'm afraid I disgruntled a few of my podmates when they found out I didn't know who she was!
The studio exists as a separate entity from the campus, but works closely with it. The college has a degree program for people wanting a career in film and television, and the fact that there is an on-site honest-to-goodness movie studio in which the students can work helps tremendously. Production companies get great discounts to use the studio if they agree to give a lecture or two to some of the classes, and allow the students to work in the production. Wyatt Earp was filmed there and in the surrounding area. Rockmund Dunbar (who was a friend of Chris's) had evidently been a student on campus when the producers of Earth 2 noticed him. They liked him so much, they went out of their way to make a role for him.
He showed us where the sets were built (the tunnels and the spaceship), and then showed us the studio where all studio-bound scenes had been filmed. They were filming a car commercial, so we didn't get to go in, but we took pictures through the windows of the booth above the studio floor.
He showed us the editing room, and then mentioned that a cliff face had been constructed outside the building for a scene in Earth 2, where someone had hung from the edge. We all reasoned that this had to be Morgan and Bess in "Flower Child"...and guess who went nuts!
Chris said, "You understand – there's nothing there any more. It's just a wall." And Mary Brick said, "I don't care. It's not just a wall to me."
So we went outside and took pictures of the wall where John Gegenhuber and Rebecca Gayheart hung upside down. Here, Chris mentioned the blonde cast member who ran laps every day. We all said, "Jessica."
He was a nice man, who gave us a tour of the place for free, when he didn't have to.
We went to Diablo Canyon, where Devon and Danziger drove the rail while looking for "Water." It had rained buckets the day before, and we were wary of being caught in the mud.
Not so the people we met, however! No sooner did we get there, than we saw a sedan out in the canyon – bogged down in the mud. The front bumper was on the ground.
They waved to us to help – we were the only people around – and Char turned around and belted out, "We get to RESCUE somebody!!!!"
It was an elderly couple and a young man who was their grandson. Maddie (who is a doctor) had the grandparents wait in our car and drink some water. The young man said he was a student at the College of Santa Fe. When we told him what we were doing there, he said he knew Rockmund Dunbar!
Just before we got to work on pushing the car out, his grandfather waved a rag to a helicopter flying overhead.
We dug, and poked, and prodded at the sand underneath the car. (Yes, we put large flat rocks under the wheels!) I discovered the front bumper was lodged up on a stone sunk deep into the mud, which was why we couldn't push it off. We jacked up the car, dug around the stone, and pulled it out. Then we were able to push them free. We all celebrated and took group photos!
They got stuck one more time before they got out of the canyon. Cheryl, who knows how to drive on snow because she's from Montreal, was elected to drive their car out. Cheryl herself was mystified by this logic, but did it anyway. As she drove the car out of the sand, Char yelled, "Cheryl's good to go!" None of us have any idea what that really means. Cheryl was successful, and the happy family was on their way.
The car we had down there was Cathy's four-wheeler, and we knew where the mud was. We hiked up and down the canyon for a while, searching for places Devon and Danziger could have driven in the rail. We think we found the place where they were tied up with vines.
While some of us walked, others drove the car along slowly. They blasted the Earth 2 theme music from the tape deck as loud as it could go! It was grand!
Mary Brick always wore a light tan coat and round sunglasses, making her look very similar to Bess. I made a joke about this, and Mary flaunted herself for the camera, pulling up her shirt to show off her belly button, and throwing her hair back wildly. I got it. The picture turned out great. Mary and I are currently in negotiation for handing over the negative, and how often that picture gets posted on the web before I do.
It started raining, so we headed back. On the way out, a tow truck passed us going in. It was the tow truck the helicopter had called for! It passed us by quickly, and we didn't get a chance to tell it not to bother. We just let it go.
We had been planning to go to Nambe Pueblo, but didn't want to risk it in the rain, so we went back to Santa Fe. We all lounged around Char and Maddie's room, taking pictures and watching more videos. I had my film developed from Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday so I could show Cheryl and Mary Brick what they'd missed. We ordered food from Austin's again, and we ate there in the motel room.
Everyone pretty much decided just to shop the next day in Santa Fe, as the heavy rains seemed to be ruining all the outdoor hikes we had planned. Cathy, however, was determined to make it to Nambe Pueblo in her four-wheeler.
I could have gone with her, and I certainly wanted to see Nambe Pueblo much more than I wanted to go shopping. But the thing I loved about this trip the most was the people I was with. Cathy and I had already gotten to know each other quite well on our trip to Bisti Wilderness, and I was leaving Saturday morning. If I went with her to Nambe, that meant I would have had only two days in the company of Cheryl and Mary Brick – two days out of a whole week! It still felt like they'd just arrived, so I decided to go shopping with the others, so I could spend time with them before I had to leave.
Friday, April 25
It began to sink in that the week was almost over – this was my last day. Where had the week gone!?!
When I got to the girls' motel, I was told Cathy had already set out for Nambe Pueblo at 8:00 that morning, as planned. However, we weren't going shopping – amazingly, the rain had held off, and our outdoor trips were back in action!
So we set out for more hiking, also, headed in the same direction Cathy had taken an hour-and-a-half before. I drove my car with Mary and Mary as passengers, following Char, Maddie, and Cheryl in the other car wherever they were going.
(We packed so many things in on Friday, my memory is a little fuzzy. My itinerary says, "La Bajada" and "Evergreen Rest." I remember all the places we went, but I don't remember which of those places had those names.)
We first went to Tent Rocks, where some of the show was filmed. On the way, we again rescued someone, giving a jump to a man who's car had died.
At Tent Rocks, we saw a place where Alonzo had been filmed on the dream plane. There is a sign there, stating that several movies and TV shows have been filmed at Tent Rocks – and Earth 2 is listed! (On the sign, however, the "2" has been changed to the Roman numeral "II.")
We all took pictures of it. It says:
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Earth II (NBC, June 1994)
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(If your favorite actor or actress wasn't listed on the sign, don't complain to me! Write the State of New Mexico!)
Other projects listed on the sign were Lonesome Dove, Young Guns II, and one of my favorite films, Silverado.
We hiked around. The tent rocks are amazing – cones of rock, formed by the wind, according to Mary R. (our on-site geologist). I hiked up the mountain as far as I could go (huff!, puff!). Coming downhill was fun! The sand was so loose, deep, and dry, that I turned my body side to side and sidestepped down the mountain. It was very much like skiing!
There was a cave a little ways off. Cheryl and I went to see it. There were carvings in the cliff face beside it that I though were petroglyphs, until I realized they were in English and slightly vulgar. There were a few neat drawings and patterns, as well.
Cheryl thought they were great. I said, "It's just fancy graffiti!" She said, "Graffiti can be beautiful." I realized she had a point.
The cave was difficult to climb into. Cheryl elected not to try, and handed up our cameras, and I took pictures inside. It was small and round, obviously man-made, with a bench along the entire wall, and there were Native American-like drawings on the inside. I guess they were the real thing. I don't know.
The scenes shot in this area mostly had to do with Gaal, and Commander O'Neill's death. Mary Brick found the exact spot where Morgan sat talking to Gaal, and saved a little bit of dirt from the site. It was dirt John Gegenhuber had sat on.
From there, we went to Cochiti Lake, and drove around it. The plains around us looked a lot like all the traveling scenes filmed for the show.
The river flowing by Morgan when he's under the dream tree is the Rio Grande. Mary Brick renamed it the Morgan River. Inspired, she proceeded to rename most of New Mexico. I think the Morgan and Bess Rivers flow into Martin Lake (aka Cochiti Lake). You'll have to ask her, though.
From there, we drove back around the lake to head to a restaurant we wanted to go to. On the way, we saw in the distance, on top of an otherwise grassy hill, a patch of white sand. This was the dream plane, where Devon walked around in "First Contact," throwing sand into the air. We took pictures from a distance, but didn't go up there.
Then we suddenly came to an area of New Mexico where all the land was a deep, rusty red. It was beautiful! Just when you think you've seen all the scenery you're going to, New Mexico throws something else at you. It's quite a state.
We reached our destination – The Laughing Lizard, a cyber-cafe which Char discovered on the internet. But they were closed for the afternoon, and we couldn't wait. So we ate next door at a restaurant that was also a country bar.
After dinner, while all the girls were lined up to use the restroom, I indulged myself in a game of pool (no one wanted to play me ☹). I racked up all fifteen balls and tried to sink them all, in no particular order, by the time we were ready to go. I proceeded to shoot one of the best games in my life, and was finished in about 2 1/2 minutes. I think Mary R. is my only witness.
Moving on, we found some waterfalls of the Jemez River and stopped to see them. On the other side of the road, I saw a cave up the cliffside. Not wanting to hold the others up, I ran up to see it as fast as I could (huff!, puff!). It was pretty large, and I got a good shot of the river below running along by a house in the woods.
I chose another way down to the waterfall, where I could see the others. It was the worst trail I could have picked – or the best, depending on your point of view. It was covered with small stones and was quite steep, so I basically slid down the mountain on my backside, sometimes going right under a tree growing across the path, with only two feet of clearance! Between that trail and the skiing effect at Tent Rocks, I got quite a thrill that day, just as if I'd been to an amusement park!
I went to see the waterfall. It was beautiful, big, and loud, coming through a hole the river had made in the soft rock.
We stopped to take more pictures of the river a little ways on, then hit mountainous country, with snow everywhere. The terrain looked a lot like it did when Morgan was tied up by Whelan. (Wayland? Whelan? Whatever.) Because I was driving, I handed my camera to Mary Brick and told her to start shooting snowy landscapes. She said she didn't know how to use my camera. I said, "Extend the zoom all the way out, put the focus on infinity, and just start shooting."
She did, and was getting into it when we suddenly came to a large clearing with two elk in it. She was already aiming in that direction, so she turned to the elk and captured them on film, as simple as you please!
We came to a volcano site Mary R. wanted to see. There was a wide valley below us, with more mountains on the other side. I asked her which one was the volcano. I was stunned to learn that it was the valley that was the volcano! It was huge!
We were really high up by this time. Our ears had popped several times, and the mountaintops across the valley were obscured by clouds.
During the drive, I became worried when my car wouldn't accelerate. I drive a five-on-the-floor, and to me, 4th gear is used for accelerating and 5th for cruising. Mary Brick assured me, however, that I just wasn't used to driving in mountains. Going uphill like we were, 4th would have no acceleration power at all.
I was astounded – those slopes didn't feel steeper than any other slope I'd driven on in my lifetime. Yet 4th gear couldn't handle it. I guess my body had become used to the gradual steepness of the climb, because it certainly didn't feel steep to me. But my car said otherwise. I put it in 3rd, and everything was fine.
On the way down the opposite side of the mountains, I kept it in 2nd and 3rd and just let it roll. The others in front of me pulled over. We thought they had found something to take pictures of. No – their brakes were beginning to overheat! They needed to let them cool down before driving on!
Past the mountains, we headed back to Santa Fe. On my left, I saw a peculiar mesa, and asked Mary and Mary to look at it. Mary Brick got excited – it was Black Mesa. And there were cottonwoods around! Thinking we had perhaps found another way to get to the Morgan dream tree, and that it might not have been on Native American land after all, she erupted like one of Mary R.'s volcanoes.
The others had seen it, too, and I found them pulled over on the side of the road. I said, "Mary, just give me 30 seconds to pull over!" She wasn't going to make it. She climbed halfway out the window before I could stop the car and frantically waved her arms at the others, screaming at the top of her lungs.
We got out. I have two great shots of Mary Brick jumping up and down in sheer joy, with Char and Cheryl on either side of her. Mary probably never even saw me take the shots, she was so happy.
It was not to be, however. We traveled down some side roads, but found that it was still on Native American land, and we couldn't get to it. We again took pictures from a distance and drove on.
We came to Camel Rock, and took pictures of that. This is a large rock which looks a lot like a camel, and it's right on the highway. While we were here, Mary Brick said, "My throat hurts." I said, "Gee – I wonder why!" I honestly don't think she knew how loudly she was yelling.
Back in the car, we were getting pretty goofy, and my wit was scraping the bottom of the barrel. I made one groaning wisecrack after another, playfully irritating Mary Brick (and probably Mary R., too, bless her). She finally splashed me with water from her water bottle. I called her a couple of choice names, but didn't stop with the stupid jokes. She told Mary R., "As soon as we stop, I'm going to get him. I swear I will."
I let them off at their motel. Mary Brick assured me she was going to get me when I least expected it. She also said there was only one thing I could do to prevent it. I assumed it was something like get down on my knees and proclaim Morgan the greatest of all, but I wasn't going to do that – I'd rather get wet.
I drove to my own motel right quick before coming back to join them. While I was there, I changed into my swimming trunks and wore them beneath my clothes, thinking I could perhaps strip down to them if I was going to get doused.
We met Cathy again. It turned out she'd spent the day in the same area we were in. She'd gone to Nambe Pueblo, though, which was the one stop we still hadn't managed to fit in.
As the evening went on, Mary Brick only mentioned the water once, saying she wasn't going to pour water on me while we were in Char and Maddie's room.
We did the group photo. Cathy and I put our cameras on timer, and we held up the sign which said "EvacPod Con '97 You Crash 'Em, We Track 'Em." The group shots turned out just fine.
On the way out the door for the evening, I asked Mary about the water. I think she said something like, "Oh, don't worry about it," then the next thing I know, she's pouring water all over me! She had lied! She didn't care about the carpet at all!
I told her I had put my swimsuit on in preparation, and she just laughed. She then told me that the only thing I could have done to keep her from dousing me was to go to her motel room and sit on her bed, because that was the only thing in the world she wouldn't have poured water on.
Saturday, April 26
I went to the girls' motel in the morning to say goodbye to everyone. Cathy said goodbye first, and left for the airport around 9:00. Before going, she gave me a copy of the Earth 2 music.
The five remaining pod members were staying until Sunday. About 9:30, they all piled into their car for one more day of sightseeing. We said goodbye to each other. They headed for Nambe Pueblo, and I headed for Dallas, Texas.
At Nambe, from what I've heard, they found high cliffs where Julia A) threw a communications device off of, and B) stood scanning for Alonzo. And I'm jealous! Nambe is now a must-see on any return trips.