Combing the Caverns

The Big Cave in Carlsbad is the size of 5 or 6 football fields.

As a foreign-born person, I never really “got” the Alamo story. I might not even have heard the Alamo story. But it is an emotional and memorable place and we both enjoyed our visit there.
Since most Americans probably know the story, you can skip ahead. This is mostly for our readers in Japan, Namibia, Scotland, Canada, England, Vietnam, and Cambodia.

Originally named Misión San Antonio de Valero, the Alamo served as home to missionaries and their Indian converts for nearly 70 years. Construction began in 1724. In 1793, Spanish officials secularized San Antonio's five missions and distributed their lands to the remaining Indian residents. These men and women continued to farm the fields, once the mission's but now their own, and participated in the growing community of San Antonio.
In the early 1800s, the Spanish military stationed a cavalry unit at the former mission. The soldiers referred to the old mission as the Alamo (the Spanish word for "cottonwood"). The Alamo was home to both Revolutionaries and Royalists during Mexico's 10-year struggle for independence. The military — Spanish, Rebel, and then Mexican — continued to occupy the Alamo until the Texas Revolution.
San Antonio and the Alamo played a critical role in the Texas Revolution. In December 1835, Ben Milam led Texian and Tejano volunteers against Mexican troops quartered in the city. After five days of house-to-house fighting, they forced General Martín Perfecto de Cós and his soldiers to surrender.
On February 23, 1836, the arrival of General Antonio López de Santa Anna's army outside San Antonio nearly caught the Americans by surprise. Undaunted, the Texians and Tejanos prepared to defend the Alamo together. The defenders held out for 13 days against Santa Anna's army. William B. Travis, the commander of the Alamo sent forth couriers carrying pleas for help to communities in Texas. On the eighth day of the siege, a band of 32 volunteers from Gonzales arrived, bringing the number of defenders to nearly two hundred. Legend holds that with the possibility of additional help fading, Colonel Travis drew a line on the ground and asked any man willing to stay and fight to step over — all except one did. As the defenders saw it, the Alamo was the key to the defense of Texas, and they were ready to give their lives rather than surrender their position to General Santa Anna. Among the Alamo's garrison were Jim Bowie, renowned knife fighter, and David Crockett, famed frontiersman and former congressman from Tennessee.
The final assault came before daybreak on the morning of March 6, 1836, as columns of Mexican soldiers emerged from the predawn darkness and headed for the Alamo's walls. Cannon and small arms fire from inside the Alamo beat back several attacks. Regrouping, the Mexicans scaled the walls and rushed into the compound. Once inside, they turned a captured cannon on the Long Barrack and church, blasting open the barricaded doors. The desperate struggle continued until the defenders were overwhelmed. By sunrise, the battle had ended and Santa Anna entered the Alamo compound to survey the scene of his victory. All the male defenders were killed. The women and children, hiding inside the mission were kept alive and used by Santa Anna to send a warning to the other Americans.
Santa Anna called the massacre “a small thing.” But it was that watershed moment that drew the Americans together as they answered the cry, “Remember the Alamo.” It took only a few weeks for Santa Anna's army to be beaten and for Texas to achieve independence from Mexico.
When we arrived at the Alamo, it was cool and early in the day. Cactus were flowering under the trees. We entered the sanctuary and were regaled by a fine story teller who spoke about the story of drawing the line in the sand.
We then wandered down to Riverwalk, an urban work of art. Back in the 12920s, San Antonio saw the possibilities of creating cool walking areas along the river in the heart of their city. It is just a wonderful place to wander and sample the Mexican food, along with the arts and crafts of the area. We sat and had lunch under a bridge after taking a cruise along the river. Brilliant urban design.

Monday, April 26, 2010
We rolled west and came to Junction, another crossroads in the Texas hill country. Keeping the “Look- for-the-historical-marker” rule in the forefront of our mind, we paused when we found this:

“The Killing of SAM SPEER. On Dec. 24, 1976, a band of Indians killed Sam Speer, only 17 years of age, who was driving in horses near here. A 50-caliber gun his brother was using failed to fire. This was the last Indian murder in Kimble County. Speer is buried in the North Llano Cemetery.”

We drove on and pulled into a city park that we'd learned offered free overnight parking. And so we took up residence on the banks of the South Llano River, just below the dam. We parked under the cottonwood trees and listened to chirp, chirp, chirp of the grackles and the non-stop rush of water as it flowed over the dam. We walked over in the evening to visit with a fellow camper. He and his wife spoke only German, however, so we had a hard time communicating.

On now to Fort Stockton, Texas. This town is the beneficiary of the work of a New Mexico artist who has created an outstanding piece of art. He fashioned a Cavalry patrol on the outskirts of the town, carved out of sheets of steel. When we rode over in the late afternoon, the 10-foot-high silhouettes stood on the desert and seemed life sized because of the distance. I even got up the next morning, hoping to capture them in the rising sun – but no luck. The sun rose above the mesas (flat-topped mountains) about 35 degrees away from where the patrol stood in the early morning light.
We drove north on the Pecos Trail, a lonely two-lane road that headed us toward New Mexico. Lots of oil wells. In the town of Pecos, we passed where Judge Roy Bean practiced his unorthodox version of law west of the Pecos back in the 1880s. We crossed the state line and our times changed to Mountain Daylight Savings time. Now the cat will give us an even harder time since she refuses to acknowledge the existence of time zones. She still believes it is Eastern time. As a result, she thinks it is entirely reasonable to rise at 5 a.m. in our new time zone.
We parked in Carlsbad, in 90 degree, low humidity weather. We drove to the National Park and entered the caverns. You take an elevator down 800 feet which allows you to enter the Big Cavern. This was discovered by a cowboy back in 1913. He built a wire ladder and slowly (with the help of a single lamp) explored this massive complex. When he told folks in Carlsbad about the wondrous sights, they refused to believe him. But he persevered and eventually managed to get a photographer down into the cavern. The lighting of the pictures might have been one of the great technical achievements because of the size of this place. None-the-less, when people saw the pictures, they were wowed... and the crowds started to want tours.
Now that it is a National Park, it is possible to go on self-guided hikes which we did. If you are up for crawling on your belly, or slithering down or up steep grades with the help of a knotted rope, you can accompany a ranger. We did the self-guided tour which lasted almost two hours. The caverns run for more than 113 miles and many are still unexplored.
In the evening, we drove to the Living Desert State Park where we listened to a concert (mediocre) before going on another hike in the gloaming of the setting sun to view native plants and even some of the local wild life. I was particularly on the search for the agave cactus since I now use agave to replace sugar since being diagnosed with diabetes in December. The Pueblo and Apache Indians in these parts cooked the mescal agave plant for their rituals – and still do. The highlight of the evening was to watch a full moon rise, blood red, over the sparkling lights of Carlsbad.
Mileage traveled from start: 1,815 miles.