{"id":1608,"date":"2026-07-07T17:29:56","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T22:29:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/?p=1608"},"modified":"2026-07-07T17:29:56","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T22:29:56","slug":"travelogue-3a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/2026\/07\/travelogue-3a\/","title":{"rendered":"Travelogue 3a"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Tecolote NM Sunset<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Meade State Park, Kansas<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

I was on the road to New Mexico from Watkins Mill<\/a> by 7:45 AM on the morning of the 26th of April, 2026. It was an uneventful drive, with the rolling hills of western Missouri and most of Kansas not all that different from those of familiar Illinois. The subtle rise in elevation on the way to the continental divide went unnoticed. It was, however, the longest drive of the entire voyage in terms of miles: 414 miles total according to The Dyrt<\/a>, excluding minor side-adventures and food foraging in towns. I pulled into Meade around 3:30 in the afternoon, and was all pulled in at my reserved site by 4:45. That’s when I snapped the photo above. The sites at Meade State Park are level, coated in reddish fine rock and sand, and easy to negotiate. This location was the geographical halfway point of my trip west. Each mile past this point was to push the boundaries of my travel and the extent of my empirical experience, not to say ‘learning,’ with the Jayco 195-RB. I walked around Meade SP, took a bunch of photos, and settled in for a nice night’s sleep with a level rig and 30 amp electric. Sweet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next day, the 27th, was more challenging. Again, I was up and out early. The drive across the last of southwestern Kansas, the panhandle of Oklahoma, a tiny corner of Texas, and the eastern half of central New Mexico, a distance to my destination of about 338 miles, pushed my skill and equipment to the limit, and, in fact, perhaps just a whisker beyond…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One thing I did that was smart: I gassed up more frequently that I could have. This turned out to be important. There are only a few ways to drive from Meade to Tecolote. I opted to take US 54 to head southwest rather than go up to US 56. I then headed northwest on US 87 when I got to Dalhart, TX. This took me up to Texline, TX, and Clayton, NM. There, I ‘rejoined’ 56\/414. I laughed out loud in the truck at calling a town ‘Texline.’ I gassed up at Clayton, though I’d only burned a half a tank. Good thing. The drive from Clayton to Springer, NM, is desolate. Not towns. No gas. Just increasingly steep ascents and the relentless piling up of the dirt that is the North American continent. Oh, and the rising wind!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All gassed up again in Springer, where the first gas station en route was a quaint corner mom\/pop convenience store, and I went for it, I passed a proper travel center on the way to turning onto I-25. Perhaps because it had been so many miles of ascents and crosswind, I was mentally unprepared for I-25. Now the wind was head-on, and the ascents were almost too much for the Ranger. I was unable to keep up 60 mph, much less 70. I soon fell back, with the truck mechanically shuddering, to 50. Then, in low gear, to 40. Forty miles per hour on I-25 invites the ire of truckers. Those with more competent rigs – ie., almost everyone – went sailing past. In my delusion, I suspected mockery. I also thought the Ranger was in some sort of serious trouble. There was a rest area, I took it. That’s the Fort Union Rest Area, and it’s currently closed as far as vending and restrooms go, but yeah, I pulled off nevertheless and contacted Randy<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finding nothing obviously wrong with the truck, I got back on the road. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, off the Interstate, I made my way up to my destination. But… there was one more tricky spot. Turning onto R ‘n K’s actual property, there was a fence and a left hand turn and not enough space to turn as wide as necessary. I tried. I failed. I hit the fence on my left side, took some skin gouges, and took out a tire.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Oops!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

A word on the reason for my visit: I have wanted to revisit the land grant New Mexico dwellers for quite awhile. My last visit there, in 2007 or so, was a stop on a coast to coast drive and camp, with the culminating point being a visit to Christian Cherry and his wife, Sarah Ebert in Eugene Oregon. As it turned out, I arrived in Tecolote, NM, and ascended the terrain to the perch above the highway, the cattle guards, the fences, just as the straw bales<\/a> that would form the insulating walls of the ‘casita’ were due to arrive by truck. There was a big motorcycle adventure planned and executed either the day before or the day after the straw slog, I am foggy on which. No matter… all of it was full of sweat, fellowship, and adventure. A few snapshots from memories of that visit: 1.) Riding on the back of a Harley wearing a helmet, clinging to someone’s back, and stopping now and then for vistas and water. Water was accorded sacred status as the renewer of life, the preserver of health. At the very least, it staved off the dehydration headache. The motorcyclists were Randy and our friend from KC and before that, New York, Rick Hillis. He died not too far back. May he be resting in peace. And then, of course, hauling those bales truck load by truck load, up from the bottom of the hill where the flatbed had delivered them. And after the hauling, came the stacking into the wood frame that made up the nascent casita. Somewhere in there, Evening Star Barron<\/a>, the precocious teeny-bopper, came out in a purple costume, and maybe even a wand, and bowed down and made a pronouncement. I don’t recall what she said, exactly. But I presume it was to wish us, and the enterprise well. We were soaked in sweat, had beers in hand, and, being mostly show people in general, were delighted. More on Eve in a bit…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Time has flown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the trailer was on the property thanks to Randy having taken over the hauling of it past the fence and corner, but was listing badly and not really inhabitable, I spent the first night in the casita.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Casita, exterior. April 27, 2026<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Casita interior. I brought my record player in from the trailer…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Casita interior… stove, bed, and view.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

And yeah, it was April. We had some snow. The stove was used for warmth.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Next morning… Spare installed…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was on the road to New Mexico from Watkins Mill by 7:45 AM on the morning of the 26th […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1609,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7,91,13],"tags":[99,101,120,133],"class_list":["post-1608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mini-essay","category-music","category-pictorial-essay","category-travel","tag-dance","tag-dance-score","tag-synthcontroller","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1608"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1626,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1608\/revisions\/1626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}