Home ·· News Room ·· Prints ·· Licensing ·· Gallery ·· About Us ·· Contact Us ·· Articles ·· Services New Mexico and Colorado stock photography road trip report, December 26, 2002 to January 4, 2003 Updated February 13, 2006 Page 2 of 5 Previous page   Next page
	New Mexico/Colorado continued... Augh! Jogging over dunes with gear is a challenge. Hopefully the camera is okay. Forgot to mention - couldn't find my focus loupe. Crap! Didn't remember packing it and discovered this as the first shot was set up. Is it in Temecula, 1000 miles away. Get to the car, toss the gear in the back seat. Where's my wallet?! Did it fall out when I was out in the dunes and my legs buckled? Oh no!!! Whew, it's in the backpack. Got to get to that gate. Don't get popped for speeding or get locked in. Gun it! Yes, made it to the gate. Stop inside to navigate. 1.5 minutes later, the ranger asks me to park outside the gate. I stall by asking the easy directions to El Paso & Carlsbad. Doesn't get much closer than 1.5 minutes to gate closing! Now, at Pizza Hut, the reason for the camera falling off is apparent. The plastic nut blew apart due to the torque of the camera as I fell. It still seems to work, but it's weak. Crap. No Calumet dealers in Las Cruces, NM, 8pm Saturday night. Dangit. What to do now? It still kinda works. Need parts and a smarter brain. "Don't carry your camera on the tripod." Ya, what's the big deal? Well, now I know. Off to El Paso. The hike to the Slaughter Canyon cave (in Carlsbad) is rough (?) according to the guidebook and takes an hour. Better bust a move! Discovered one of the standards (LF) is lost. How did that come off? Went to Lowes in Las Cruces and picked up some replacement hardware for the broken camera knob. Ha, found the cap in the LF box. How'd it come off in the first place. The spare knob part from Lowes seems to work! DAMN! I did forget my focus loupe, a critical piece. Well, it's not like forgetting the light meter but it's impossible to check critical focus. Here's El Paso - Budget Hotel near exit 23A. Cute desk worker Lisa seems to avoid my questions. My approach sucks. Dec 29, 2002 Sunday Here's another Denny's off George Dietric road. Wonder who that is? Sent off email to most people to let them know this dog is still alive. Got to love Netzero. Still shaking the noggin' at forgetting the focus loupe and dropping the camera. The first can be solved with a simple check list. Easy enough. I'm the only Patron at this Denny's. Thought these Texas farm boys rose early. Although, it's Sunday. Probably no churches on the 62/180 highway toward Carlsbad. The second error - don't carry the camera mounted on the tripod. The major detriment is the loss of one free hand. Perhaps another way to carry the tripod? THANK GOODNESS I didn't bring the 3051 mega-tripod, otherwise this trip would be hell already. The little 3021 seems to be okay, though haven't blown away any Jackson 4x5 shots yet, so I don't know. Also busted a film holder dark slide tab. Gorgeous sunrise here, 1/2 hour ago (6:30am), beautiful pinks & deep reds, then gray, then standard sky. Seen that happen many times. To breakfast - original Grand Slam and on to the road. My soul seems to be with me again after a short hiatus. Also noticed I have white sand caked on the mud flap. "I didn't steal it. Honest!" Interesting, White's City, right by Carlsbad Caverns, is privately owned by two families. Because most business work the summer only, they don't survive. The main part of this morning was spent traveling to the NM area. Huh! The dude who shot the other because of being dehydrated (then rescued an hour later) happened in the Guadalupe mountains. He got 2nd degree murder, 3 years, out in 1 year. Don't bail on life is the lesson! The drive out of El Paso takes you on the 68/180 past Hueco Tanks, one of the great climbing locations. Do I have my gear? Yes! :) Do I have time? No! :( Keep driving. Passing the time, stopped by a picnic stop and blew up a firecracker. Cool! Haven't done that in forever. Bought them at a stop on the I-10 a few days ago in NM. I think. Passing the salt flats area, a sign indicated a private control war occurred in 1877. Exciting land. Ah! A way on to the salt flats. Hopefully don't get high-centered. And yes, I checked to see if the flats were too soft. Sweet. Just right. With a non-camera man, my Nissan commercial was thusly a little more lame. Fun anyway. Drove so far the camera was invisible. Augh! Follow the tracks back & viola, there it is! After the film session, it was time to get going. Oh crud, another National Park to stop by. This one has a hike to the highest peak in Texas. Looks like a butt buster. Hmm, why wouldn't I take the LF camera. Oh, hope the weather improves for that. A tad on the windy side. Decision - El Capitan overlook or Guadalupe peak. Big forest beyond the hills. Shocking! Even had a Butterfield stage station there. Had to film that for Dad. Midpoint. Cutting this close, get on the road to the caverns. Hit the slaughter canyon cave (New Cave) turn off. The canyon can be seen on the highway. A 20+ minute drive out there, good butt busting hike up, ~25 minutes in cool weather. Had 25 people in the group and of course a blabber hammer. Always one. An excellent tour by a young lady from North Carolina and a dude from New Zealand. Sad that the cave walls and ceiling were covered with diesel soot from guano (bat waste) miners. They mined what turned out to be dirt rather than guano. After a time, guano actually turns to dirt. Haha! Bat skeletons could be seen inside the dirt. Neat! Well worth the $15 to see a non-developed cave. An excellent experience in the total dark and silence. Even saw a cave cricket. No color. Wonder why? They also don't chirp because that'd be the dinner bell for a larger animal. The Christmas tree formation was truly impressive. Pictures in post cards done with strobe flash. Back down the trail and off to White's city. A pretty good spinach lasagna at the Velvet garden. On the menu - seafood. Why in the world would one order a "special" of sea food in New Mexico?? Are you insane? Now, got to figure out what to do about sleeping arrangements. Did find out that Whit's city was controlled by one family and you have to be hooked into them to run a business here. Period. Decided to drive to Carlsbad to see the options for sleep. There was a great turn off driving into the middle of no-where. That has potential. Passed an oil-pump - nice photo op. Into Carlsbad. It was 5pm... No way it's bed time because wake up is then 2am. Cold and dark. Someone mentioned a movie theater in town when I asked. Good way to waste time without drinking. Met a dude there, Mauricio and his cute coworker Judi. She was a bit young - 11th grade. Blabbed with them for a good half hour. Bought a ticket to the 9pm (ugh) Twin Towers Lord of the Rings. After standing around for a while, Mauricio came up to me and offered to show me the projection booth. He offered to me to watch Catch Me If You Can and again accepted. This time for free! :) Watched that then Twin Towers. Better than wandering around the town in the dark! After that long and mostly boring movie, he offered to tour me around Carlsbad at night. He seemed pretty cool but kept a watchful eye just in case. Totally cool dude. Had to avoid being a technogeek, though. Worked just fine. Found out that Carlsbad has the 2nd largest physical high school in the US in acreage. It looks like a junior college campus! He gave some great tour ideas, well worth pursuing. Even saw an oil well being drilled. His brother works for the drillers. The shack the workers hide out from the cold is quaintly called the "dog house". Hahaha! Gave me his cell in case I wanted to hang tomorrow. Cool. Bid him farewell and found a rat hotel for $25. Bed at 1:30am instead of 6pm. Ugh, I'm tired. Dec 30, 2002 Monday Another breakfast at Denny's. Not bad. Sadly no local interest #'s. Oh, stupid not to spend an hour and map those ghost towns out. Asked the waitress what day it is because I wasn't sure. Dang, need to get to the caverns 'cause daylight is a burnin'. Dang, the Tabasco wasn't stoppered and the eggs drown. Ugh. Daylight burnin', get on the road! The caverns are about 30 miles out of Carlsbad. Rather, White City is. Then a 7 mile drive up to the mesa. Whoa is it windy here! If the weather is going to be like this, don't think it's a good idea to assault Guadalupe peak - if it gets bad I'm toast. Taken under advisement. Get gear, get tickets, get audio guide (an absolute must have!) and head to the natural cave entrance. Don't want to miss something. The park descriptions for strenuous must be worded for 90 year old people with walkers. No problem. If you can walk two miles without passing out, you're good. There were some people who had a basketball for a stomach and sounded like they were going to pass out. Sad. Wait, if you look at the American tourists, they're almost all heavy to plain fat. Gross! Funny thing, the foreign tourists are almost all reasonable. Okay, we're all a bunch of fat-ass, TV watching, entitlement sucking (many additions) slugs. We have it too easy. Just like Rome. The first explorers of this cave were brave! This thing is freakin' steep. Only can go down it - one way route. With a lantern in hand, man people back then were tougher and braver. Period. Passed plenty of beautiful decoration. One dude brought his tripod. I should have asked, but it slows you down. Need a bean bag, non-slip grip. Used the railings and installed rocks (not part of the formations!) to steady the f1.4 @ 1-2 second shots. The 24mm wasn't very appealing for most so stuck with the 50mm most of the time. Besides, the 24mm is two stops slower. There are several side trails closed off. Either they were guided tour areas or not visited any more. Sure wish the bats were here to fly away. That'd be so cool to have 200,000 bats coming out of the cave. Lechiguia cave isn't far from here but it's special access only. After seeing a picture book on it, it's easy to see why. Hit the main loop trail in the caverns and took it around. Burned off 1 roll of 35mm. Only used the flash and cord once or twice because direct flash would ruin the lighting, dramatic at times. A theatrical lighting specialist was consulted to do the lighting. It was funny to note the audio guide indicated colored light wasn't used. Incandescent, metal halide & fluorescent ARE colored. That's why most formations are really - incandescent. Previous page   Next page
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