Roswell is not a one trick pony. They’ve got military boarding schools, petroleum production, ranching and all of that stuff.
But you sure wouldn’t know it driving by. The whole town is in on the aliens.
Even the McDonald’s is UFO themed.
Too bad all the effort went into appearances and not the customer service at that McDonald’s.
And we’re back on the road!
Today, we hung out again with one of the men behind all that giant pulsed power machine (aka, almost like a laser). We got a tour thanks to Nicholas’ Uncle Frank. I love that my best bear bud knows a Laser Scientist. And today, Uncle Frank took us to try something else - New Mexican food.
For the most part, New Mexican food is a lot like Mexican food, but they’ve got a few specialties like sopapillas, which is a type of fried bread that you eat with honey. I liked eating it with a lot of honey. We went to a place called Monroe’s, and aside from Sopapillas, they served us chips and salsa for breakfast. Even better.
Here’s what sopapillas look like.
And here’s my best bear bud with his uncle Frank.
I just saw the big daddy of lightning canons. That’s not really a laser but it’s pretty darn close. My best bear bud and I got a private tour of the Pulse Powered Facility at the Kirkland Air ForceResearch Laboratory. The place looked right out of Tron. Here, I laid eyes on the Shiva Star. This thing is MASSIVE.
Imagine a machine capable of storing nearly 10 million joules of energy. And then being able to pulse 120,000 volts and 15 million amps in one millionth of a second towards an object. I don’t know what that means, but it sure sounds like a lot!
Anyway, any target of this machine stands no chance.
I got to feast my eyes on what little remained of a test cylinder, which was not much. The thing was compressed into almost nothingness.
I want this kind of power in my paws. I want Nicholas to make me my own Shiva Star. These guys are only using for research on how to achieve nuclear fusion. I’ve got so many better uses than that.
Time to start thinking.
First stop, Joey’s. He and his wife Jill live in a very cute adobe house.
Immediate next stop - hotel room where I can get some much needed sleep to make up for the trauma of being forced to get up so darn early in the morning.
The rest of Albuquerque can wait.
Last stop in the park was the Painted Desert, which is this massive expanse of stratified red stuff that covers several states. Supposedly it’s one of the more impressive features of the park but I was pretty worn out by the time we got here. So I took a look, tried to say hello to some Texans who gave blank stars back at me, then went back to the car.
I’m sure the place would have been more spectacular during sunset, but we had places to go and no time to dwadle!
Did it.
Too bad the full route’s been decommissioned.
Newspaper rock was a stop where you could look at well preserved petroglyphs.
I don’t know why I was so excited but I was, so I ran out ahead of Nicholas.
I decided to wait for Nicholas on the walk back to the car.
Ok they weren’t real ones, but apparently these types of dinosaurs roamed the region.
I wish dinosaurs hadn’t gone extinct.
I would have greatly enjoyed riding one.
Next on our list was Crystal Forest. This place used to be the home of many petrified logs in a variety of colours. But the best looking ones were hauled away by the first visitors before the whole region became protected…so we only got to see the specimens deemed not worth taking (or too heavy).
Still it was cool to see a few up close.
