There are Places You Belong... and Places You Don't...

Along the Mogollon is one where I do...

After finding one of those places the night before, where I shall never return, we made a night camp along the highway in a roadside rest area...

Noisy as those can be, the sunrise offered a nice balance...

In the morning sunrise I turned west after fueling in Socorro, rolled past the VLA site one more time, and climbed up past Magdalena, Datil and Pie Town to Springerville. In just a few more miles I was rolling along my treasured Mogollon.

The simple truth is, though the High Lonesome, the coast and the rivers always attract me... the Malpais, the Chaparral, and the Sky Islands of Arizona and New Mexico will always be home. That is where I always breathe easiest. There and along the Mogollon Rim.

*Camp on the Mogollon*

Was under this rim that I chased wild cows 45 years ago. It's back in that country... and some of it still lives... where I'll end up.

Though the population has exploded in the settlements that choke the sonoran desert of Phoenix and Tucson... where five acre lakes, a foot deep, have been built amidst dozens of golf courses, that evaporate away precious water in a land where water is scarce...

...There's 113,000 square miles of Arizona to get lost in... miles that those townies have never and will never see.

Nascar is waiting... and Sunday morning we'll make the run to Avondale.

One of the last days in Denver our mail was picked up from fort Collins. I had dis-remembered a conversation I'd had with a reader a few weeks ago. He' told me of a gizmo he had that he used for sorting out some problems on his own rig. A laser thermometer. He allowed that he had an extra laying around and wanted to send it to me.

Now... let me say here that I am Not Good at receiving gifts. Fact is I'm awkward and stumbling. So... when I opened up the Box from Guy Cobham... a reader and RV Road Friend...

 ... to reveal a Laser Thermometer and LED light... I was... humbled. Thank You sir. Your gift will be a remembered kindness. It was a very nice way to start off a day.

Back On the Mogollon
Brian