February 6th, 2015, Lordsburg, New Mexico

We left San Diego and the sea; the sea of sea lions, surfers and bikini clad women and plunged eastward into desert, cactus and sand. It's warm. We are talking in the 80's. Stopping in Casa Grande for an hourl, we visited one last  time the husband's childhood friend. Around 1500 hrs. we were back on the road and heading toward Tucson. We knew we wouldn't be driving all night and planned to stay in Bowie, Arizona but finding no accomodations, we continued on to Lordsburg, New Mexico where you find us at this moment.

Upon arrival we approached a Best Western Motel for a room. The only rooms available was "smoking" rooms. I so remember a time when the husband and I would be overjoyed to be staying at a hotel that had "smoking' rooms. That time has come and gone. We drove on. Though tired and road weary, we drove on. We found a beautiful room at a Hampton Inn and as I crawled out of that truck, I had to lengthen the legs and stretch a bit to be sure my legs were still functional.

Travel broadens one doesn't it? I've learned a lot on this trip. The landscape, the food and the hotel habits have been most educational. The televison experience is something I'm still researching. I've found that the hotels in Texas, maybe not all, but the ones I've stayed in will have Fox News on their lobby and breakfast room TV. When quesitoned about this, I was told they had a contract with Fox and the TV had to be on that station. Later I found, if I wanted to change it I would have to poll everyone watching and if NO ONE objected, I could change the station. We stayed in that Holiday Inn in Casa Gande for 10 days. We then moved to a Holiday Inn Express in the same town as all the rooms at the big Holiday Inn had been reserved for the Super Bowl Game. Again the same thing. Fox News. The remote was left close to the TV and the breakfast room was empty as I was the first one to arrive there for coffee. I looked around the room, took a poll and when there was no one that objected, I quickly changed the TV channel to anything but Fox. I did this every morning that I stayed there.
Our next hotel was a Best Western Inn in Mission Bay, San Diego, California. The TV station there was tuned to a cartoon channel. At least they were being neutral!

I'm now in New Mexico at a Hamilton Inn. The hotel is beautiful and the breakfast room is well appointed. Paisley clad  sofas line the walls with mini tables in front of them. The center is dominated by a long black granite island with bar stools on each side and electrical receptacles to plug in one's laptops and  the best part is the TV on the wall at the end of this island is not tuned to Fox. No contract here in New Mexico?
I suppose this state doesn't garner a lot of electoral votes. If we don't make it home today, Ill  have another hotel to review.

On another note, I'm hopeful we can buy a bag of chilis. Deming and Hatches are on our route; two towns that are known for their green chili. We like to pick some up and roast them at home, package and freeze them for future meals.

I"m hoping our passage gets us to Luling, Texas for one more meal of BBQ. We plan our traveling on arriving at our favorite places to eat? Yes we do!

This trip has went well. No unexpected adventures and I'm ready to be back home. We have plans on some house renovations so I'm gearing up to be in "house mess" mode for a while.

We have miles and miles of sand and cactus to travel today. I don't mind and truly enjoy the different lands to see. We have San Antonio as our goal and anything beyond that will be gravy.

I'm off to repack, reload and hit the road!