American Adventure

New Mexico

Thank you to my good friends Ann Dillon and Jeri Bowen of Albuquerque, NM

Starting on Tuesday, October 22, 2002, 3:54:38 PM

Escape from Albuquerque

As I was about to leave Albuquerque I had heard that there was scattered thunderstorms around the area. I was planning on continuing with my original heading and go south. However, when I got on the bike and out on the highway I looked around and saw that the south was covered in clouds. I looked to the east and it was also obscured. I decided to go on line and see exactly where all the storms were and how I might be able to avoid them. I looked and noticed the thunderstorms saturating the path to the south. They were also scattered throughout the eastern route as well but not near as heavy. I decided to take interstate 70, east and on towards Amarillo. There were several times I thought I had made a bad decision. I looked around and thunderstorms were all along the horizon.

Some worse than others. Some looked as if they could easily support a tornado or two. The wind would pick up and blow with strong force across the freeway. Sometimes it would change directions making me quite nervous. Then some storm clouds would shy away, as if they were purposefully subsiding to give me clear passage.

I looked back in the direction that I had passed to see that a huge storm had came across and blanketed the freeway as if it were closing off the path behind me. I came out from the monster, unscathed and into the safety of the sunlight for a brief distance.

As I came over a hill and around a corner I saw a rainbow. I passed sign showing a short distance from the little town of Santa Rosa. The rainbow seemed to be sitting right on top of the town. I couldn't help myself. With a vision like that I just had to pull off of the freeway and drive through this town. After all, there must be a pot of gold there somewhere.
I pulled into and started driving through town. It began to rain lightly so I decided not to stay long. Out of the corner of my view I saw a quaint little church. I pulled down the street and took the picture here. Later, after looking at the pictures, I noticed that the same rainbow can be very faintly seen in the upper right of the image, as if it were coming right out of the church itself.

I continued with my drive towards the Texas state line. Not very many storm clouds could be seen but the different cloud formations that I did see were pretty neat. I had hoped for a much better sunset but it just didn't turn out the way I had hoped.

drove on to Tucumcari where stopped and got something to eat just before crossing the border.

Once in Texas I would find the rain again. It lasted throughout my stay there so I didn't get very many pictures of my home state.