Today was my last day riding with Kay and we had a great ride. I am really happy she made the decision to join me on this adventure. She was a lot of fun to be with, helped me with some bicycle issues (chain coming off and barb wire wrapped around my tire and sprockets), full of interesting stories and really supportive!

We started the day by meeting up with a friend of Dennis Woodruff’s, TJ Parks, in Caprock. Thank you Den! Sometimes you meet someone and you can tell immediately that he is truly a nice person from the first moment and that was true with TJ. He exudes friendliness and positivity. We spent about 30 minutes with him and his very patient and sweet 5 year old grandson AJ. We learned some interesting things about New Mexico. Lea County, NM was the largest oil producing county in the US in 2020 and may still hold that title. I mentioned that we were adjusting to the smell of oil while biking and he said that locals refer to it as the “smell of wealth”. We were also talking about how dry the land is and he noted that a lot of fires were caused by crows. The crows build their nests on power lines and sometimes the crows hit them, arc, catch on fire, fall to the ground and start a fire - who knew! He told us to look for fake utility poles that are places to lure the crows to build nests there. In response to your question re. circle crops Paula, TJ said the irrigation system for these fields is a fixed post in the center of the fields which spins around vs a rolling irrigator that moves across the fields. Thank you TJ and AJ for the visit. We have noted that the people in NM have been really nice and your visit further added to that perception. Please visit us in New England sometime 😊

We could have talked longer but wanted to set off so we could finish our ride before the temperature got too hot. We had some wind from the south which we appreciated as it kept us cool. We biked 47 miles from Caprock to Roswell and the majority was through public lands with a few private ranches. The view was beautiful but the same in every direction which was vast openness, dry grass and no shade. We were happy, given the consistency of the view, to have some variation in elevation - we had some rollers to break it up. We met up with Marie a couple of times and had a truck lunch at mile 37 before the last 10 mile descent into Roswell. After a nice lunch, we enjoyed two downhills, crossed the Pecos river and began to see civilization again which is always fun. As we entered Roswell, we stopped to take the obligatory picture in front of the “Welcome to Roswell” sign with the alien 😊. We also biked past several Pecan tree orchards at different stages of maturity which are beautiful in their symmetry. We saw a sign at one orchard offering fresh shelled pecans so we called their number. The 2021 harvest had just come back from the de-sheller in Lubbock, Texas and they were still being bagged. We ordered three one pound bags and they nicely delivered them to us in our hotel later in the afternoon.

We had a nice dinner on a patio at Peppers restaurant. We have discovered that spicy food is a norm around here so you have to be thoughtful with your order. I enjoyed some spicy tacos the night before so went mild. Kay, who loves spicy, happily enjoyed a green chiles burger. Marie ordered a salad with chipotle dressing on the side but didn’t taste it before dressing her salad and soon was sweating 😥. Since it was Saturday night we treated ourselves to a glass of Chardonnay so that helped cool us down a little.