Sunday, May 5, 2013

GREAT WEEKEND...


Nothing all that newsworthy during the four hour drive over to Quemado from Fountain Hills, but we picked up a couple of newsy bits when we got into Quemado.


It seemed like an odd Saturday. Too quiet, actually. We got into Quemado about 4:00 p.m. Usually there are cars at the Largo Café, or in the parking lot at the Largo Motel. Not a car to be found in either parking lot. No one at the pumps at J&Y, no cars on the road. We’ve always seen activity somewhere on the streets of Quemado. There was none at this very moment. It was almost a Twilight Zone kind of moment.

I’ll admit I thought perhaps we should check the churches to see if there were any services taking place for a newly departed, but former resident of Quemado. Highway 60 was especially quiet also, with only two cars going west while we were standing in the Rito Quemado Convenience Store.

“We haven’t been here since November,” I said to the clerk, a woman I didn’t recognize as anyone who formerly worked at the Largo, or the True Value Hardware Store, or J&Y Auto. But she looked like she fit in just fine, and before we walked in, she had been speaking with a couple of possible “locals”, as we went about our business, using the facilities and picking out a few bags of munchies for the twenty-six mile trip to the Santa Rita

“What’s new in town?” I inquired.

“Well, we have a new Trading Post,” the kind woman said with a smile. “It’s right next to the Largo Café.”

“Oh, right where the old one used to be!” I said, hoping it would give her some idea that we just didn’t drop in once last November, but had been around since the last Trading Post was in business, which was probably well over 5 years ago before it closed. It didn’t seem to matter either way to her how long we’d been around, or how well we knew the former businesses in town, yet she continued smiling.

The next new thing for Quemado is that it is no longer a “dry town”. The Rito Quemado Convenience Store has a Liquor License!

I do have to wonder how the introduction of readily available alcohol might change the people, and of course, the town. Only time will tell.

The Highway Patrol has new vehicles, and we saw one of said vehicles going east on Highway 60 as we were just coming out of town heading for our turn-off. Not much as changed as we headed up the gravel. The saw mill has some beautiful wood logs baking in the sun, and the houses on that side of the road have really cleaned their yards of miscellaneous junk and junk cars.

And well, what else did our eyes spy while going up the road? A small white pick-up truck with a utility trailer very similar to the one we used to have was parked off the road. We sighed, and I kept driving.

Bill usually drives up the road, but on Saturday I gave him the day off, so he could do a little sight-seeing, like I get to do when he drives. It was a beautiful afternoon. No threat of rain and just breezy enough to blow the dust off the road that our truck was kicking up. As Bill was chomping up the bag of Bugle’s I had bought we were listening to Classic Vinyl on XM Radio.

The drive to the Santa Rita could be summed up in three words… LIFE IS GOOD!

The road was in pretty good shape, and it had obviously been recently graded and more gravel added in some areas. Only passed one car which was headed in the direction of Highway 60. It was a lone woman driving a nice white short bed step-side pickup truck. Had to wonder where she had come from, or where she might be going to. I can only hope that she made it safely to her intended destination.

All was quiet in regards to wildlife out in the middle of nowhere. We sometimes see a coyote, or a few antelope, and have seen some elk and deer at times, but on this drive the plains were void of game. Possibly it was a bit too early for evening grazing. What there was left to graze on, that is.

Even with what seemed to be a typical winter season, occasional snow and rain, the plains looked parched and over-grazed. And if there’s no precipitation in the forecast over the next few months, and all the cold temps that area has been experiencing, wildflowers don’t stand much of a chance to make an appearance either. But Spring is not over yet, so never say never!


I slowed the truck to make it around the last bend, and finally the Santa Rita was in sight. It was so good to see the Santa Rita, and especially our little piece of heaven, after all these months away.

All was as we left it. Nothing stolen or broken into! Hallelujah! The truck clunked over the cow-path that was probably a little deeper than it was in November. Pieces of sonotube around the concrete piers were blowing in the breeze. Cleaning up the piers was on the list of chores for the weekend.

We had just taken a load in from the truck when our neighbors Barb and Paul came riding up the drive and into the back meadow on their ATV. We had a nice chat with them for a couple hours, with topics ranging from our local cowboy to what happens when one puts a stick, or several sticks of dynamite down a dead well, among other topics of discussion, like who maybe potentially owning the lot next to us; and the outfit that seems to now be in possession of several lots on the Santa Rita. It also seems that the matter of our stolen utility trailer may still be getting “looked into”, but personally, I think the chances of it being returned to us are slim to none.

And in the “did ya know?” department…it’s still in the County books that if a brand is registered (for the $100 fee) you can then deem your property an official “ranch”. Well, brand or no brand, we’ll always call our piece of heaven The T-Square Ranch.

We had just finished dinner when neighbor, Gene came cruisin’ up through our back meadow. It’s so good to know that we have full-timers on the Santa Rita! Gene is getting around quite well, but none of us were up to standing around much more at that point so we all went inside and “set a spell” while we talked some more about the goings on in the area and with family.

The stars were beginning to blink on in the heavens as Gene made his way back to the Rock House Ranch, and it was about time to call it a night. But not before I beat Bill at a game of Monopoly!

The moon was beginning to rise over the tiny town of Quemado in the distance as we hit the hay!

Sunday!

While it was a little chilly at night, probably in the 40’s, we woke to another wonderful sun-soaked, cloudless day in Central Western New Mexico. Great weather for all the time we were planning on spending outside. The temp climbed quickly, but there was just a hint of a breeze to stave off it becoming too intolerably warm. Bill put out the awning and life got that much more pleasant.

Of course I went visiting, walking up the large sandy wash, looking at all the odd tracks in the freshly “bloomed” sand. I knew I would have to spend some time looking for possible new discoveries, as freshly bloomed sand might also yield newly percolated treasures that the earth had kept under wraps for a while.

But first, a walk up the road to check on a neighbor’s dwelling, and then a walk back through the front meadow to take a look at the south-end of our treed area which we don’t walk through that often. Bill found a pinon pine, and we hoped it wasn’t the last standing pine in that area of the property. We’ll look for more, possibly get an exact count of the pinon pines that also inhabit our little slice of heaven.

Then we went chasing after more of the sonotube paper that had blown loose to be found hither, thither, and yon around the property. While we got the cement piers freed from their raggedy sonotube bonds, I’m sure we didn’t get all the pieces of paper that had blown loose.

While the concrete piers are now unusable for the building we had hoped to put up several years ago, hopefully we’ll be able to utilize them for something at some point in time.

Make that…I know we didn’t get all the pieces, but we’ll have to leave that for our next trip, when we have a few more days. Hopefully the weather will be just as beautiful for walking the entire property.

And the next trip will be just a few weeks from now.  Long weekend.  Memorial Day Weekend.
Birthday Weekend.   Bumpy cake out on the Santa Rita.  I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate 58 years on planet earth. 



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