The very next day after our trip to Nogales we drove to Madera Canyon a highly reputed birding and hiking park, part of the Forest Service system in the Coronado National Forest. Not knowing what to expect we settled on the Nature Trail for starters as we expected a very tame trail on which we could warm up and get into the swing. After finding a parking spot at the Madera Canyon Trail head, we set out on the nature trail which passes by this parking lot. We soon realized that we were on a very nice trail with plenty of elevation change and also many birds. Western Scrub Jay, Acorn Woodpecker and Bridled Titmouse to name a few. Four hours later we returned to the car and drove back to the coach, with a stop at Safeway to refill the larder.
Early, for us, the next morning we set out again to the Titan Missile Museum Click here for the web site near Green Valley, just off I 19. When the entire Titan Missile installation around the country was dismantled and destroyed as part of the SALT Treaty this site was preserved as a museum. The silo (they called it the launch duct) has a disabled Titan II missile in it and the cap or top door is fixed in half open position with tons of concrete to prevent it from being opened or closed. The internal blast doors are also disabled. The tour encompassed the entire site above and below ground. Our volunteer guide, Chuck, had been a launch site officer and had served the shifts in a control room in the seventies. The nature of the site is frightening as everything is mounted to withstand a direct hit. Indeed the launch door is beveled so that it will plow aside debris from a surface explosion as it opens. In a cute play, Chuck invited a young girl to take the Launch Commanders chair. I should have seen what was coming, but. . . as Chuck talked about the workings of the command center he set up the requirements for an actual launch – which thankfully never happened. All of a sudden he placed the Commanders launch key in the lock and took out another key for a console several feet away and before we were quite ready, he had Marilyn turn the key with her left hand. The electronics reflected the beginning of a launch sequence as he turned the second key. As the klaxons sounded my palms were sweating and I had flashbacks to Dr Strangelove (or how I came to love the bomb). It was a very eerie and unpleasant experience. We can be thankful that these systems existed when they did and even more thankful that they accomplished their mission of deterrence with out ever being tested in the real world.
After lunch back on the coach we went to Tumacacori Mission, just south of Tubac. This was a mission first built by the Jesuits and then taken over by the Franciscans after the expulsion of the Jesuits. Its construction was never quite completed before it was abandoned and left to disintegrate until Theodore Roosevelt designated it a National Historic Landmark in 1907. The Franciscan Mission is in reasonable shape if mostly a restoration and the foundation of the Jesuit church is just visible. From there we could not resist another stop in Tubac for the galleries and shops before returning to the coach for dinner and a movie – Anonymous.
On Tuesday high wind warnings had us on the move early and we made it into the Elks Lodge in Las Cruces NM well before the winds were to hit. We had emailed Leorah and Stuart to let them know we were passing through and they told us about an annual lecture at NMSU that was to be given by Jaron Lanier whose CV is too long and varied to give here, musician/computer science/author [You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto] and more. The weather for Wednesday continued high wind warnings – predicted winds to 60 MPH and gusts beyond that – so we are staying put and will attend Purim Spiel at Temple Beth El here in Las Cruces. Stuart Kelter wrote the spiel so we don’t want to miss it.
Oh, the Tequila, well when I started to write this I had a small glass of it along side the computer and was sipping on it. Good stuff, very smooth, not cheap even in Mexico.