We left Tucumcari, NM about 9:30-10:00 to head South. We couldn’t resist a stop at the grave site of Billy the Kid in Fort Sumner, NM. There’s a tacky little road side museum there. Does every 2-bit thug from that era get a roadside attraction? I wonder. I’m half-tempted to get into the roadside attraction business. Would welcome your ideas, of course.
The tacky museum didn’t have the grave site, that was down the road behind the tacky Ft. Sumner roadside museum. Ahem. It’s a sad little graveyard. And they surrounded his grave with a cage because it’s been stolen a few times before and/or maybe they wanted to put the little bastard in jail. Suspect that may be why his “real” grave signs are in quotes – the chain of custody is in doubt. Mystery.
We tried to visit the Indian monument behind the Billy the Kid grave, but we didn’t have cash on us when we walked up to the place. It’s too bad because this did not look like a tacky site. It documents the history of Ft. Sumner and the trials of the Navaho Indians/Trail of Tears story. Gail, who worked there, did load us up with plenty of brochures so we could get a sense of the place.
Next, we rolled into Roswell, NM to check out the UFO Museum. Needless to say, we don’t believe. However, we did make an effort to remember The Doctor as we traveled in the footsteps of aliens and alien abductees along the by-ways of Roswell. Some of the t-shirts were very amusing, things like “What happens in Roswell stays classified”, but none of them tempted us to buy.
We ate another crappy roadside meal, this time at Farley’s. I swear they hate vegetables in this part of the country. And fruit – they hate that too.
Right now we’re camping outside of Carlsbad and plan to hit the caverns tomorrow and then swing up to go through Truth or Consequences.
It’s 7:54pm.
We looked through their offerings, but aside from some fine leather goods it was the usual mix of Elvis, I Love Lucy, Route 66 crap they have everywhere else. I’m disappointed with the Cherokee.
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