Downtown Marfa

I'm still writing about being on the road to Rancho Laurena, and taking my time, both in blogging the journey and as it was in fact on the road less traveled. Sorry Lauren, we'll get there eventually, just one more post after this and we can share some photos of our time together.

I tend to stay away from the Interstates when I'm on my solo photo road trips—there's nothing more boring to me than churning away at 70 miles per hour with only piggy-back semis and other desperate time-crazed travelers for company. And there's generally not much worth looking at from these American semi-autobahns.

So, I take back roads when I can, which is most of the time. You will likely remember that wonderful book Blue Highways: A Journey into America by William Least Heat-Moon. I was never as ambitious as Mr. Heat-Moon, but I'm serious about mapping out the blue highways for my journeys. It's simply easier to stop and get out and look around when you're on a two lane seldom used road. I especially like no longer being a strict destination driver. When something catches my eye, I get out for a closer look and maybe a few photographs. And here's a telling thing: I've actually stopped, made a U-turn, and gone back to look at something that caught my eye.

I left off last time showing you the delightful discovery of an abandoned movie set in my post Contrabando, which was a continuation of my Dawn at Prada Marfa blog. Both of those are set in the southwestern corner of Texas, where we find ourselves in the bracing rare air of the high dry desert and actual real life mountains that get up over a mile high. It's a beautiful place, one I've long wanted to visit, especially in the springtime before the summer heat sets in and it gets too hot.

I was tweeting my journey, off and on, for the few friends that were keeping track. I promise that there were only a couple of tweets while in motion. I usually pulled off the highway to attend to that master of my physiology—the damned prostate—to pee and tweet. It was nice to keep in touch, though I never explained in detail until now exactly what I was doing.

Marfa is an unusual small town, a high desert hamlet made famous by the mysterious Marfa Lights. It does have its own Public Radio Station, and there are a number of artsy funky galleries, but for someone just traveling through, there's not much there there. The nearby towns of Alpine, which is a university town, and Marathon offer more creature comforts and as many art galleries as the more famous Marfa. 

The Marfa Lights are known throughout the southwest, and there's even a viewing stand as you approach the city from the east. A closer inspection reveals that in addition to the public binoculars on a concrete patio looking south to empty high prairie, the impressive circular edifice turns out to be the fanciest roadside restroom I've ever seen—not the mini museum I expected.

No, Pinky, that's just lens flare, not the Marfa Lights.

No one has been able to adequately explain the Marfa lights, though it does attract X-Files true believers and crystal pyramid types who have ready answers. A young cowboy, Robert Reed Ellison, reported seeing the lights in 1883 and wondered if he was seeing Apache campfires. The Apache themselves believed the lights to be stars dropping to earth. Explanations from science to science fiction and miracles still abound. It may be probable that one reason the source of the lights cannot be located is due to the interaction of the cold and warm layers of air that can bend light. But the lights are still a mystery—whether it's swamp gas, reflected light from mica veins, electrostatic discharges or the ghosts of Conquistadors still searching for gold.

I spent two nights in Marfa, including the first night which included a spectacular Riata Inn Motel fail! I took some sunset shots of the Prada store, then spent the next day in Big Bend National Park and driving down that beautiful Ranch Road 170 where I found the Contrabando set.

The next morning, I left Marfa early before dawn to travel up the lonely US Highway 90 to the Prada Marfa art installation. There I took the Dawn at Prada Marfa shots and when the sun was high enough, continued my journey westward to Rancho Laurena. 

I couldn't make the trip in one day, as I was determined to avoid the Interstate, but I was foiled by a lack of small roads in far west Texas. I had to get on I-10 in Van Horn and drive through El Paso before I could escape to Highway 9 that traced the border. I only saw a dozen cars in the 80 miles from El Paso to Columbus, New Mexico—and ten of those were Border Patrol trucks. From Columbus I headed north, passing under I-10 at Deming on the way to my motel stop in Silver City. 

The next day on the Journey to Rancho Laurena finds us finally arriving there to discover Verbal, Mr Remedy, AZ David and Lonnie all lounging in the pool. But before we get there I'll show you a surprise discovery in the next post, a beautiful and serendipitous stop along the way.

So now here follows some images of Marfa and the trip out, racing the sun.

Thanks for stopping by, and for coming along with me.

Fake fossils and biracial babies

Yard Dog gallery, my legs, my car and a dead plant art installation

A minimalist ballroom

An old service station retasked, but closed

Cupid's got a cig

Plywood instead of hardware, just two blocks from downtown Marfa

There's a story about my nice Gary Fisher Sugar 3 mountain bike with disk brakes and Lauren's groom AZ David. It will be told too.

Water tower

Main Street, Marfa (Actually, Highland Avenue)

The peach colored Marfa Courthouse. You can go all the way up to the cupola, they don't mind, just walk up the stairs. 

The view down that same main street. Near the white truck driving toward you is a little tiny bit of the ass end of that Porsche on the left. Note that once you get to the edge of town, as seen in the not too far distance, that's it—you're at the end of town.

Steps up to the cupola

More steps up

Now we hit the road, I found this lovely gift left just for me. You'll have to look closely, or click on the image to get a larger size to see it maybe, but on that lonely road, Highway 9 from El Paso to Columbus, someone decorated a creosote bush just hoping I would stop and take a photo.

This was on the other side of the road a few miles further on

The first day out from home I drove on side roads down to Marfa, and took about 11 hours to do it. It was quiet and peaceful. I have a series of photos that will go into my Lonely Road set on Flickr. You can see that the trip from Marfa to Silver City, while not long, took most of the day. I got to relax for the night there, and went to a nice Mexican restaurant, and had a couple of Carta Blancas.

Oh! Nota bene: That top shot, the one of the Porsche 356. I had one myownself for a while. Mine was a later version—a 1964 C—and a coupe, not the cabriolet you see in the image above. It was a blast to drive. I bought it from a former boyfriend of the bride's and sold it some years later to another, to her first true love actually. It was nice to keep it in the family, so to speak.

all images copyright © 2009 by barry b. doyle • all rights reserved

(except Google map screen cap)