"Bill's Excellent Adventure!"

5/6/07 - Sunday. Jane, thanks for the advice on RVs and campers. I'll sure use you as a resource!

Did two things today. One, went to the "Atomic Museum" a nice display of the development and use, both good and not so good applications, of nuclear power. Took some pics, but must admit, I wasn't terribly enthused over the subject so it lacked some excitement for me although the parts dealing with Hiroshima and Nagasaki were moving even if a small display.

I did see one of those feet x-ray machines I remember my parents letting me put my feet in at the old Buster Brown shoe store (now that's dating myself, isn't it!) The one on display was from the 1930s, that's a little older than my experience!

The other was a "Jacob's Ladder" that produced ozone. It is two rods that gradually separate at the top powered by a transformer. It produced plasma which arch's to the top. Used to be a standard prop in the old scifi movies. This is relevant to me as I built one in middle school for a science fair!

Later in the day, about 4:30 I decided to drive to the top of the mountain in the Sandia range I can see to the east of Albuquerque. I actually followed directions in a travel book on the Southwest my boys got for my trip! (Thanks guys!)

It was about a 70 mile round trip with temps dropping from a pleasant 64 at the hotel to 28 and below with an additional wind chill factor of something at the peak of the Cibola National Forest. It also started to snow while there and the visibility was bad, but it was a awesome site nonetheless.

Took a bunch of video clips most of which I'll probably scrap as they were done on the fly while winding up the mountain and down again. Albuquerque sits at about 5000 ft. The top of the mountain was 10,600 ft! Still smattering of snow on the ground, especially the further up I climbed. My original plan was to stay up there for sunset, but it was just too nasty for me!

I'll post the pics later tonight...right now it's time to eat!

Oh, notice I've added a new link on the blog. It will take you to more of a menu driven selection of photo categories crossing all places I've been to. I don't have everything categorized yet, but I'll get there.

see ya!