I Know What I Did Last Summer, Pt. 2

We left the little canyon city of Bisbee and headed east/northeast into the high desert of southeast Arizona (Geronimo Country) and southwestern New Mexico. We have learned what may be obvious to others and that is that the higher the elevation a desert is, the less extreme. The mean temp. here might be 85 but in Phoenix it’s 105.
We thought we’d check out Silver City, NM, a town we knew nothing about but of which we had received interesting reports. The old town turned out to be very charming; a bit like Ashland before the explosion.
It felt like it was just starting to enter the gentrification arc. This, of course is when a city or area is very funky and interesting because a bunch of artist types live there. Then others who are not bohemians but find them interesting will begin to go there for the experience. As it gains popularity it begins to grow and services improve. Then, at the top of the arc, it begins to gentrify. Starbucks comes in, the Gap, etc. Rents and prices go up so the artists move out to the next funky locale where they can afford to live and it starts all over again. Monterey, California used to be a true fishing village with artists and writers. Likewise Ashland, Oregon and Fremont, Seattle. It’s inevitable and there’s not much to be done about it.
Silver City has the feel of just entering the arc. New galleries and groovy coffee shops filled with people excited and happy about just being there. Outside of the old town it appeared to be just another high desert town with WallMarts and Costcos. But the old town was good.
Traveled up to fabulous Socurro, N.M. situated near the Rio Grande River. It was a mid point for us on the way to Santa Fe but it also was a jumping off point. Fifty miles west on a high, flat plateau is the Very Large Array; a series of large (very large), movable radio telescope dishes on railroad tracks. They work together in that the information they receive is processed together with the other dishes hundreds of yards away to from, in effect, one very large telescope. The dishes can be moved on the tracks to affect resolution and focus. The movie, “Contact” with Jodie Foster featured the V.L.A. They are awesome if you happened to be a science geek like myself. Otherwise, don’t bother.
More later.