Starting Ruth & Tom's next adventure

We hit the road Monday January 31, 2011. After a day of driving, we pulled into the classy sounding town of Van Horn Texas on the first night of our 75-day adventure.

When we left Tucson, it was a warm sunny morning, but we drove into an increasingly ominous darkening sky, following I-10 east.

The tough part was packing everything for our trek into the Prius: golf clubs first, then everything else had to fit around them, including espresso-maker of course.

Once on the road it felt good. We took a break and a walk in the very historic, unfortunately very run down, section of Las Cruces, NM. A monument commemorating the history claims things got much worse after “urban renewal” efforts in the early 70s.

We left New Mexico, drove into Texas through El Paso. We were surprised that much of western Texas along I-10 was at elevations over 4000 feet. We checked into the historic El Capitan Hotel (actually, the only classy thing we could find in Van Horn) and enjoyed a wonderful Cajun shrimp angel hair pasta dish from the dining room, cooked by the chef who helped us carry in our bags.

By Tuesday morning, we were on the edge of the big winter storm hitting the mid-section of the country. It was snowing and blowing hard in Van Horn, but that didn't stop us from bundling up and walking the main street in blowing snow. In an otherwise woebegone looking main street [see photo] stood the elegant, renovated 1930s era El Capitan Hotel, with palm trees in its southwest style courtyard.

Looking ahead, San Antonio may not be as tropical as we expected, with highs in the 30s forecast the next few days. That’s OK; we’re going there to visit cousins Carolyn and Steve Kelley and their mother Audrey. We’ll bundle up for the River Walk.

Please share your experiences.

We’d like to hear your experiences of places along our route: unusual things to see, great places to eat (preferably with vegetarian selections), and golf courses you like. Next stops will be the South Padre Island (a kite festival ), Dallas, Cancun (yes, we have to leave the Prius and fly there from Dallas), then Thibodeaux and New Orleans, LA. [Please share your experiences by comments to this blog or by personal email to Ruth or Tom or on our Facebook pages.]

-Tom & Ruth