The time has come

After a quarter century of neglect and eight years of savage abuse, this country, our country, has traded the bitterness of division for the peace of unity with a serene transition of power. A pervasive corruption ushered criminal policies of catastrophic consequences and left a resilient people unprotected on the edge of despair. For too long a time, we believed our lives needed to be sacrificed for the comfort of the privileged. When we hid from the shame of enslavement, we allowed greed and intransigence to crush the promise of possibilities.

A radical transformation of our pillaged selves has unfolded across this nation, energized by the vision of a man who dares to believe in our equality and unity.

I made my first political contribution to his campaign after his visit to Santa Barbara in November of 2007. While modest, it secured a shared purpose with the millions around the world who reject intolerance and oppression. Where I have often felt powerless and unable to resist the might of economic and social injustice, the renewed faith in the glorious virtues of my adopted country instills an optimism that nearly suffocated. Defeats are bound to happen but ultimately we will prevail, just like Dr. Martin Luther King’s magnificent dream has come to pass.

To witness the inauguration with others in my city (where glorious winter temperatures dwell in the mid 80s) I showed up at the Arlington Theatre early this Tuesday morning, the 20th of January. I applauded with the abandon of someone relieved that the disgrace and hurt is over.

Yes we can.

The time has come.

Text of President Barack Obama’s inaugural speech
My fellow citizens:
I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because we the people have remained faithful to the ideals of our forebears, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land — a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America — they will be met.
On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.
We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things — some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sanh.
Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions — that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act — not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. All this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions — who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them — that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.

Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. Those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account — to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day — because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control — and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart — not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers ... our found fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake. And so to all the other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort — even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment — a moment that will define a generation — it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends — hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism — these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility — a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence — the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed — why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent Mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:
"Let it be told to the future world ... that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet (it)."

America, in the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Thank you. God bless you. And God bless the United States of America.

The President’s address was preceded by an invocation offered by Rev. Rick Warren, a controversial choice because the evangelical Saddleback megachurch leader opposes gay marriage. No friend of religious zealots, I feared his words would be laced with innuendos designed to rally Christian conservatives. I found his invocation touching, inclusive and respectful.

Civil Rights leader Rev. Joseph Lowery followed Barack Obama to the lectern with a heartfelt and witty benediction. A co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., he supports gay rights. "When you talk about the law discriminating, the law granting a privilege here, and a right here and denying it there, that's a civil rights issue," he explained in 2004, when stating his opposition to state-based initiatives to ban gay marriage and civil unions. "And I can't take that away from anybody."

Text of Rev. Rick Warren’s invocation
Let us pray.

Almighty God, our Father, everything we see and everything we can't see exists because of you alone. It all comes from you. It all belongs to you. It all exists for your glory.
History is your story. The Scripture tells us, "Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God. The Lord is One." And you are the compassionate and merciful one. And you are loving to everyone you have made.

Now, today, we rejoice not only in America's peaceful transfer of power for the 44th time. We celebrate a hingepoint of history with the inauguration of our first African American president of the United States. We are so grateful to live in this land, a land of unequaled possibility, where the son of an African immigrant can rise to the highest level of our leadership. And we know today that Dr. King and a great cloud of witnesses are shouting in heaven.

Give to our new President, Barack Obama, the wisdom to lead us with humility, the courage to lead us with integrity, the compassion to lead us with generosity. Bless and protect him, his family, Vice President Biden, the cabinet, and every one of our freely elected leaders.

Help us, O God, to remember that we are Americans, united not by race, or religion, or blood, but to our commitment to freedom and justice for all. When we focus on ourselves, when we fight each other, when we forget you, forgive us. When we presume that our greatness and our prosperity is ours alone, forgive us. When we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us. And as we face these difficult days ahead, may we have a new birth of clarity in our aims, responsibility in our actions, humility in our approaches, and civility in our attitudes, even when we differ.

Help us to share, to serve and to seek the common good of all. May all people of good will today join together to work for a more just, a more healthy and a more prosperous nation and a peaceful planet. And may we never forget that one day all nations and all people will stand accountable before you. We now commit our new president and his wife, Michelle, and his daughters, Malia and Sasha, into your loving care.

I humbly ask this in the name of the one who changed my life, Yeshua, Isa, Jesus [Spanish pronunciation], Jesus, who taught us to pray:
"Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen."


Text of Rev. Joseph Lowery’s benediction
God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, thou, who has brought us thus far along the way, thou, who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee, lest our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee.

Shadowed beneath thy hand, may we forever stand true to thee, oh God, and true to our native land.

We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we've shared this day.

We pray now, oh Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration.

He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national, and indeed the global, fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hands, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations.

Our faith does not shrink though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.

For we know that, Lord, you are able and you're willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds, and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor, of the least of these, and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.

We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that yes we can work together to achieve a more perfect union.

And while we have sown the seeds of greed - the wind of greed and corruption, and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.

And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.

And as we leave this mountain top, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.

Bless President Barack, First Lady Michelle. Look over our little angelic Sasha and Malia.
We go now to walk together as children, pledging that we won't get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone.

With your hands of power and your heart of love, help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nations shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid, when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around ... when yellow will be mellow ... when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right. That all those who do justice and love mercy say Amen.

Fanta Se

Travel articles specialize in the impression that cost does not rank high on the list of considerations. Editors fill pages with stories that praise upmarket appointments without any critique. The goal of these articles is not so much to inform as it is to attract moneyed readers and, most critically, advertisers who will pay tidy sums to reach these privileged pairs of eyes. Follow the money: profiles of spas abound but natural hot springs garner a loss less attention because there is nothing to sell.

When a description of less onerous travel receives the editorial thumbs up, it risks pathetic treatment. The Daily Sound, a free five-days-a-week newspaper in Santa Barbara, recently crowned the Mammoth Mountain Inn “one of the best budget accommodations” in Mammoth Lakes and the “least expected” even if the writer notes that it is “older and not as up-to-date” as other properties. At $189 per night, the endorsement ridicules the notion of affordability with a choice that puzzles at a time of serious economic disruption.

Congratulations to the ski resort (which manages the hotel) and their (certain) public relations efforts.

With a mere 48 hours’ notice, I seized upon the attractive Delta fare to return to New Mexico for a few days. At $246.50 it is not an inexpensive flight, but it is a deal and less expensive than to rent a car, drive and fuel it between Santa Barbara and Albuquerque. Flying out of Santa Barbara is a joy that avoids the trauma of a drive to LAX. Flying into Santa Fe is a pleasure mitigated by the great cost of transit via Denver. I have done it twice only. My accidental status as elite frequent flyer member with Delta saved me a further $80 (two bags each way) in luggage fees.

The outbound routing – granted – did involve two stops and the better part of the day. Later I would learn that while I purchased the ticket on Delta’s website, the first segment carried a Delta flight number (7574) that was in fact operated by American (3038) but “marketed” by Alaska (no idea what flight number). The final hand in the pie resulted in no frequent flyer mileage credit.

The cross-fertilization of airline travel was not on my mind as I flew over Los Angeles. The Getty Center, UCLA and the Wilshire corridor, Hollywood sign and downtown skyline basked under clear skies - thank you winter. Later, I spied upon the red mesas lightly dusted with snow outside of Grand Junction, the deep gashes of Colorado’s Western Slopes, the precariously perched airport (with a runway that angles uphill) near Telluride, the majestic San Juan Mountains and Lizard Head encased in deep snow, Durango also sporting a blanket of white. Winter receded on the barren mesas northwest of Albuquerque before the bosque on the banks of the Rio Grande signaled the final approach into Duke City.

An hour and a half later I sat in front of bowl of Black Mediterranean Mussels at my friend Eric II’s Ristra restaurant in Santa Fe. The seafood appetizer owes its success to the chipotle, mint and aromatics that infuse its broth. Eating a bowl is de rigueur, if only because it reminds me of a constant when I lived in New Mexico. I followed it with the Poblano Relleno, the first deference of several on this trip to my location. Ristra opened in X, a longevity that reassures me (and him, I am sure) in an industry loaded with far more failures than successes.

Because the state of New Mexico no longer issues new liquor licenses, the right to sell alcohol is acquired only when a seller relinquishes his license. This artificial conceit applies to retail businesses, bars and restaurants. By limiting the pool of licenses, the policy drives up prices that routinely sail into six-figure territory. That is in addition to the application fees, of course.

Eric II kindly invited me to stay at his Tesuque house on the northern fringes of Santa Fe. The heat source for the house comes from heated water ducts under tile floors, an unexpected, efficient method that keeps the house at a constant temperature. Bisou the dog seemed to remember me from my visit two years ago unless she was just happy with the heat, too.

With friends X and Y we headed to Taos for a day of skiing. In spite of the sport's central role in my life, Eric II and I had never skied together. I would like to report that I excelled on my first ski day of the season and it might be a fair assessment on groomed runs but as soon as we left packed snow for glades or chutes I labored to keep up. Eric II has a past as a ski instructor that, somehow, compounds my disgrace. The blame can lie with a host of reasons but my response to a day on the slopes has often been unpredictable. Old gear, yes. Elevation, yes. First day out, yes. How about snowboarders?

After keeping riders off its terrain for years this season is the first to welcome them. I have never understood the reluctance – to say nothing of less civil behavior – from skiers to share the hill with snowboarders. The central point of contention revolves around the perceived trashing of the mountain by inexperienced riders whose boards push the snow around. A story I did on snow grooming settled the matter in my mind years ago when the crew stated unequivocally that riders and skiers of equal ability inflict the same damage on the mountain.

X’s wife and Y’s mother joined us at Maria’s, a long established New Mexican restaurant whose 100-plus margaritas attract a steadfast following. We chose to dine in the cozier bar area to be closer to the booze. Maria’s prides itself on serving only real margaritas, which the eatery defines as a concoction made with real tequila, real triple sec and real lemon or lime juice. What a concept! In a nation where a zealous race to the bottom cheapens all it touches, the insistence on quality ingredients impresses. Staff also shies away from a widespread practice in the U.S. to drown beverages of every type in ice to dilute flavor as profits solidify. “Chilled but not iced” has got to be my most repeated request when I order a drink. The notion baffles most establishments where the choices alternate between lukewarm and frozen.

Most margaritas fail to inspire me with their combination of degraded ingredients smothered in ice. If Maria’s serves that many margaritas, it follows that their selection of tequila, an alcohol distilled from the fermented juices of the hearts of blue agave plants, must be exceptional, too. Similar to European AOCs, the Mexican Government assigns a NOM (Norma Oficial Mexicana) on the bottles to certify that tequila is made from 100 percent agave plants. Tequila comes in five varieties: blanco or plata (silver), joven or oro (gold), reposado (aged), añejo (extra-aged) and extra añejo (ultra-aged). Not aged and with additives, the first two types lack character. The minimum length of aging in oak barrels defines reposado (two months), añejo (one year) and extra añejo (three years). Theses tequilas exhibit flavors and temperament in line with fine cognacs and are enjoyed neat.

Faced with Maria’s exhaustive list our group asked many questions. Too many for our waiter who turned down our requested to order entrees at the same time. “I have already spent too much time taking drink orders at this table,” he said before he left. And I had not even asked my questions, so I remained without a drink. After sampling Eric II’s tequila I did not dare bother the waiter with a late addition to our drink selection. Eric II ordered it for me but when he returned to the table the waiter inquisitively asked who had ordered. I felt punishment was coming.

When we were allowed, I selected the Blue Corn Enchiladas with Christmas and sopaipillas, a triple nod to New Mexican eating conventions.

Not ready to give up the fight I returned to Taos solo. After yesterday’s hike up to the West Basin Ridge and the hard work coming down St. Bernard – or was it Stauffenberg? - I tried the Walkyries Glade and then upped the ante on Longhorn, an interminable bump run. I survived, obviously, but the goal of the game is not simply to remain alive. Still without a groove I exited midafternoon hoping to stop at an Arroyo Seco coffee house of old to lick my emotional wounds but it had closed. I reported my counseling session to The Bean (North & South) in Taos. The first location was closed due to highway construction and I could not locate the other one.

The drive down the gorge was pleasant although I cursed slow moving traffic on the two-lane highway. Santa Fe Baldy and the Santa Fe Ski Area high in the Sangre de Cristo reflected the sun’s lowering rays when I snapped the picture, repeating a habit of shooting photography while driving at 110 kph that I originated at the Utah/Arizona border earlier in the month.

After a tour of the Santa Fe New Mexican’s renovated digs downtown, Cecilia, Sylvia and I walked over to The Shed, another local institution where I feasted on more New Mexican foods. The restaurant hides behind the portals on East Palace Avenue, but its reputation is no secret. The James Beard Foundationbestowed it an America’s Classic Award. Scott, another (former) New Mexican employee now engaged in the teaching trade, joined us a little later.

I finished the evening with him deep in conversation about past and future at the La Fonda bar, a fitting location in a hotel once the terminus of the Santa Fe Trail and the beginning of a new Western adventure.

Santa Fe is a most non American city, a charm that the rigors of daily life tends to push toward the background. Outsiders quickly remark on the unique Puebloan architecture that combines elements of its ancestral duality and provides a marked visual departure with most other cities in the country. Native Americans and Hispanics prop up the city’s identity, a manifest influence that permeates food, art and lifestyle. Hundreds, literally, of galleries and restaurants capitalize on all three.

To insiders - and by that I mean people who live here - the conformist pressures to manufacture a tourist version of Santa Fe inevitably reduces the city to a Fanta Se, a phantasmal reflection of itself. The cynicism extends to the state’s nickname that suffers a sarcastic adaptation when it becomes the Land of Entrapment.

If the spirit of the land has been co-opted by balance sheet interests, visitors will be oblivious to it and inhale a reality they have experienced nowhere else in the country. In spite of a small but eminently viable ski area, the city has not been christened a winter destination. The self-imposed off season results in affordable hotel room rates. Even as the event calendar slows down in January and scaffolding shrouds the St. Francis Cathedral, travelers will find plenty to occupy their days in the City Different. Right now, patrons at Evangelos Cocktail Lounge can watch a clock that marks the countdown to Barack Obama’s inauguration. The digital readout points to the 5 days 20 hours 55 minutes and 35.3 seconds that remain until “The Party’s Over” for the current occupants of the White House, until it is “Time to Go.”

At long last. Like all of the most vibrant and unique cities in the United States, big and small, in blue states or red states, Santa Fe abhors conservative ideology.

I dropped by REI in the Railyard off Guadalupe Street to learn how to change lenses on my sunglasses. The Railyard is a redevelopment of the former train depot that enjoys a new life now that the Rail Runner Express commuter train line has opened. (Inexplicably the long-distance train station is in Lamy, 32 km southeast of town.) Eight weekday trains reach downtown Albuquerque (100 km) in about an hour and a half for $6 one way or $8 same-day roundtrip, fares that are less expensive that the cost of gasoline for the same distance. Online discounts and monthly pass further reduce ticket prices. The Rail Runner also serves the airport and travels as far south as Belen, another 50 km (and a dollar each way) beyond Albuquerque.

The Railyard aims to become the focal point of the Santa Fe community with more than the usual assortment of shops and restaurants. The property hosts the farmers market, the arts organization SITE Santa Fe, the Hispanic cultural center El Museo Cultural, the teen center Warehouse 21, performance and open spaces. It is slated to have a cinema.

After a morning coffee with Sylvia at the forever bohemian Aztec Café, I headed up the road to the ski area, 25 km filled with memories at every curve, on every trail and every peak. I succumbed to thin air euphoria, to the crush of snow underfoot at 2,700 meters. The naked aspens of the Big T frame images of a past that rewinds in haste. It is safe to hide in the forest, on a boulder, by the creek, under three layers of clothes or none. Instinctively I will find my way on a hike up or downhill on skis. I glide and leap without effort, care or worry.

I want to roll in the snow, rub my face in its delightful coldness. I want to feel the sun melting the flakes on my face. The world spreads far below, so far as to be out of mind if not out of sight.

The pages of the calendar stopped before the trouble. There will not be another day.

Surprisingly affordable

The terrace of the Ubud hotel strikes the appropriate tropical tone. Coconut trees border it and a profusion of shade trees reach out to shelter it from the sun. Just beyond the infinite pool a verdant rain forest covers the landscape up the slopes of Gunung Batakau, a conical volcano that anchors the view, interrupted only by profoundly green rice paddies.

The pretty postcard utopia works perfectly from this viewpoint. But danger lurks! Instead of trekking down into the gorge and its cacophony of devilish sounds, I have connected to the internet to book an overnight in the desert.

Images of barren hillsides and empty vistas dance in my head, a temptation that I do not resist. I reserve the last room at the Panamint Springs Resort. With Elisabeth, I will spend New Year’s Eve in stark surroundings and the dry air of Death Valley, as jarring a contrast as can be entertained from the moist equatorial climate of Bali.

The driving force behind the decision to escape to Death Valley for the holiday is not the abundance of festivities but the understanding that I would be free to explore the park without being pestered at every turn. The scenery that envelops my hotel (and that stimulated my interest in this Indonesian island) is not, for all practical purposes, accessible to independent travelers. On the trail into the gorge, it wasn’t long before a local approached me and offered his services as a guide. When I declined, he proceeded to tag behind me a little too close for the purpose of casual social interaction. Minutes later, a toll taker who was seated on the other side of a makeshift barrier halted my progress when I could not pony up the required fee.

Let my people go!

To maximize the time spent in Death Valley, we spent the night before the last night of the year in Ridgecrest, a discouraging community that is neither on a ridge nor near a crest unless the slight bump of Lone Butte qualifies. City forefathers probably eyed the nearby Sierra Nevada range with envy and reasoned that a little marketing sleight of hand wouldn’t hurt anybody. Unless you happened to be an early settler whose visions of alpine meadows collapsed in the middle of barren desert plains.

Ridgecrest is not a base of operations to anything, save the Coso Rock Art district, a notable collection of Indian petroglyphs, which warrants a detour. The National Park Service oversees its archeology but because the site lies on the sprawling Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, access is limited to U.S. citizens on public tours coordinated by the Maturango Museum. Those denied visitation privileges can contemplate the mystery of a naval installation almost the size of Delaware, but unlike the state, nowhere near any water.

The shortest route to Death Valley passes by Trona, a spectacular example of municipal calamity. Dilapidated homes and abandoned businesses stretch along the base of a low ridge. Row after row of exposed squalor gives the impression the town was evacuated precipitously. Trash collects against chain link fences that delineate plots of gravelly home ownership. Two churches, each with a fresh coat of pain, provide the only sign that life has not fully departed. A backdrop of a lunar landscape after a resounding explosion completes the grim picture. When summer temperatures top 35 degrees with regularity, pollutants from a nearby plant add to the apocalyptic dread.

I could not bring myself to scout the desolated streets to shoot photography. To document social disintegration with a camera hints at exploitation and opportunism. The justification of reporting as a means to educate only minimizes slightly my resistance.

Even in winter scant precipitation falls on the floor of Death Valley. Rainfall totals increase with elevation and the two ranges that ring the park’s namesake valley, the Armagosa and Panamint, capture water and, higher up, snow. By the time we reached the upper reaches of Wildrose Canyon, snow patches hung to the north faces. Farther, the barren slopes hosted pinyon pines and junipers and a decent blanket of snow. Enough of it made progress a little hairy and I ditched the car to continue on foot. Ideally, I would like to head up Telescope Peak but the access road to climb the 3,368-meter summit is closed for the season. Even in summer, it requires a high-clearance four-wheel-drive vehicle.

Ten hefty charcoal kilns mark the trail head to both Telescope Peak and to Wildrose Peak, a neighboring summit 605 meters shorter. Nearly eight meters tall, the kilns produced fuel for two silver lead smelters 40 km away in the late 1870s. When the ore quality in the Argus mines deteriorates, the Modock Consolidated Mining Company closed the kilns after only a year. The owner did well for himself and his son, a teenager at the time, would go on to do exceedingly well and eventually build himself a little house on the ranch his folks had purchased.

I went up a short ways up the Wildrose Peak trail, enough to get a great view of the canyon and the distant Sierra Nevada crest appropriately named. I decided to return to the car by hiking cross country, intoxicated by the thin dry air and fragrant pitch of the trees.

The popular imagery of desert grandeur relies on sweeping sand dunes wrapped in a Lawrence of Arabia moment. Not quite the Sahara, Death Valley boasts nonetheless of two sand dune fields. The tallest ones rise to about 180 meters in the Eureka Valley in a remote corner of the park – and a 45-minute drive from the Palisades glaciers, the southernmost in the U.S. The dunes at Mesquite Flat can be reached by a short stroll off the main park highway. As the sun descended behind the Panamint Mountains, it was a great time to trudge in the dunes interspersed with mesquite trees, keeping an eye out for its thorns.

To reach our upscale digs at the Panamint Springs Resort, we followed the highway over steep Towne Pass. The descent on the other side was precipitous. We pulled in as the sun sank behind the Inyo Mountains. To call it a resort is to stretch the truth to the point of lying. More a motel than a hedonistic temple, I have fond memories of it because I always stop for a beer. When I inquired about a potential New Year’s Eve menu, the reply was that “we offer over 100 beers.”

Under new ownership, the motel’s public rooms feel more threadbare than I remember them. When it is warm – and even two thirds of a kilometer higher than the park headquarters at Furnace Creek, it gets plenty hot – kicking back on the veranda with one or more of those hundred beers is mighty pleasant.

Other than the motel at Stovepipe Wells, the nearest accommodations – or any dwellings - are in Lone Pine, a good 80 km away. This isolation is not good for rates. But on the final day of 2008, the final room at the grand resort could be had for fewer than one hundred dollars.

We met up with a French couple living in New York City who included a stop in the desert as part of an end-of-year tour of California. They shared their hilarious impressions of Buttonwillow, Tehachapi and, you don’t say, Ridgecrest, where they had spent the previous night across the street from us. The pair lived in Hong Kong for six years and traveled extensively in Asia before relocating to Manhattan. The thrill of San Francisco and the Big Sur coast, they found, died down without indecision in these communities, better appreciated from a rear view mirror. With no small irony, the wife pronounced Ridgecrest “surprisingly affordable.” They said they encountered another town, far less appealing if that was a possibility, about 30 minutes our of Ridgecrest…

We toasted New Year’s Eve on Eastern Standard Time with the assistance of una bottiglia di proseco smuggled in for the occasion.

And we toasted the New Year by joining a ranger and a sizeable crowd on a tour of the sand dunes. An hour later I headed toward the tallest one. The trip there is a succession of ups and downs until I got close enough to figure out which ridgeline to follow. A young girl and her mother tried their hand at hurling themselves down a dune atop a large plastic saucer. I ran all the way down, keeping my balance in extremis.

The effect of the Italian champagne lingered and I managed to fool a pair of Italian tourists who was enjoying a picnic outside the Furnace Creek Ranch with my language skills. I love it!


We spent the last part of the day in the pastel assortment of Artists Drive, a one-way dwindling ribbon of a road that slithers amid chocolate, pink, taupe and blond rocks. Because Elisabeth had no time off beyond her regular weekly ration and one-way plane or train fares called for a deeper purse than we possess, I drove all the way back to Santa Barbara to return her home.
The next day I was off again.

First destination was the mountains of Big Bear Lake, under a respectable layer of snow compliment of a recent storm. The Hwy 18 off ramp was backed up by cars heading up to Lake Arrowhead, one of several that cradles in the spine of the San Bernardino range. I chose to ignore that red flag until I got myself in a traffic jam a few turns up Hwy 38, the next road up. After recalling an interminable delay much higher on the slopes that took a good hour to resolve itself, I flipped the car around and started up the backdoor entrance to the lake on Hwy 330, the last possible road.

Even at nearly twice the distance, I am confident I got to the Cougar Crest trailhead faster than if I had remained in traffic, inching my way. Dressed up for the season – it is winter after all – I traipsed atop packed snow in search of the Pacific Crest Trail junction that had eluded me on a prior visit. It is but four kilometers, a short distance made somewhat more arduous by the snowpack.

Views of the towns on the lake’s south shore accompanied me all the way, with Snow Summit and Bear Mountain ski areas providing the backdrop. The scenery energized me and tempted me to extend my visit to take in a ski day. The reality is that both are small ski areas that would be packed, doubtless, with holiday hordes.

Instead I exited this island in the sky for a nighttime drive through the desert to Laughlin, motivated by a record low room price of about $25 at the Tropicana Express. This generosity was extended on the Saturday night of a holiday week-end, no less, when rates typically skyrocket. As is often the case and in counterintuitive fashion, lowest rates pop up not with individual properties but on consolidators’ sites. I booked my room at http://www.hotels.com/. It was fine for the purpose. The clientele of the casino depressed me. My preference is the Harrah’s because it sports a small sandy beach on the Colorado River. Many years ago, management comped me a room and tossed in a generous food and beverage credit. It didn’t take long before I settled in a chaise lounge, my lips closing around the straw from the cocktail glass. The Arizona bank of the river never seemed so close.

An In-N-Out Burger (my only entree to the fast food industry) employee recommended the Harrah’s buffet as “the only place where I’ll eat in this town.” I filled up on breakfast goodies before crossing the Colorado River under dull skies.

The car received its sustenance in Bullhead City where a Nevada state patroller who felt no particular duty to pump gas into his cruiser and money into his state’s filling stations joined me at the Maverick pumps. Each gallon transferred into my car’s tank kept 30 cents (8 cents a liter) in my wallet.

The drive to Hoover Dam at Lake Mead is a bit longer on the Arizona side than through Nevada but I opted for it nevertheless. Not many distractions along the way other than a billboard that exhorted me to rent a machine gun, to “try one” at a Las Vegas gun store. Lest our more enlightened brethren shudder at the thought, customers do not take these weapons for practice at the local bank/mall/school/church/office. The fun comes in pulverizing a target within the respectable confines of the store’s range. Rentals come with a minimum of 25 rounds of ammunition, but that must not buy much time with a machine gun. It’s gotta make you feel invincible, manly, American!

A couple of years ago the city of Dorchester, Mass., sponsored a billboard endorsing safe sex practices. According to a news report, it left some residents “shaking their heads” at the sign, which promotes condom use, because it can be seen from a nearby school. Guns=healthy; condoms=pervert.

Traffic goes through a police security checkpoint before getting to Hoover Dam, a formality that is dispensed with a simple wave. A bridge bypass is being built to avoid driving on the dam altogether. The Federal Highway Administration predicts it will be completed by September 2010, an optimistic projection given that only the support towers for the Arizona and Nevada approaches have been completed.

The roadway atop the dam brings motorists eye level with Lake Mead and affords a front-row view to the declining water storage that has dropped 30 meters since the turn of the century. The 160-km long reservoir now holds about 48 percent of its capacity. Unsightly bathtub rings encircle the shoreline. After lowering boardwalks down to the water level some marinas have now closed, their boats floating too far below the decks.

Engineers have designed plans for a new water intake to bring water to parched (and wasteful) Las Vegas to avoid shortages when the lake’s level dips below the existing two pipes. Other schemes look to tap into the water table underneath rural Nevada’s rangeland some 500 km away. It’s been done before. Aqueducts siphon water from the Sierra Nevada, Owens Valley and Colorado River to the Los Angeles region: the farthest source, the California delta, is 715 km away.

Overdrafts from Lake Mead do not only concern profligate Las Vegas users. The reservoir impounds snowmelt water from the Colorado, Virgin and Muddy rivers, in total draining a six-state basin (Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico). Downstream, California and Mexico round out the list of interested parties.

I explored a bit of the Lake Mead backcountry: besides the ubiquitous lake, the park encompasses hundreds of thousands of hectares albeit very few maintained trails. Wind squalls discouraged much exploration but within the sheltered recesses of Redstone the cold of the day was tolerable.

Not much activity at Echo Bay. The marina overlooking the Overton Arm felt deserted and slightly spooky. I zigzagged past the Mormon towns of the Moapa Valley before heading out toward St. George. Instead of the straight shot on I-15, I left the freeway in Littleton on the Arizona Strip and followed the base of the Shivwits Mountains into Utah where Joshua trees kept me company and snow dusted the road near the pass. The sun sunk quickly and bathed the southern Utah sandstone scenery in vivid colors.

My hotel for the next two nights showed more signs of affordability: $30 for the first, $25 for the second! Motel 6 forever! St. George is a good base for a return visit to Zion. The six degrees below zero (but bluebird skies) ushered me along. With great anticipation, I climbed the lower reaches of the sublime trail to Angels Landing. Until Refrigerator Canyon the few patches of snow I encountered were mostly to the sides. Once in the shade of the narrow passage the trail was covered in snow and ice. Walter’s Wiggles, too, sported a thick layer of packed snow rendering passage precarious. Quite ready to prove the Visitor Center’s ranger wrong, I set out to climb the steep approach to the final destination. Quickly, very quickly, I was on my knees grabbing on to the cable to avoid a fatal fall hundreds of meters to the canyon floor. Normally at waist level, the cable laid at my feet, nearly buried in snow.

Instead of pursuing a climb on all four, I picked another trail into the quiet high country opposite Angels Landing. A great meadow of white expanse and a frozen cataract greeted me. Back at Scout’s Lookout a group of young hikers asked about the path to Angels Landing. I offered a wager that they would not make it…

On the other side of the Virgin River bend Zion canyon hides in the shade longer and is much colder. I climbed gingerly up into Echo Canyon but at the Hidden Canyon junction, the trail disappeared under a mound of snow. Even with a careful calibration of my step, progress became hazardous. The sight of the river 300 meters below me did not provoke confidence and I turned around.

Minute by minute the shade from the slanted sun engulfed more of Zion Canyon. On the other side of the tunnel the open Checkerboard Mesa basked in dusk glory. Splashes of now covered red and yellow sandstone bluffs and reflected the sun’s last rays. The road, quite a bit higher than in Zion Canyon, sported numerous icy spots but was still eminently navigable. I left the park momentarily to say hello to the herd of buffalo on the grounds of the Zion Mountain Resort. During my last visit with Eric, we were both surprised that the buffalo meat on the menu came from a ranch in another state.

The air was delightfully crisp in a way that sharpens appreciation of nature’s scents. The day was ending and I wanted for it to continue, to prolong my suspended state on the deeply etched plateaus of southern Utah.

The cold front that plowed over the rest of the state and plunged temperatures below -30° in the northern half crept southward the following day. Utah’s southwestern corner is often immune to the fury of such systems. It earned the nickname of Dixie because the climate is indeed much milder in winter. And it most certainly remained warmer than in Salt Lake, Park City, even Cedar City, but the skies turned an ugly grey and the wind kicked in, turning a brief pause at the Virgin River Canyon Recreation Area even briefer.

After finding success in snapping a picture of the Arizona state line sign as I drove past it at 120 kph, I repeated the feat a few kilometers later where I-15 crosses into Nevada. It is not that easy to focus on a subject while also keeping the steering wheel in reasonable alignment with the freeway.

The sight of the power plant near Moapa belching smoke into the air signaled the approach to Las Vegas. The thick haze draping the bowl in which it sits confirmed it. Not a pretty sight.

A calamitous financial wind has blown on the city since my last visit in April. Celebrated as the epicenter of American money-making dynamism, the region has been slapped hard by the collapse of the mortgage/real estate/banking/investing/lending speculative illusion. Phenomenal growth gives way to the highest rate of foreclosed properties in the nation. Economic prowess may have been the result of accounting wizardry but the evictions are real. On the Strip, ground zero for the excess of the last decade, half-finished high rises rub shoulders with exclusive resorts not too happy to share close real estate quarters with skeletons. Prescient, the House of cards withers.

Tourism has dropped as well and hoteliers have responded by slashing their rates. Never in a position to afford the Bellagio, I selected it because the room rate at the elegant property was most definitely budget friendly. Whereas the upscale resort routinely charged a minimum of $300 a night for a room in the past, I scored mine for $129, an attractive rate that helped ignore the preposterous $25 wireless internet access fee.

Still on an Asian high, I booked a table at Sushi Roku, hidden in the midst of the Forum Shops at Caesars Palace next door, a neighboring destination that took me a good half hour to reach on foot. Not a gambler, I could have lost my shirt had I been tempted by the discreet sales at the profusion of luxury boutiques that lined my path. Gianni Versace, Salvatore Ferragamo, Gucci, Fendi, Louis Vuitton, Yves Saint Laurent, Tiffany, Bvlgari, Bottega Veneta, Hermès, Giorgio Armani, Dior, Chanel and others competed to put a new watch on my wrist, a ring on my finger, a wallet in my pocket and a new shirt, too, on my back.

The food was fine, the ambiance très chic. Maybe trop chic for a single dinner in this hot spot for the smart crowd. There is something terribly tragic in an emporium dedicated to self-indulgence during times of trouble.

Thirty minutes from the Strip nothing has changed for a few millennia at Red Rock Canyon. The current economic anxiety recedes to a distant distraction. I played hide-and-seek among towering boulders and rock faces, prying my way through narrow passages that threatened to keep me wedged for good. I made my way to a pitch high in the Calico Hills where rock climbers were practicing and photographed the photographers. True to expectations I found ice in Ice Box Canyon on the other, shaded side of the Scenic Loop.

From the seclusion of my Bellagio digs I watched a half dozen cycles of the choreographed fountain ballet dance against the backdrop of the Tour Eiffel and the Arc de Triomphe. Paris in the desert. The reality made unreal. I wanted to lose myself in the gorgeous pool but the air temperature was a single degree when I dropped by and the water could not have been all that much warmer.

Scrabble players at a loss for words will rejoice at this discovery on I-15 in California between Baker and Barstow sure to be worth some serious extra points, if unpronounceable: a five-letter word with three z’s, one x and one y!

This road leads nowhere.