El Paso

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We arrived in El Paso on Monday 2 Feb to some of the most beautiful weather of the trip. First, I had to get a musical ear worm out of my head, old Marty Robbins song about "West Texas Town of El Paso". I'm pretty sure Mom listened to Marty Robbins on the old RCA record player when we lived on Lockbourne AFB. I know I've never listened to Marty Robbins. Anyway, I finally got rid of it when connecting to WIFI...someone named their SSID "Puff the Magic Dragon"...so you know how that turns out ;-( We decided on this stop to rest and catch up with RV related chores. Following a hydraulic leak in the jacks, the sensor would show jacks down and alarm, so to work around this we'd remove the fuse. I'm a little embarrassed to say how long we've been taking the fuse out...so I won't. Anyway I refilled the reservoir, lubed the jacks and it resolved the problem. I also replaced the gutter extensions, fixed a water leak, the toilet seal, adjusted the bedroom slide-out cables, adjusted the entry door lock, while Mi Hyon caught up on laundry, shopping and advanced food prep for meals on the road. It is nice to get caught up on chores and rest. Today is Friday so we decided to take advantage of great weather and venture out to see a couple local points of interest. First was the Wyler Aerial Tramway up the Franklin mountains within El Paso. El Paso is the only city we've been to that has a Mountain Range surrounded by the city. The tramway travels up the east side of Ranger Peak along two 2600 foot steel cables up to the summit at 5632 feet. At the summit we could see 3 states and Mexico and of course shop in the convenient gift store. Mi Hyon loves heights (and gift stores) and thoroughly enjoyed the 360 degree views. Even though I don't love heights; I still had a great time. After the tramway we went to the Old Ironsides Museum on Fort Bliss, where they have a large display of military equipment from the Post's long history of Calvary and heavy armor. It was laid out well and well maintained, I think mostly by volunteer soldiers and their families. Anyway we decided this was going to be a restful stay so we limited our outing to the two nearby POIs. I will say Fort Bliss' 's exchange was amazing! I've never seen anything like it on a military post, it could rival any major mall in numbers of stores and it's beautiful architecture. I took the opportunity while there to get a haircut...well not everything can be great, but it'll grow out and I won't need another cut for a couple months.

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Photos

Our Ride Up Approaches
Wyler Tramway

The ride up
The tram was established to bring equipment up for a local TV station. That is their towers up ahead. They entered into a partnership with the State Parks Bureau and the tram is now dual use.

The opposite side of the mountain
Mexico and the other half of El Paso

An Interesting Time Capsule
They took an old tram car and made it a time capsule to be opened in 2060. Maybe we'll come back ;-)