Advertisement
Every European who comes back from the USA tells us how friendly the Americans are. And indeed the people we meet here are friendly, helpfull and open. Everyone welcomes you with a smile and a 'Hi, how are you doing today?' We know now we have to smile back and answer 'I am fine and how are you?' The next question is almost always: 'Where are you from?' We answer: 'From Holland and Slovakia.' 'Oh nice', is the reaction. It is like playing chess. The first moves are the same: e2 - e4; e7 - e5 etc. But unlike the chessgame where the identical first moves lead to a intriguing and complex game, the initial conversation seldom gets a interesting follow up. Once when we told we came from Holland and Slovakia, the reaction was: 'Oh nice , did you come with the bus?' Apparently such conversations are a mere social intercourse without further meaning.
We are driving with our enormous motorhome across the landscape of New Mexico. It is way more beautiful here than in Texas. We pass the Sierra Diablo and the Carlsbad National Park. There are lots of churches around of all kind of directions: 7th day
adventists, methodists, lutherians and so on and so on. Now and then we see a billboard with: '360 babies killed a day!' In the local shop I have to show my ID in order to buy some cans of beer. Not a region where people spent their spare time to read 'The Origin of Species' we guess. When we visit the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens State Park near Carlsbad we see beautiful displays of how plants and animals are adapted to desert life. We read how striking the similarities are between desertplants from North America, Africa and South America, though they are not related to eachother. We would call it convergent evolution, but the word evolution seems to be taboo here. Adaptation, that is all and no more than that.
We drive further to the North through a completely uninteresting landscape with now and then a sleepy village. Nevertheless it was this very spot that some extraterrestrials choosed to land their UFO's in June 1947. Actually they happened to crash their Flying Objects. In spite of their big eyes they bumped against a hillock, the only one in the wide surroundings. Finally something happened in Roswell. We read
it all in the UFO museum where articles and pictures are on display of honest looking witnesses. 'Of course I believe in UFO's, I saw one myself', declares Jimmy Carter. And Ronald Reagan says that the world would change if we would have a close encounter. Why do these ET's look so much like us humans, we ask ourselves. Only the eyes are bigger, so that they look like baby's and in stead of 5 they have 4 fingers on a hand. Convergent evolution, we think. But the word evolution is taboo. ET's are allowed though. As long as we stay the Crown of Creation of course.
The officials might have had doubt on their right on the crown when they opened the capsule with ET's inside. Us humans did not have such a sophisticated engines. Two of the creatures were still alive. It must have been a meeting in American style. 'Hi how are you doing today? Where are you from? Did you come with the bus?' What the extraterrestrial visitors answered is unknown. It is a secret. Like everything is a secret around this story. But it attracts a lot of tourists each year. Like us.
Over highway 70 we drive to the East, to White Sands National Monument, part of the Chihuahuan desert. It is a fascinating area with gypsum dunes as white as the whitiest washingpowder promises to wash. Whiter than white. The gypsum comes from the San Andreas Mountains. About 200 million years ago there was a Permian sea. The sea dried up and left the minerals as gypsum cristals. Water eroded it to the playa's and the wind took the grains from there to form the dunes. It is hot while we are walking across the dunes. But the white gypsum sand is remarkable cool. Most plants cannot live in gypsum. But here they do. We see how some gypsophyles struggle to survive. The Soap Yuccca elongates its trunk to stay above the ever growing dunes. But when the sand is blown away, it breaks under his own weight. The Sakunkbush Sumac forms pedestals by binding gypsum sandgrains into a hard and compact mass around its roots, branches and trunk. The Rio Grande Cottonwood disappears sometimes completely under the sand, but still knows to survive. Luctor et Emergo. But most astonishing is the Bleached Earless Lizard. They are endemic for White Sands.
They are white. Dark ones will not survive as is explained in the visitors center. Adaptation? Yes by natural selection tell the displays. Even the word evolution is used.
Satisfied we leave New Mexico, the country of Billy the Kid and the Apaches. Unfortunely the Billy the Kid museum was closed and the only Apache we met was drunk. Up to Arizona!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.094s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 12; qc: 27; dbt: 0.0402s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Jaap van elst
non-member comment
Mooie biologie!!!
Biologie, ecologie, evolutie .. EN een reptiel!!!!!! Heerlijk...