Wednesday, June 28, 1972

June 28, Houston

I’m picking up on this letter after we arrived in Houston — actually we arrived yesterday which was Tues June 27th but we’ve been occupied by many details since then and it’s only now that an opportunity has presented itself to continue writing. Late this afternoon we got the news that our furniture will be arriving to be unloaded tomorrow so that will be a busy day. Then we’ll have Friday & the weekend to get squared away in our new home before I go to work for the first day here in Houston.

Last Friday we drove from Delta Utah to Cortes, Colo, taking several hours out along the way to do a bit of sightseeing in Arches National Monument. There were really some spectacular rock formations there and I took a number of pictures. Our time was a little limited so we didn’t drive all the way in, so we didn’t see some of the longest arches — Jean & I will have to so that someday after I retire. The scenery along the road was also quite beautiful in spots and resembled that in the Arches National; Monument itself. All of southern Utah seems to give rise to these unusual rock formations of which the Arches, and also Bryce and Zion parks (which I’ve never visited) are representative. In the southeast part of Utah and the neighboring part of Colo the topography changes and there is some nice agricultural land, interspersed with more rugged and desert-like sections.

Friday night we stayed in Cortez, Colo, which is close to Mesa Verde National Park. Most of Saturday we spent sightseeing there — that is Muriel, Jean & I did (Palma wasn’t interested and stayed at the park lodge while we visited some of the many historic sites in the park). The Indian ruins are located on top of a large, high, widespread tableland or mesa, which is covered with verdant vegetation — hence the name Mesa Verde. The ruins cover the time period from about 1 AD to 1300 AD and show the progression from an early & relatively primitive culture, thru the pueblo period and finally into the final or cliff dwelling period. This ended between 1250 & 1300 AD when the area experienced a severe drought over a period of 20 years or so and the pueblos & cliff dwellings were all abandoned because of the failure of the food supply. Within the park there are some 800 sites of ruins, etc, so you can see that it was really a well developed culture & a considerable population of Indians at one time. Of course we only saw some of the more well known sites, but we did visit examples of all the stages of the culture from the earliest to the last.

After we left Mesa Verde we continued on thru southern Colo for awhile, thru some good agricultural areas before we stopped for the night. Sunday we drove thru New Mexico, stopping for a short while in Santa Fe to see some old Spanish buildings there. As we entered New Mexico from Colo we first drove thru some beautiful forest & ranch country; Santa Fe itself was a disappointment to me and the rest of the route south & east form Santa Fe was rather bleak terrain.

We entered Texas on Monday (we spent Sunday night at Clovis just outside the Texas border) and right inside Texas we encountered another stretch of good agricultural land — irrigated I believe, but showing lush fields of corn, and what appeared to me to be soybeans. The weather was hot as we drove thru Texas (it had also been hot on Sunday in New Mexico and we used the air conditioner in the car for the first time on the trip on Sunday). I had always heard that west Texas was desert-like but generally to me it seemed quite green for the most part.

It took us till well after noon on Tuesday to cross Texas; but we did go out of our way to drive thru Austin, the state capital, where Muriel will be going to the Univ of Texas next fall. We only drove thru the campus briefly but it did give her some impression of it — she’ll get a good introduction at the orientation session she’ll be attending in July.

We were all happy to arrive in Houston — hot tho it was — and we straightway went to the realtor’s, got the keys to the house, and went and looked at it before checking in at the motel. The girls were favorably impressed I think with our new home, tho without any furnishings it doesn’t have the appeal yet that will come when our belongings are moved in. I also unloaded my cargo of plants —bonsai trees, fuchsias, etc — and set them in the backyard. They came thru quite well so I have hopes for the plants that went on the moving van (the two large oak trees I had dug up as well as some larger fuchsias and other plants).

Today was a somewhat frustrating day as it seems rather difficult to get things done in a locale where one does not know where the laundromats are etc. But we did get to a bank this morning, rented a safe deposit box & got the valuables stowed away and an account started, as well as getting some laundry done. This afternoon we cleaned up drawers & cabinets at our new home, putting in fresh paper etc so we are tolerably prepared for the arrival of the van tomorrow. I also swept out the garage — it’s likely it will hold mis stuff rather than the cars for awhile until we decide the appropriate niche for everything. The house was generally quite clean, but with a fair assortment of dead bugs around — as the pest control man had been thru the house a week or ten days ago and sprayed it for these. Houston is definitely a buggy place and spraying for bugs is a part of the way of life.

With love, Carl