Our first stop of the day was Washita Battlefield National Historic Site:

This site interprets the surprise attack in which Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle and his band of Indians were killed.  Despite a previous unprovoked attack on his people at the Sand Creek massacre four years earlier which left over 100 Indians dead and his wife badly injured, Chief Black Kettle continued to sign treaties in an effort to peacefully coexist with the US government:

We walked a nature trail adjacent to the visitor center:

The kids completed their Junior Ranger workbooks and received their badges:

We continued east to Oklahoma City, the capital of Oklahoma:

We had lunch in the RV:

We left the RV at the Capitol and drove over to the Oklahoma City National Memorial:

It was at this site that in April of 1995, 168 Americans were killed in the Oklahoma City bombing.  The road in front of the building site was replaced with a reflecting pool, and building’s former location, to the left of the pool, is now the site of the memorial:

The bomb destroyed the building at 9:01AM:

The building site now contains 168 chairs, one for each victim.  They are placed in the approximate locations where the victims were found:

Especially heartbreaking are the small chairs memorializing the 19 child victims, 15 of which were in the building’s day care center:

Portions of the building’s rear wall remain:

Rescue crews left their mark here:

The rescue response began at 9:03AM:

Adjacent to the memorial is the Oklahoma City Memorial Museum:

The kids completed their Junior Ranger workbooks.  M tried to get out of doing the Junior Ranger pledge, complaining that they were outside in public.  The ranger asked M if he was too cool to do the pledge and he said yes.  The ranger told him to “suck it up”.  They did the pledge and received their badges:

Returning to the RV, we walked through the underground tunnel that connects the parking lot to the capitol building:

We visited the Oklahoma House of Representatives chamber:

Ceiling detail:

The Senate chamber:

After leaving the Capitol, we continued east to overnight at the Walmart of Sallisaw, Oklahoma.  See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.

I got up this morning and reached the airport before dawn:

The air was variable and chaotic at the airport.  I did manage to take off, and found that once I climbed above the mesa to the south of the airport, the air became smooth.  Despite a weather report showing winds from the south at 4MPH, it turns out the wind was more like 11MPH from the south.  The airport was engulfed in rotor from the mesa.

I flew east towards the monuments:

In light of the strong winds, I decided to stay high to avoid rotor from the monuments.  I also avoided flying over the monuments, as some members of Navajo law enforcement erroneously believe that Indian sovereignty extends to the air above their land, and that Monument Valley Tribal Park is a “no fly zone”.  The reality is that the FAA has sole authority over US airspace, but that’s of little comfort when Indians illegally confiscate one’s RV and paramotor.  I didn’t want that to happen to me, so I stayed away:

I came back to land, having to re-enter the rotor coming off the mesa above the airstrip:

The landing was dicey and I ended up not quite sticking the landing, but I was fine and so was my gear.  Here’s the flight track:

This video shows this morning’s flight, as well as yesterday’s two flights:

Back at the RV, M was photographing his R/C car:

On our way north out of Monument Valley, we stopped to photograph the monuments:

We again photographed Monument Valley from the northern approach:

Continuing east, we crossed from Utah into Colorado and visited Hovenweep National Monument, another Ancestral Puebloan ruins site:

We hiked out to view the ruins:

The ruins here were built between 1150 and 1350:

Hovenweep features square towers, a feature not found at other Ancestral Puebloan sites:

The kids completed their Junior Ranger workbooks and received their badges:

We continued east to visit the Anasazi Heritage Center, the visitor center for Canyons of the Ancients National Monument:

The museum was very impressive:

M used the loom:

The basket collection was extensive:

This basket is 800 years old:

This basket is estimated to be over 6,000 years old:

The kids completed their Junior Ranger workbooks and received their pins:

We continued east into the foothills of the Rockies:

We continued east to overnight at the Walmart of Alamosa, Colorado.  See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.

This morning, we left the Walmart of Las Vegas, New Mexico after another great breakfast by Trish:

We drove east, crossing the southern edge of the Rocky Mountains and finding ourselves in the aptly named Great Plains.  If I squint, I’m pretty sure I can see St. Louis.  I exaggerate, but after spending months in the West, this feels very, very flat:

The linear depression in the distance across the photograph is the Santa Fe Trail:

We continued northeast to Fort Union National Monument. The fort was built to subdue Indian tribes and protect travellers on the Santa Fe Trail.  Built in the 1850s, the fort met a sudden demise with the obsolescence of the Santa Fe Trail due to the arrival of railroad service from the East.  Suddenly a fort with nothing to guard, it was abandoned by the Army.

We checked out the visitor center:

A model of the fort, in its day the largest military installation in the West:

The hospital building is adjacent to the visitor center:

Our first stop was the second fort site.  Little more than earthworks, it was designed to repel a Confederate assault.  Southern forces did invade and conquer southern New Mexico, but this site never saw action, as Union forces from here deployed to the southwest where the Confederates were turned back at the Battle of Glorieta Pass.  The contours of the fort are faintly visible:

The third fort was built of adobe, and has fared better than the first two forts:

Officer barracks:

The prison:

Fort Union was the logistical hub for military control of the Southwest.  The fort was both a military post for regional defense and a military depot for distribution of supplies throughout the region:

Some walls require heroic measures to save them from collapse.  After over 125 years, some of the mud walls are starting to fail:

A warehouse in the depot:

The faint trail along the left edge of the photograph is the Santa Fe Trail:

The kids completed their Junior Ranger workbooks and received their badges:

They also completed the workbooks for the Santa Fe National Historic Trail:

Saying goodbye to the fort, we drove west towards Santa Fe.  Trish made a few more owl hats during the drive:

We continued west to overnight at the Walmart of Santa Fe, New Mexico.  See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.