Author: Occidental

After departing Lincoln, we were going to be passing through Roswell, If you haven’t been you kind of have to go, at least once. But first, breakfast. And when in Roswell we can heartily recommend a stop at Roswell Donuts.

Any place that has kolaches? Count me in. Cream donuts filled to order? You have to be kidding me! How about a breakfast croissant? If they don’t have the one you want they will make it up for you on the spot. My new favorite donut spot. Luckily it is several thousand miles from home or I’d be looking like I was packing a UFO around on my waist.

We rolled into Lincoln, just down the road from the Smokey Bear Historical Park, not expecting much. We ended up spending the remainder of our day there. Lincoln was famously at the center of the Lincoln County War that took place from 1876-1879. Now, most of the town is frozen in time as the Lincoln Historic Site and may just be the best preserved town in the west.

After our exceptionally windy night at Valley of Fires Recreation Area we were on the road moving east again, and found ourselves in a chilly Capitan, New Mexico, home of the Smokey Bear Historical Park. The historical park (both indoor and outdoor displays) features a lot of vintage Smokey items, as well as Smokey's history, and Smokey's grave. Despite the "all fire is bad" messages of the past, there were displays acknowledging that fire is…