Beep Beep

The City of Las Cruces, together with New Mexico State University and several health initiative and planning organizations, has published a booklet called the Las Cruces Prescription Trails Program Walking Trail Guide. The very first walk it describes brought us to Tellbrook Park, a small neighborhood park tucked into a side street over on the other side of town. 

I don't think we would have found this little gem without the booklet. We have friends who live nearby who had never heard of the place. 

On one side of the park there was a shady neighborhood of lovely homes. The view in the other direction...

... looked out over the desert, toward the valley and the distant Robledo Mountains. Back inside the park...

we found groupings of native plants and...

many cacti. We spotted some white-winged doves up in this odd-looking tree.

This green lawn made us stop a while; green grass being a real rarity where we live in the Chihuahuan Desert. Now, this is the part where you will need to do some careful looking--a bit of imagination will help, too. On the far side of the lawn you might just be able to make out three little rabbits, nibbling away at the grass. 

I was wishing for a big camera, or a telephoto lens, but had to make do with my iPhone camera. Glancing over to the other side of the lawn, we spotted a roadrunner. 

I think this speedy bird must be Beez's totem; roadrunners show up wherever he goes. I never get good photos of them. This was the best of the many that I took that morning, as the roadrunner checked out the bunnies across the way. 

Remember that you are using your imagination, please. The roadrunner greeted the rabbits like they were old friends. The four of them played a crazy game of Beep-Beep-Bunny tag all around the lawn, then away down a desert trail, around some cactus, down into a big arroyo, and out of sight. 

I have no YouTube video of the game to prove it, but I'm sure you believe me. You can see it with your imagination, right?

Hillcrest Zoo

I don't like zoos, although I do appreciate the trend toward larger, more natural enclosures for zoo animals. I just don't like to see animals in cages; and I feel embarrassed, awkward, and ashamed to be standing and staring at them. If you've read Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, you've experienced, along with the character Billy Pilgrim, the feeling of being in a cage at a zoo with your every move under observation.

However, we had company from out of town and the little kids wanted to go to the zoo. Clovis, little Clovis, is actually home to the second largest zoo in New Mexico, after the Rio Grande Zoo in Albuquerque.

The Hillcrest Zoo is set on 22.5 acres within the 140 acre Hillcrest Park. We were surprised at the size of the zoo, as the small entry area just didn't lead us to expect such spacious grounds. It was a perfect place for little children--ours were 2 and 5--uncrowded and not very intimidating. The grounds were quite nice, with lots of shade trees, and grass, and water features. There were plenty of well-placed benches, too, which my knees and I have grown to appreciate.

Here are some photos of Sere and Geti, the young hyenas that were added to the zoo last year. I hope that there are plans for a more spacious enclosure. The local newspaper runs naming contests for the newest zoo animals, and the zoo follows through with a sign indicating which school child came up with the names--a nice touch for a very child-friendly place.