@ancapbarbie's Happy Place 2015

This is Part Two of my #happyplace entry, which Hive account@robertandrew created a couple of weeks ago and for which Hive account@snook nominated me a few days ago. Click here or on the image to the left for Part One.

My Current Happy Place

Definitely the front porch at my eccentric aunt's house in Alto, New Mexico. I miss this place so much since I moved to the NYC area. So quiet and peaceful, at the edge of the Lincoln National Forest, on a little dirt road that even Google hasn't mapped, and only a couple of other houses visible which are vacant most of the time because my aunt might be the only homeowner in Alto who doesn't live in Texas while renting her house out to tourists.

Mostly, in stark contrast to NYC, there are trees - so many trees that you're required to cut some of them down to prevent potential forest fires from jumping from tree-to-tree and burning down the whole forest, while in NYC they plant them in concrete. And you can see the stars at night. I can't get over that here - no visible stars. I don't have a good enough camera to show the difference but you can see all of them on a clear night at my aunt's house, which is at just below 8000 feet elevation.

As an aside, I always got a chuckle when I would visit Denver and folks would try to say I wasn't used to the altitude, and I'd be like, "Bruh, I came downhill to get here, ya low-lander." Hehe ...

I took these after an ice storm.

Nearby Route 48 with "traffic".

Some of the forest along Route 37 we nicknamed "Mordor" after a fire burned it down in 2012. This is why you make sure your camp-fires are out, kids.

The Sierra Blanca peaks visible from the end of our little dirt road. You see why I love it here?

At the Colorado/New Mexico border.

A couple of shots taken at Mescalero Lake/Inn of the Mountain Gods.

The sun setting over the Sacramento mountains on the drive back from Roswell and some sick sense of humor just outside of Tularosa.

On Route 54 just north of Carrizozo. A State Trooper stopped while I was pulled off on the side of a construction area to take some pictures of my mountain, only to make sure my car wasn't broken down.

My aunt suggested my landscaping reminded her of Rivendell so I built these stairs along the front of the house with that in mind out of trees the county required us to cut down and rocks that are about the only things which seem to grow indigenously in the yard. I took these pictures before the gravel and back-fill were finished.

My aunt and me at Grace O'Malley's Pub, which is sadly no longer in business.

Okay so only the first picture was actually taken from my #happyplace. Please submit all complaints to the suggestion bin:

Source

The idea behind this tag:

The place where you love to do a Combo of things including but not limited to, relaxing, pondering, eating and drinking, meditating, and yes even working on Steemit. This is a new Tag and Initiative that I am creating. I hope to see many others participate in the fun of it. 😄 ~ Hive account@robertandrew