I am not sure on the dates. At best I can guess I was maybe 5 years old so that might make it the summer of 1957. The occasion is a summer vacation and as I remember, we went to New Mexico, Eagles Nest, Red River and Questa are what I remember with a trip to Taos.
I am not sure of all the events, and not real sure they were all linked together but I think they were.
Event one of that trip that I remember is stopping at a road side park in far west Oklahoma Panhandle. The park was a bit desolate but we stopped to have lunch. There was a windmill just across the fence from that place and I remember that Grandpa sent me through the fence to go catch grass-hoppers. His comment is “catch a bunch of them so we can go fishing when we get there”. I do not think I had anything to catch them with other than my bare hands and I am not sure we kept any that I caught. Hell, I am not sure I caught any but would guess that I did as they generally are not all that hard to catch when they are thick and as I remember there was a bunch of them at that spot.
Next on that memory lane is that we were camped at a roadside spot near Eagles Nest. I am no sure if we stayed one or several nights. It seems that My aunt and uncle were with us and they had a pickup with a camper hut on the back? but not sure about that. I do remember that my Grandpa had a camp trailer at that time that we stayed in. I remember that at that spot, my aunt was cutting Grandpa’s hair and I remember watching him shave out there. I also remember that must have been a stream or irrigation ditch behind where we camped cause I got in trouble for getting wet.
Next on this trip I seem to remember that we were headed down into Red River and it was by the old pass road. I have been out there many times recently and the new road in is pretty nice and 3 lanes but in the old days there was an old road full of switchbacks that you had to take to get in from the Eagles Nest side. Seems like we have 4-wheeled up that road once since but I believe it is not well maintained anymore. Anyway on the way down in I think we had to stop about half way down. Seems some of us had to make a pit stop and I seem to remember they talked about they went out where the Elk had been as there was a lot of Elk Poo out there. Someone brought up that it was good we didn’t find bear poo.
The next memory of this trip was that Grandpa took me fishing at some pond or irrigation lake above Questa just off the river. It seemed we fished for a long time and were not catching anything but a couple of locals (Mexican fellas) were doing real well. I remember the stories but not that actual discussion that Grandpa asked what they were using and they said “corn”. Turns out they had been “chumming” that spot with canned corn for weeks and when they wanted to catch fish they just came up and put corn on the hook to catch a few fish. I think we may have tried it but do not remember if we did or even if we caught anything.
I remember one last part about the trip and that was that we went to Taos and Grandpa bought me a Roy Rogers pistol set and mom got me a Roy Rogers briefcase and set of colors to go to school with as I would be staring school in the fall. I remember that either I or them had put the brief case in the rear window of the car to get it out of the way and the hot sun out there melted my colors. I do not remember getting upset about it either?
Now some of this I remember because we may have had pictures or old home movies of portions as I do remember watching old movies of some of the things, but can’t remember when or where. I am not sure that all of it was on the old movies either. Time has passed and it becomes hard to separate whether you remember on your own or what you have been helped to remember. No matter the pictures in my mind are pretty clear about a lot of these events. At times I can close my eyes and see Grandpa walking up to the house or hear him telling me to be quiet and not scare off the fish. I can see him baiting my hook and reminding me to “be careful when you toss it out so you don’t loose your bait”. I can remember the horrible smell of “stink bait” that he said was the best thing possible for cat fish. I remember him saying one time, when mom was cleaning chickens and she separated out the livers, “them sure would make good bait, maybe we should go fishing today”.
Mostly I do remember that Grandpa sure liked his fishing. I am just glad I got to go with him.