Day 12

Day 12- Lordsburg to Faywood Springs

We rode 79 miles and 5057 feet in bicycling elevation gain.

Today we did a lot of elevation riding to Silver City; at Silver City, I met Tim, a 23 year Army Vietnam Veteran, working at the visitors center, he was telling me about PTSD and how veterans organizations like the American Legion have not been a good social outlet for him – I encouraged him to give it another try as caring and listening about what happened in the Vietnam War and locating resource services are renewed focuses of the American Legion.

On our way to Post 18, we stopped at the “Hub” of Town between 6th and 7th Streets and ordered a sandwich from a sandwich shop Clerk that gave us this lead on a place to stay halfway on our Journey to Deming.

At post 18, we met with Commander John and member Bob, who showed us around the post; they gave us a post 100th anniversary coin, as the post was one of the first 18 state charter members of the American Legion.

We left the post in search of the “hot springs camping” area as recommended by the sandwich clerk; we arrived as the sun was setting. It was also raining off and on for the last hour of riding; and for the first time since I can remember, I saw a rainbow from one end to the other, but could not fit the rainbow within one picture frame.

Faywood Hot Springs camping et al was located 2.2 miles off our main route to Deming, but it was

Getting dark and we thought we would give it a try. We met Saankpt the clerk at the welcome center; he told us about how he had a Christian name given by his mother, but that he recently went to Egypt in order to go through an ancient African ritual to become renamed.

While in one of the natural springs hot bath area, my cousin and I met a man who told us his life journey when in college during April vacation he took a spiritual journey making a steam bath until dizzy and running into an ice cold Indiana river; then, he decided to go to a monastery for three years; during that time he learn to make wine and beer using the monks ancient recipes; he left the monastery and lived a life of lust and indulgence until in his late forties he “matured” and “found his way” and put his life on a new path; now he states he is a drug addiction counselor.

After setting up our tents at the campsite, this ended our 12th day of the journey.