Yet another great trip across this beautiful county for a little imagery. Leaving Memphis in a mad dash towards Las Cruses and Deming New Mexico.

First stop Gainsville, Tx (KGLE). A great GA stop no matter what your needs. They always have the cheapest fuel in at least fifteen states (sorry Dewitt Spain), it was $4.70 per gallon this trip. Very nice staff, two crew cars, all the necessary amenities; computer, Internet, clean bathrooms, etc., and the most amazing thing……. ALL these amenities are available 24 hours a day! I’ve landed here at well past midnight on many a trip only to grab a car for food then continue to my final destination, or grab a car and run to the Comfort Inn down the street. All-in-all a great place to stop.

Woke up early, snapped a quick sunrise shot of the plane on the ramp, then took off into the cool early sky headed to Carlsbad, for a quick refuel. Problem! Alternator seems to be failing at the ONE task it is required to do; provide power. It does not want to re-excite when recycled. Oh well, beautifully clear morning and only sixty miles to Carlsbad. Let’s keep on truckin, cancel with Fort Worth center and continue to KCNM for an uneventful landing.

Once on the ground I refuel and search for a local mechanic, the airport data says maintenance is available. THIS is not quite true. Cavern City is a nice stop with very nice amenities, but maintenance was on my mind at the moment. All the buildings and services seem to be owned by one family and his son was a tremendous help. We walked over to the local EMS Helo mechanic for some assistance. He did all he could without having the replacement parts, basically a new alternator. Having no other options, we put the battery on a charger, I’ll explain why in a minute, then talked about great road trips through Arizona: riding motorcycles up to Jerome, hitting the In-N-Out in Prescott, the ride through Alpine and Show Low, highway 191 and 180, all just gorgeous places to see. I let the battery charge for a few hours because my only option was to make an impromptu trip to El Paso, TX for the repair. With the very close proximity to the border and their control tower in mind, I wanted the best chance possible of talking to them on the radios, which had a limited amount of power since the alternator was not operating. So I coordinated with El Paso tower on the ground prior to departure, let Albequerque Center know I was on my way once airborne, then shut all electrical off and enjoyed a beautiful flight through clear calm skies. Snapped a few more shots of interesting formations over the mountains leaving Carlsbad then had an uneventful (“uneventful” is always welcome in aviation. It’s a very good word) arrival to El Paso WITH enough power to talk with them the whole arrival.

Part two (yes there is even more) to come…