(with a BIG nod to “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure”)

“Of course you realize that the Alamo doesn’t have a basement,” said Walldough-the-Magnificent.  Well, he didn’t exactly SAY that, but I could tell.  Radiant as he often is, veritably emanating transcendence yet uninvolved.  I was about to leave on what Pooh & Friends would call “an explore”, with the dogs.  Wif da dorgs.

In retrospect, with 20/20 (be)hindsight, I should-a lissend to what he said.

(It wouldn’t have made any difference.)  Dorgzenneye (a collective sometimes be-labeled “Jose Cuatro-Perros” — me being Jose, with 3 more) were going to ramble anyway.  We (well, just I) decided on an area Betty and I call “Blizzard Valley.”

A couple years back during a definitely non-summer bike ride, we ventured to a corner of Cactus Park.  Relatively level and non-challenging trail, we pedaled into new terrain.  A snow flurry enveloped us.  It was fun — the temps didn’t drop, the precipitation didn’t pile up and make the ground wet — we pedaled on.  Senior citizen adventure.  And the dogs trotted nearby, doing what dogs do.  Now that I reflect on this, we did lose “JaJa”, and enlisted the aid of willing and friendly ATV-enthusiasts to go out and find her.

After driving around a bit, we saw her in the distance, trotting along without an apparent care in the whirled.

We’ve called the area “Blizzard Valley” ever since.

I noted a couple old zig-zaggy trails (old wagon roads/tracks) up the mountainside across the valley from us, and added those to my ever-expanding list of “stuff to explore in the future.”  So, today was the day — for that.

Today was also “the day” for some sort of Jose-Cuatro-Perros trek, as Betty was hosting the book club at our house, and the intellectual cultured vibe she aspired to attain would be greatly facilitated by Jose Cuatro-Perros being sumwear else.

We parked at the more-or-less entrance to Blizzard Valley and began trudging up what appeared to be an old road up the mountain to the southwest.  View is down and back to the northeast of Cactus Park.

THIS is the point where it was obvious further passage up this road would be less-easy than previously hoped.  A big rock slide.

We negotiated around the rocks, and whatever ‘road’ there may have been … wasn’t.

Doggzeneye trekked up, bush-whacked (“schwact”), road-less for a while.  Above, da dorgz have temporarily become cliff-cave dorgz, ‘cept this isn’t much of a cave.  It was a cliff, however.

It was at about this point that the thought just popped into my head.  Pee-Wee had gone through the entire Alamo-tour, patiently, with frequent admonitions to keep whatever questions he had ’til the tour ended.

“Where’s the basement?!” he blurted out.  The tour guide was not kind.  She ridiculed him, and everyone else in the tour group laughed in unison.  “There is no basement in the Alamo!”

There was no road going up to the top, I finally decided.  This Alamo did not have a basement.

Scrambling down, we encountered a lower road, or trail.  At this point, it was ob(de)vious that even da dorgz weren’t all that enthusiastic about going UP this lower trail.

We continued down, back to the truck.  But not before …

We encountered a deformed (as usual) dwarf ugly Inuk.

A little while later, we went through a swath of pretty decent flagstone pieces.  It could be that this “road” (and the upper, ‘failed’ road) were constructed to mine or quarry or pick-up-&-carry-off-by-whatever-means-possible flagstone pieces for construction projects down in town.  Probably by mule and/or donkey or indentured illegal immigrant laborers.

Looking back into “Blizzard Valley” as we drove away.  Below, focusing in on the area we had trekked in. (Compare the horizon profiles — you’ll see that the lower photo is of the center of the above).

The red “X” is pretty much where the cliff-cave dogs were.  We could have gone a bit further up, and reached the ridge-top — but we were pretty tired and I knew that simply going back down would be a bit of a chore.  The blue line with an “X” at the top was the rock-slide-blocked road we went up on.  The green line with the “?” at the upper end is the trail we eventually encountered and came back on.  The “?” maybe/possibly continues uphill.  Some day we’ll go back … maybe.

Upon arriving home, pretty much exhausted (I had also done a bicycle workout earlier in the day), Walldough had not moved.  Magnificent beasts such as he are possibly at one with the yooniverse — and if not “at one”, then “at two” with the big U, at least.