Back road journal--solitude at dawn

Dawn over the Old Santa Fe Trail, New Mexico

"Out here there's the sky," wrote Willa Cather in Death Comes for the Archbishop, capturing the essence of the wide open spaces in New Mexico. Out here, you can see forever, and the colors and light of dawn astound. Out here you can breathe in solitude and freedom. My best photo of the trip.
"Dawn spreads its paintbrush on the plains," were lyrics in the old Western, "Wagon Train. "Whoever wrote that, had to have taken the back roads out here.
Even the Interstates can be back roads...Sunday morning on I-25 heading for the Santa Fe Trail landmark, Wagon Mound--so named because it resembles a covered wagon led by oxen. Scarce traffic, wide open spaces, the solitude of traveling and thinking.
(Click on all photos to enlarge)

Wagon Mound, and I-25--even it is a "back road"