Wanderlust Adventures
Zooming along the scenic winding mountain roads with the sun in my face and wind in my hair, I drive through the apple orchards and head to Miss Ruby’s, a bustling café, providing fair trade coffee and a locally sourced menu. The historic rambling adobe with its large courtyard and organic garden is a combined restaurant and post office. Miss Ruby’s Café is the hub of the village; and it’s where the locals gather each day for a bite to eat, to hear the latest buzz, and to pick-up mail and packages.
Living in an amazingly picturesque and remote mountain village nestled high in the Sacramento Mountains, I am grateful to have Books-by-Mail. The New Mexico State Library free book delivery program is offered to rural residents in the Land of Enchantment who don’t live near a public library or one of the State Library Rural Bookmobile stops. Mailbox #6 is where the fun begins for me, a curious explorer with a serious case of the travel bug. Books, you see, are my secret passport to travel the globe – one book at a time. And, so filled with anticipation and excitement, I take the library’s sturdy reusable canvas bag along with a cup of freshly brewed Java to a favorite spot out in the café’s courtyard and garden.
Spring is in the air. While I sip coffee and carefully peruse my books al fresco, the tiny iridescent hummers in the garden are putting on an irresistible acrobatic ballet hovering in mid-air and darting from flower to flower sipping nectar. The books in today’s mail contain a treasure trove of information – hiking the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, the ancient stone Inca city built on a ledge between two peaks in the mysterious cloud forest of the Andes Mountains; snorkeling adventures in the Sandwich Isles and exploring the coral reefs and underwater world of Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve in O’ahu, Hawaii; and, camping at a Spanish colonial settlement, El Rancho de las Golondrinas, the Ranch of the Swallows, the last camp for northbound travelers going to Santa Fe on El Camino Real, or the Royal Road.
Miss Ruby brings out my lunch plate – a deliciously grilled buffalo burger topped with green chilies and a side of purple fries, one of several soulful sides on the café’s locally sourced menu. “So, Miss Globetrotter, what’s on you travel radar screen this month?” she asked.
“Thanks for asking, Miss Ruby. I visualize the days ahead trekking in the Peruvian Andes, snorkeling in Hawaii; and, taking a step back in time, experiencing what life was like traveling in a caravan and camping at El Rancho de las Golondrinas in the 17th and 18th centuries.” I answered, laughing. “Want to come along?”
Miss Ruby smiled. “You bet I do!”
What a joy to live in a cozy adobe cottage tucked away in a tiny isolated mountain village with stunning vistas, crisp and fresh mountain air, and beautiful silence. Books-By-Mail is a gift that brings countless hours of enjoyment. Books and photographs satisfy my wanderlust for adventures, that is, until I go on vacation next month to Patagonia, Argentina, where I’ll be horseback riding with gauchos on the pampas.
Katacha Díaz lives and writes in a quaint little historic town at the mouth of the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest. Her writing has recently appeared or is forthcoming in The MacGuffin, New Mexico Review, The Galway Review, Skipping Stones, Route 7 Review, Coastlines, Gravel, Twisted Vine, and Foliate Oak, among others.