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Thanks eddie. It sure was like the dessert here in Tulsa, too many over 100 days, even 110 days! I will have to visit both huh. I may just like the smaller population of LC. The summers are better too lol. Are you thinking to move out that way?
No kidding, the last two summers in Oklahoma have been beyond ridiculous. I went out there because my son may be attending NMSU.
A couple other things I thought of. Alb is much greener than Cruces which is pretty brown and much more desert looking. However, Las Cruces has beautiful pecan groves just southwest of town. As green as Tulsa. Alb however, isn't as green as Tulsa but the mountain east of Alb has pines at the higher elevations.
Las Cruces mountains (Organs, Dona Anna) are pretty brown and you have to go an hour and a half or so northeast or northwest of LC to get into green mountains.
Cruces metro area is a little over 200K and Alb is almost 800K.
Alb also has access to Santa Fe (1hour) and all the other neat places in northern New Mexico. Las Cruces has good access to white sands, Cloudcroft and Riudoso.
Do visit both because they are enough different that you might prefer one over the other. But both are delightful IMO.
Ya know the brown is gonna be something I've never seen before. And I think I want to see LC first and stay a whole week so it can sink in to see how it feels on the eyes. I am going to love that bare naked feeling of being able to look out for miles and miles. Ive never been in desert. The idea of just being this little speck---out there. Oh and to see millions of stars.
And if I need a green fix that is really great to know I could go out to the pecan groves in LC, or I know the bosque in ABQ.
I just looked up images of Cloudcraft and Ruidios and the latter looks like Colorado! Huh!
Now I have Las Cruces fantasies of wouldn't be neat to have an electric tricycle and do all shopping errands and stuff. I'd never do that in ABQ, too city. So just mentally trying on LC for size. The climate is so perfect for that.
Oh, hey Rich, is Rio Rancho comparable to Las Cruces?
Okay, imagine POOF ABQ is gone, vaporized due to aliens from Roswell, and then there is left Rio Rancho, is it, can it be self contained liveable? I'm meaning, a farmers market, a couple grocery stores, a big box store for "stuff", churches , coffee shop/outside dining, a community center, a library, places that groups of like interest meet? I see RR has UNM West, I don't know if it has writing/literature/fine art classes there. It has almost the same population but I can't discern whether it is built like its own little city or it is just this massive neighborhood.
Thank you
Last edited by TULSA2ABQ; 09-30-2012 at 11:10 AM..
Oh, hey Rich, is Rio Rancho comparable to Las Cruces?
Okay, imagine POOF ABQ is gone, vaporized due to aliens from Roswell, and then there is left Rio Rancho, is it, can it be self contained liveable? I'm meaning, a farmers market, a couple grocery stores, a big box store for "stuff", churches , coffee shop/outside dining, a community center, a library, places that groups of like interest meet? It has the CNM community campus which offers some classes, is there anything else offering classes literature, writing, art and such very near RR or within? It has almost the same population but I can't discern whether it is built like its own little city or it is just this massive neighborhood.
Thank you
Rio Rancho is on part of the ABQ north border. RR started as a retirement town, grew fast, so it does not have the malls, shops, Bosque, zoo's trails etc.
They do have a Farmers market, but there is a closer one to me in Corrales. We have some grocery stores, Smith's, Albertsons yes even a Walmart. They have a pretty good community center. Senior citizens are also welcome to the ABQ centers. Two libraries. In reality to a degree, yes it is a large neighborhood. It is not an old City, it was all a desert in the 60's, and grew from that. Too spread out for public transportation. The crime rate is either the lowest, or second lowest in New Mexico (Los Alamos is lowest currently). We are about an 11 mile drive to Old Town...
Ya know the brown is gonna be something I've never seen before. And I think I want to see LC first and stay a whole week so it can sink in to see how it feels on the eyes. I am going to love that bare naked feeling of being able to look out for miles and miles. Ive never been in desert. The idea of just being this little speck---out there. Oh and to see millions of stars.
And if I need a green fix that is really great to know I could go out to the pecan groves in LC, or I know the bosque in ABQ.
I just looked up images of Cloudcraft and Ruidios and the latter looks like Colorado! Huh!
Now I have Las Cruces fantasies of wouldn't be neat to have an electric tricycle and do all shopping errands and stuff. I'd never do that in ABQ, too city. So just mentally trying on LC for size. The climate is so perfect for that.
LC has big wide streets and not all that much traffic on them for how wide they are. (They are wide for drainage purposes in monsoon season and the two interstates carry a lot of traffic). Traffic flow is pretty fast along the main corridors. I don't know about an electric tricycle unless you lived in the midtown area but you can get where you are going in a vehicle pretty fast in Las Cruces compared to most towns it's size.
Still a couple of other things I forgot. The town of LC is pretty brown because there isn't much grass in town. However, the campus at NMSU has a lush lawn and lots of palm trees and other types of trees. Sort of an oasis so to speak. Nice unpretentious campus.
The older part of town has some trees but still pretty sparse greenery. The newer part of town (up above I-25) called the east mesa has been developed basically using regular desert landscaping so while there really aren't that many trees but the desert landscaping is nice and the sunset views are spectacular. The west mesa is further out and apparently has more greenery allowed and has beautiful sun rises over the Organs east of town.
Finally, Mexican food. Las Cruces and Old Mesilla (a must see) have about a million hole in the wall mexican places all of whom are masters of the Hatch chiles which are grown mostly just north of that area.
I can't wait to hear about your trip. I'm hoping to get out there again soon.
Also, if you go to (or from) Cruces you can cut down at Amarillo and go to Canyon, Tx and then cut through Clovis, Roswell, Riudoso and Alamogordo to get there. All four lane with bypasses around about every town except for Portales and Ruidoso. Should take about 12 hours from Tulsa (with minimal stopping) and is about 1.5 hours shorter than going back through Alb.
LC has big wide streets and not all that much traffic on them for how wide they are.
Not my experience at all. Try taking E. Lohman Ave from Roadrunner Pkwy across I-25 toward Solano Dr. It almost always takes >5 minutes to go ~1 mile.
LC is laid out much more like Santa Fe than Albuquerque, if you get my meaning. Freeways are ancillary rather than shortcut, and the street layout is haphazard, leading to far more traffic for far fewer cars.
Not my experience at all. Try taking E. Lohman Ave from Roadrunner Pkwy across I-25 toward Solano Dr. It almost always takes >5 minutes to go ~1 mile.
LC is laid out much more like Santa Fe than Albuquerque, if you get my meaning. Freeways are ancillary rather than shortcut, and the street layout is haphazard, leading to far more traffic for far fewer cars.
Yes, I've heard that stretch is pretty bad because of the lights at each side of I-25 but that it gets better when you get to the one ways on Amador and Lohman. And LC seems to have a lot better traffic flow north and south than it does east and west.
However, Tulsa is far worse during busy drive times and I think that is what I was getting at.
I agree, to only have a negative comment about ABQ is a bit ridic. With that said, you can't compare a small town to a city that has a metro area of 1 million people. Comparing Rio Rancho to Las Cruces is more in line than ABQ to Las Cruces. If that was the choice I would say Las Cruces. Other than that, ABQ has better shopping, better transportation, more and diverse places to eat.
Traffic in Las Cruces is much better than in ABQ 90% of the time.
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