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[[underline]] To Espanola [[/underline]]

[[underline]] Oct. 15. [[/underline]] 

Started at noon & travelled slowly down the valley through deep sand. Occasionally we would strike hard ground & good road for a little way across a clay point, but in every gap the sand has blown into the valley or washed down or drifted up from the river bed till the roads are very bad. 
Very few ranches were seen until near the mouth of the Chama where they are all along the river flats - Little Mexican or Indian patches & gardens and orchards. The adobe houses are now gay with strings of chili or piles of corn & squashes adorn the house tops & door yards. Little stacks of alfalfa & corn stalks cap the barns or sheds, but is all on the smallest scale of poverty, metete to mouth living. Some day this part of the Rio Grande valley will be a rich & closely cultivated region. 
Camped at the ranch of Francisco R Cerva 3 miles above Espanola who proved to be an uncle of our camp man Jose Fernandez.