005: Los Alamos

No photos from this, but we took a little side trip on the motorcycle to Los Alamos. Or as Paris likes to call it, "The Town That Science Built." One of the main objectives of the labs now, (post-cold war) is to maintain the nuclear weapons we currently have in our nation's arsenal. I wasn't too interested in seeing this because I thought it was going to be uber-nationalistic and really depressing. But in fact, I was somewhat awed by what goes into "testing" a nuclear weapon if you can't detonate it.

I was also enthralled by the numerous other labs that do work on everything from the Human Genome Project, to Nano-technology. Of course the big draw is still the history behind The Manhattan Project. But even if you're not keen on that sort of thing, I would still recommend taking a day-trip to Los Alamos if you're in Santa Fe.

Another aspect that makes the trip so cool is the interesting topography of the region. Los Alamos was built along side a dormant volcano. And the resulting hills and valleys throughout the town were left behind from an ancient eruption—very cool.