John and his entire family all worked at the Los Alamos Laboratory at one point or another in their life, and both John and his dad even lived in Los Alamos for awhile as well. But we were disappointed to discover that the awesome gift & bookstore that had been inside the museum has been closed. That had been an exciting store, selling everything from Atomic Cafe T-shirts to little models of the Atom.

I was persistent though, because I wanted to buy T-shirts from the lab bookstore, since the shirt I bought many years ago was starting to wear out. Fortunately, one of the local stores in the Los Alamos square still carried the T-shirts and I was able to get some. But the museum and bookstore had been a really awesome attraction in the past, and I was sorry to see the bookstore closed.

I suspect also that the huge Los Alamos fire which destroyed acres and acres years ago, caused a lot of migration from the town as well. It's isn't exactly a ghost town, but it was sure a lot less busy than I've seen it in past trips.

We saw it right after the fire years back, and ironically, the area of the fire damage looked like a bomb had gone off. It was nice this trip to see trees trying to grow again, and foilage peeking out from the previously charred hillsides.

Brenda