January 2010
The Thirty Mile Hot Spot
by Karen Boehler
If you were asked to name a place that’s 30 miles from Roswell, 30 miles from Lincoln and 30 miles from Ruidoso Downs, you might be hard pressed to do so. But the wide spot on U.S. 70 on the far east end of the Hondo Valley that’s known as Riverside is that place, and today it’s worth stopping at.
Bella Flores is a California native who bought the old gas station and bar at the crook of U.S. 70 two-and-a-half years ago. Two months after she arrived, she opened the gas station as a country store, and the sign over the soon-to-be soda fountain and restaurant reads, “Riverside Stage Stop.”
Flores says there’s a reason for the name. “First of all, it’s Riverside. Second, stage stop just came to me because I’m 30 miles from Roswell, about 30 miles from Lincoln and about 30 miles from Ruidoso Downs. And the stage ran 30 miles a day.”
Flores managed restaurants for most of her life, so when her brother—who lives in Roswell—saw the “For Sale” sign on the then-closed property, he told his sister.
“He saw the property here and thought I might be interested,” she says. “So he gave me the information and I came out and saw it, and fell in love with the area.”
Her next step was a big one. “I quit my job. I took all the money out of the house I had in California and decided this is what I wanted to do,” Flores says. And, after moving from Riverside, Calif. to Riverside, N.M., in July 2007, she had the store opened by October 2007.
Today, the sign outside welcomes visitors. Inside, they can find flavored coffees, soft drinks, snacks and local items such as Carrizozo cider, Fat Man’s beef jerky, San Patricio jam, local honey and locally made gift items. “There’s a lot of work here that is from the local artisans that I’d like to get more and more into,” Flores says. The store is indeed packed wall to rafters with “a little bit of everything.”
For those who live in the Hondo Valley, the restaurant is currently used for a community rummage sale, and is open any time the store is open. But Flores’ plans call for eventually re-opening the restaurant as what it was originally intended to be, once she can find the money.
Meanwhile, the store has visitors ranging from Texans on their way to Ruidoso to long-haul truckers to motorcycle riders. “It’s a place they know they’re welcome,” she says of the bikers. “The truckers, know they can get a hot cup of coffee, and it gives them a place to pull over.” And besides the store, there’s an RV park with about 30 spaces and a lot of open space to simply sit and enjoy the scenery.
Flores says her goal is to make Riverside—which doesn’t even have its own zip code, it shares with Picacho six miles down the road—a community gathering place for locals and visitors as well.
“I believe that there is a reason I’m here and there’s a reason I’m supposed to be here,” she says.
“I’ve made some great friends,” she says. “Sometimes it’s taken them a while before they finally do stop, and once they have stopped then they’re regulars. I’m getting to meet some really great people. People of the area. People of the valley, who believe in what I’m doing.”
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