HAPPY FIRST DAY OF DECEMBER

Oh my goodness, now we've really got to get cracking. I have already written out most of my cards to send out, both trees are decorated, and stocking stuffers have been stuffed into stockings, all wrapped up and ready to be put on hooks for Christmas Eve.  I'm a little more ahead of the game this year.  

And now, here is an ode to dogs.  I met this sweet pup several years ago at a visitor center garden in New Mexico. His human and he were driving across country like we were.

Dogs have no idea how

Wonderful they are.

They just wander 

Around making the

World a better place.

~Author Unknown ~

REVISITING A TRIP TO SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO IN 2013

We have been looking through our old travel photos, and came across two posts of a trip to Santa Fe - the other I will share tomorrow.   Santa Fe is a place I look forward to seeing again when the world settles down.   One of my favorite areas to visit are the deserts.  I always feel drawn to them. Maybe I was a desert tortoise in a previous life!

It's fun to look back on our travel journals.  It puts us right back there.  This one reads:

7.23 a.m. August 17, 2013.   We are in the mountain time zone now.  Having stayed the night in Tucumcari, New Mexico, we are now heading to Santa Fe, New Mexico, 2146 miles into our journey.  A comfortable stay  in our hotel.  

We have 162 miles to Santa Fe.

At 7.55 a.m. we crossed the Guadalupe county line.  There are sunflowers growing wild on the roadside.  The scenery is now flat scrub land  with magnificent buttes in the distance.  It is a fresh morning, my kind of wake-up weather.  The traffic is light and flowing at 75 mph which is the speed allowed out here.  

We enjoy seeing all the trucks on the road and can now identify Peterbilt from Volvo from their grills in our rear view mirror.

We are driving next to a railway line and we have seen lots of very long trains on our journey.  One very large one had three engines in the front, another had two in the front and two in the back and so on.   All had more cars on them than I had ever seen before.  From what we could see it looked like they were carrying anything from livestock to coal and oil, to those big containers you see being loaded onto ships.

 8.19 a.m. and we are near Santa Rosa traveling through a safety corridor.  Fines are doubled and we must put lights on.  Gregg keeps the cruise control at the legal speed.  We have seen several people pulled over by the police and he remembers going through St. John's, New Mexico where he got a speeding ticket many years ago and before he met me.  When we were driving through St. John's together, I didn't think we were going very fast at the time, we were also pulled over for speeding.  Now that's been about 30 years ago but there is no third time lucky for the police officer in that town because we came via a different route and only saw signs pointing to St. John's.  And we are keeping the cruise control on all the time. 

2205  miles and at 8.22 a.m. we crossed the Pecos River.   We have a strong cell phone signal, woo-hoo!

Driving under several overpasses, we noticed that they have decorated them with beautiful engravings of Indian-style horses and pretty designs.  I missed the one of the horses but caught another that was less intricate.  

8.30 a.m. we passed the sign for San Ignacio.  I love the names out here.

One thing that has changed since our journey across country all those years ago, the amazing number of wind farms we have passed.

8.28 a.m.  Elementary Dear Watson, we have just seen a sign for the town of Moriarty!

9.12 a.m. Crossed the Santa Fe County  line.

10.09 we stopped for gas and a car wash on the outskirts of Santa Fe.  We had more red mud on our car from our trip to Palo Duro than I have ever seen.  It was great being able to drive down into the Canyon for the sights we saw, and driving over roads covered in water was an adventure.  One was deep which gave me pause for breath.  You can see why people own four-wheel drives.

We reached Santa Fe and the first place we headed for was the Santa Fe Botanical Garden at Museum Hill. You can see it here.   

Oh my gosh, we had a great time walking around.....

and we were told by the two nice ladies at the entrance that it had only been open four weeks.  

We were also told many interesting things, one of them was how the garden was designed to save water.   Gregg is talking to one of these ladies.

I loved the look of this fountain, each side a seat for you to sit for a spell, and maybe doze off to the quiet sound of running water.

Almost immediately I spotted a hummingbird land on a branch of one of the new trees.  I don't know what kind it is.  A thrill all the same as I haven't seen one since the last time we were in California and that's been a few years ago.   

There were many small lizards running around....... 

and of course the flowers were gorgeous!  

The bees thought so too!

I will have more to share on the flowers in a later post.

We have been having fun with the new tripod that Debbie of It's All About Purple recommended.   It's working out great.  Thanks Debbie!

We loved everything about this place and I look forward to the time we can return.  Santa Fe is a great area, and I would recommend this lovely garden to anyone.  We also felt very fortunate to see it in its first month of opening and we look forward to going back when it is even more established.  

We were very lucky not only to stumble upon the garden but we realized that there were several museums nearby, and we went to two of them.  One was the Museum of Spanish Colonial Art and the other was the Museum of Indian Art and Culture.  You can look here to see what other museums  you can visit.   If we had the energy we would have looked at them all but as the old saying goes, you have to leave something for next time. 

8-20-13 Part two will be shared as soon as I can.  When we reach the hotel each evening, Gregg and I sit down and we each look at our e-mails and check in to see how our son's day has gone, and other family members and friends.  That's something that has changed with the invention of cell phones and laptops that you can carry easily along with you.  

We were in the Grand Canyon overlooking those gorgeous views and our son called.  We had a nice conversation, interrupted twice because of a weak signal, chatted again for a while and then completely lost that said signal for the rest of our drive out of the canyon.  Gregg also chats to his Dad almost every day, when cell phone signal allows.  Lovely to be so connected because of this wonderful modern technology.

We've been lucky at all the places we have stayed in but it has been sometimes tricky to get a signal to call ahead for a hotel, and we look for cell phone towers or wait for the next community to show up.  

One thing that has changed on this journey that we never did before, is to call ahead for a room.  Of course we didn't have cell phones back then, and the way we travel we might change direction on a whim, so there are days we may not be heading in the direction we first thought.  

Yesterday we found a road we were planning to take that had a detour lasting for miles and miles.  It took us on a road we have never traveled and it was fun seeing something new.  On many of the other roads the fun was in remembering the last time, which in some cases was over 30 years ago.  There are lots of wide open spaces around here.  It truly is glorious scenery, each state offering its own beauty, and so we keep on traveling because this morning we head for Zion National Park.

Sending love and hugs to all family and friends, which of course include all you blogging friends out there. 

And that was the end of that part of my journal.

WISE WORDS

2017 CROSS-COUNTRY ROAD TRIP - SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO TO TUSCON, ARIZONA

April 20th, 2017 

10:40 a.m. We left the hotel in Santa Fe, New Mexico with the Odometer reading 51125.

I didn't write anything yesterday as I was under the weather. We think it was a combination of the heat (should have worn a hat but didn't), I forgot to take my water flask. Yes I know, after all that, so I felt very dehydrated and possibly was feeling the effects of the altitude. I remembered we both felt very whoozy and light headed the last time we were here.  (I found out last time from a gentleman whose son was in the chorus at the nearby opera theater, that an oxygen bottle was put nearby for the express use of out-of-towner opera singers, who were affected by the altitude.)  

This time Gregg was okay thankfully. It was only 72° when we went out, but it felt much, much hotter.  It could have been something to do with the strawberry milkshake!!! I don't handle dairy very well, and what we ate was a bit of this and a bit of that after that nice healthy breakfast, not exactly our usual fayre. We seemed to be on the go for most of the day and everything was in a bit of a rush. Ohhhhh I was just asking for it, especially as my diet at home is usually pretty bland.  Lessons learned!  After a dreadful night, I spent the whole day in bed just sleeping. 

Gregg got out a couple of times, one time to the drug store for some medicine for me, and another time when I was feeling much better but not quite up to going out, and I insisted he explore.  The 'do-not-disturb' sign was on the door all day.  Such a waste of precious site-seeing time, but we had two wonderful days in Santa Fe and will be heading back one day, 100 percent prepared! I feel a bit weak this morning but glad to be feeling better than I was. 

11.00 a.m. We passed a sign saying that we were in the Santo Domingo Reservation. 

Gregg read that 2% of the land in America is reservations. 

11.20 a.m. Just passed a sign for the San Felipe Pueblo.

11.39 a.m. Passing a winery called Black Smuggler.  

We passed orchards before that. Saw the irrigation pipes. This is semi desert, bordering on desert we are driving through. 

12.32 a.m. We have gone 3,000 miles on our journey now. 

Saw a sign for parking at Albuquerque airport $2.50 a day.  As Gregg said, you can't beat that. 

We are heading to Tucson, Arizona. We will visit the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum at 2021 N Kinney Rd., Tucson, 85743

1.13 a.m   Saw a sign to a town called Truth or Consequences, NM. 

1.19 a.m. Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. 

None of these places we intended to stop at. I just like to make note of places along the way, and then look them up that night when we stop at a hotel.

2.15 p.m stopped for gas in Elephant Butte, (pronounced Byute) NM.  A man gave Gregg a friendly nod of his head as he was coming back to his car. He looked like some kind of law enforcement official.  He had short, slicked backed black hair, a pencil mustache, in his late 20s and looked like he was straight out of a 40s movie and was a handsome man.  He was wearing a black shirt, grey slacks, a gold badge on his waist band, along with his gun and looked very smart.  However, I would think it was a bit hot wearing black in New Mexico.  

12.50 p.m just passed through Hatch, NM, the chili capital. 

We passed over the Rio Grande River before that. 

2.00 pm. We crossed the Continental Divide at 4500 ft above sea level. 

3.10 pm we have just stopped at a real nice little restaurant called Kranberry. 

Gregg had an open faced steak sandwich....

and I had a sensible grilled chicken salad, and didn't eat all of it.

This was my first meal since the day before yesterday and I was feeling more like my old self.  Nice lady who took care of us.  I didn't get her name.  

There were photos of Amelia Earhart and Charles Lindbergh on the wall. And also a photo of the Spirit of St Louis, which we have hanging in the Air and Space Museum in Washington DC.  What a small world!  They touched down in Lordsburg, New Mexico, and we on a whim decided to stop here for lunch.  I like these little bits of history we come across. 

Saw a dust swirly driving along, looks like a mini tornado without the devastating effects. We could see it going around and around and then it was gone. There have been signs for miles warning us that this area is prone to dust storms.  When one hits the signs say, do not stop in the road, move to the side.  

3.35 p.m we entered Arizona. 

We have been seeing orchards. Hundreds and hundreds of bright green trees. Again, this is a very dry area. Well irrigated obviously. We saw a sign for pecan and walnuts and wine. We are thinking that these may be pecan and walnut trees. 

Passing the Cochise Stronghold, Exit 331 

4.48 p.m. Going past Tombstone, Arizona. 

Stayed the night in Tucson.  We forgot to change the GPS directions from the city of Tucson to our hotel. We realized our mistake when it put us right in the middle of the city and no hotel.  A happy mistake though. It was fun to look around this beautiful city.  From there we changed our directions to our hotel and we arrived 15 minutes later.