Santa Fe, NM

July 12th - July 15th

Thursday, July 12th
Santa Fe

We drove into town and got some breakfast. Historic Sante Fe is so cute. All the buildings are pueblo style and there are cute little stores all over the place. First stop was Lorreta's Chapel. I remembered going there about 10 years back and being very impressed with it. It was built around 1860. The choir loft was apart of the design but they forgot to build in a way to get up there. The church was too small for a normal staircase so they needed a spiral one. I guess the skill set for that was uncommon so they prayed to the saint of carpentry. A couple of days later a carpenter came into town and took the job. Apparently he used minimal materials and no nails. The spiral staircase had 33 steps and needed no support. According to experts, his design was ingenious even if he had had better tools. Once he completed the job, he left without a word or getting paid.

We walked around town, were going to go to a couple of museums but they were all quite expensive. We went to the local hostel and checked in. This was definitely not one of the nicer hostels. But we did get a nice private room in the area where the long-term hostellers stay. Right outside our room was a computer hooked up to a DSL line so we were quite happy. I sat outside and started to write postcards but started talking to 2 guys who had been staying there for quite a while. The one guy was from NY and like it there because the pace was so much slower. Besides that, I couldn't get much out of them.

That night we head back into to town. After walking around forever, we finally decided to eat at a diner on the plaza (main square in town). Right next-door was a bar/restaurant that had a band playing on their 2nd floor balcony. So after dinner we sat on a bench outside and listened to the music. It was really nice.


Friday, July 13th
 Santa Fe to Jemez Springs<P>84 to 4

In the morning we had to do our chores at the hostel. Yes, we had chores! I chose the one where you had to clean the patio out front. Not to bad - I just had to wipe down the tables and clean the ashtrays (which were pretty much clean). We also had to clean up our room and when we checked out, the guy actually told me to go back upstairs and vacuum the floor!

We drove down to a Kinkos so that James could download our photos to the website. While he did that, I took a quick drive around town to check out the neighborhoods. So far, Sante Fe iss the closest I have come to a town I could live in and I just loved all the pueblo style houses. I could totally imagine renting a house and decorating it with all the cool Indian stuff from the area.

Someone had told James about a really cool place west of Sante Fe called Jemez Springs. It was kinda on our way so we decided to check it out. It turned out to be a good choice. It was located in a valley with gorgeous rock formations in the mountains. It was late afternoon and the next stop was quite far away so we decided to set up camp. The campsite was great but a storm was brewing. It rained all night long but luckily didn't start until we had finished dinner.

Saturday, July 14th
Jemez Springs to Acoma Pueblo to El Morro to Gallup
4 to 44 to I-25 to I-40 to 279 to I-40 to 53 to 602 to I-40

Next stop was Acoma Pueblo and the Enchanted Mesa. Acoma Pueblo is an Indian village on the top of a mesa. The Acoma people have been continuously living there for centuries. Most of the Acoma people live in villages a dozen or so miles away but there are still some families that actually live up there. We took a tour up the mesa to see how they live and learn a little about the history of the people. We didn't take any pictures up there because above the $10 tour charge they charged $10 for a camera permit. But we did take photos from a far.

We drove on to El Morro. Not as much as we expected, it was a large rock that had been engraved by travelers as far back as the 1500's. OK so that was pretty cool but there's only so many times you can enjoy seeing "so and so passed through here on the fifth day of June Sixteen Hundred and Thirty-Five" carved out of stone on a wall.

We spent that night in Gallup. Gallup is quite a large town on Rt. 66. It has all usual neon signs and tons of motels. We decided to camp at the Red Rock State Park. It was a pretty crappy campsite, but whatever. The campsite was in a V between two fair sized rock mountains. To our left was another V, which housed a stadium. As we were setting up, we noticed that the road the other V was packed with traffic so James went to go find out what was going on. You'll never guess what it was - a rodeo!

We decided to go into to town to get some food and then head back and check out the rodeo. We had dinner at El Rancho Motel. I had stayed in this hotel about 10 years ago with my parents. The hotel was a very popular spot for celebrities. They all stayed here when they were filming Western movies. All of the rooms are named after them and they have autographs scattered around the walls.

After dinner, I begged James to let me have a drink in the bar (he's still on antibiotics from the dog bite). The bar was dark and dingy - real local looking place. We ended up chatting with the cocktail waitress - a single woman with a 7-year old daughter who pretty much just travels from place to place with the kid. Lovely interesting woman.

We left to go to the rodeo but as soon as we stepped outside it started to rain. The rodeo was $16 so we figured it would be a waste to pay that if it was just going to be rained out. So we went back to the bar and played backgammon for a couple of hours.

When we got back to the campsite, the last of the rodeo go'ers were leaving. We took a walk down to the stadium to check it out. Quite interesting, there were 2 trucks still in the middle of the field, obviously still left there from the finale. There were gates for the bulls. Each had the name of local businesses that must have been the sponsors for each bull. No one was there except the clean up crew. It was quite eerie but really fascinating. I'm disappointed that we never got to see it!


Sunday, July 15th
Gallup to Petrified Forest to Meteor Crater to Flagstaff
Rt. 66 to I-40 to 180 to I-40

We head out of the city on Rt. 66. It was everything it was cracked up to be; tons of neon signs and run down motels. We drove it for a couple of miles where it ended and we got back on the I-40 to the Petrified Forest (also known as the Painted Desert). Really cool thing to see. Like White Sands, in the middle of the desert, there were hills made up of colored layered from pinks to reds to grays. There is also a section called the Crystal Forest, which has no living trees, but the ground is scattered with petrified wood (wood thousands of years old crystallized into stone).

We were going to call it a day and head straight for the hostel in Flagstaff but on our way we saw a sign for 'Meteor Crater'. We decided to check it out. It turned out to be this huge crater that is supposed to be the best-preserved impact collision crater in the world. It was 60 stories deep and 4000 feet across. Pretty impressive stuff!

Finally we got to Flagstaff and checked into the hostel. It was definitely a partiers hostel as there was a common room in the middle of the courtyard with a pool table and blaring jukebox.

James and I were in separate rooms and the girls in his room had recommended a Mediterranean place they were going to. When we got there, the girls invited us to sit with them. There were two girls from Maryland; one was moving to California and the other was just along for the ride. There was also an Irish girl traveling alone and an Irish girl traveling with a couple (who had gone missing for the afternoon!).

On our way back to the hostel we picked up some beers and hung out in the courtyard chatting for a while. Very nice people, interesting conversation but eventually I was exhausted and excused myself. I tried to read in bed but got through half a page and passed out.


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