Mesa Verde National Park

A windy, dusty day today but we had a great time anyway exploring Mesa Verde National Park. It was pretty hazy as we drove the nearly 30 miles up in to the park, but the views from the park road were still pretty spectacular. Quite a drive – up, up, up!

First stop: the Visitor Center where we discovered our neighbors from the RV park. We had visited with her one evening on our walk, so we signed up for the same tour that they were planning to do. There are three ranger-led tours here at Mesa Verde: 1) Long House is currently closed for trail renovation; 2) Balcony House included a 32’ ladder, a 12’ x 18” tunnel and a 60’ climb along an open rock face plus two more 10’ ladders; and 3) Cliff Palace, the largest, with five 8-10’ ladders and a 100’ vertical climb to exit. So Cliff Palace it was.

This was our first view of it from the overlook while we waited for the ranger to guide the approximately 50 people on our tour.

Climbing one of the ladders and then a closer view. What an amazing place!

These are vigas – old, old vigas.

Here’s one of several kivas which were used for both social and ceremonial purposes. They had a separate vent off to the side and were entered by ladder through the smoke hole in the middle of the roof.

We spent quite awhile after the tour visiting with our RV park neighbors, Roland and Suzanne, who are from Cape Cod. Nice folks! Then it was on down the road with several stops at overlooks. This is one of the other cliff dwellings across the way – there are several hundred of these scattered throughout the park. The picture below it is without the zoom – the dwelling shown in the first picture is under the small “arch” near the top of the cliff at the center of the picture. It amazed us that anyone ever found all of these abandoned cliff dwellings because they really blend in.

We also hiked down to the Soda Canyon Overlook for a look at Balcony House.

Pretty flower beside the trail.

And, the Utah Junipers are interesting. A large section of Chapin Mesa (where we were) was burned in 2002. Apparently, forest fires caused by lightening are common here.

Before heading home, we stopped at the Chapin Mesa Museum for about an hour. Very nice exhibits of ancient pottery, baskets and lots of information about how the Ancestral Puebloans lived.

Hmmm….I think I’m glad to be able to buy Teva sandals.

Tomorrow we head for Utah.

Nice day up in the mountains

What a lovely, quiet day we had today! John took a walk earlier before I was up and around, so once I got motivated we took another walk up the hill. There we sat for quite awhile just enjoying the day: blue sky, warm breeze and gorgeous scenery! It doesn’t get much better than this…

But, as those of you who have hiked with me before know, I soon get bored just sitting. Time to check out the rocks surrounding us. That one would make a pretty good spear point, don’t you think?

On our way back from the hike, we explored around the park buildings. They do weddings here, too. Pretty place if you know of someone getting married – as long as they don’t mind thin air!

And, they could pick their own wedding bouquets!

After a quick lunch, we hauled the laundry over to the main area and got that started. Then we grabbed a few golf balls and clubs from the trunk and hit/putted while the clothes were washing and drying. Best way to do laundry we’ve discovered so far.

Late in the afternoon, we drove into Cortez to pick up some groceries – at Safeway, no less! I don’t think we’ve been to a Safeway store since late last summer.

John fixed a pretty good Pad Thai dinner and then I printed out some flute music I had found on line. We drove over to the showers to get cleaned up after all our exercise today and now we’re just vegging. Tough world. Tomorrow we’ll go check out Mesa Verde National Park – should be pretty neat!

Leaving New Mexico

Well, today we looked back in our trip log and discovered that we arrived in New Mexico on April 21st.  Guess May 20th is an appropriate date to leave.  We’ve talked for years about spending a month in each of the 50 states and, after 2 1/2 years of full-timing, we finally did just that!  We have had a wonderful time exploring New Mexico: museums, art galleries, local, state & national parks/monuments, cultural centers, casinos, zoos & gardens.  We’ve seen stalactites, dinosaur skeletons, cliff dwellings, petroglyphs, rattlesnakes, huge kites and played in giant white sand dunes.

We rounded everything up this morning and hit the road by 9:45.  There was an accident in Albuquerque on I-40 so it took us an extra 1/2 hour to get to the Flying J to fill the fuel tank.  And, of course, that always takes at least 1/2 hour….  Then it was on to Camping World to pick up a Mountain Directory for the western U.S.  And, finally, Westward Ho!

Just out of Albuquerque the terrain started getting more interesting.

 

We even found a train to race…

 

…but it won.

 

Even more interesting rock formations.

  

Just after we turned north on Hwy. 491 in Gallup, it was my turn to drive.

 

And John’s turn to take pictures…

Did I mention that Hwy. 491 was pretty bumpy?  Here’s the top of the picture above.

We were appalled at the Indian housing in Shiprock.  There were at least 50 or more of these – depressing…

 

More bumpy road.

 

Colorado mountains!  Oops – there’s still snow on them…

John started to wonder about the campground I had picked out after about the third mile on a pretty narrow county road just outside of Mancos CO, but the end result was well worth it!  Lovely, peaceful place.  I think we’re going to like this home!

Time to go “home”

John and I recently discussed how our interpretation of “home” has changed since we started full-timing. Now it seems that we use the term “home” for wherever we happen to be. We were even calling the condo in Taos “home”!

But, it was time to head back, so we packed up and hit the road. We decided to take a different route back and – boy! – did we!! Sure glad we were in the car and not the motorhome. We chose the “High Road to Taos Scenic Byway” on Hwys. 518, 75, and 76. Gorgeous views in the Carson National Forest.

The village of Truchas had beautiful views from its perch on the mountainside at just over 8,000’ elevation. This is coming into Truchas from the north.

And, this is the view from the other side of Truchas.

Then we took a side road back to Hwy. 285 on Hwy. 503. Hwy. 503 was by far the most interesting – it narrowed down to essentially a one-lane road through a couple of villages and could hardly be termed a highway!!

This was the wide part!

Oops – narrow again!

But, it was beautiful and we really enjoyed it. By the time we got back to Santa Fe we were hungry so we finally gave in and ate at a chain fast-food restaurant. Too bad we forgot about the little town of Madrid on the way home, though, ‘cause it would have been more fun to eat there. We did stop there, however, for a few quick tours through some funky little shops and a few minutes sitting in the sun on a bench.

Back home we got everything unpacked and put away and settled in. Tomorrow we head north to the Cortez, CO area. More fun places to explore!

Touring Taos

Up, ate breakfast and hit the streets. We were only a couple blocks from the historical plaza, so we checked the area out for the next couple hours. This is the main street through town, just a block from the plaza.

The window and door pictures are from the Kit Carson Museum (also not open…)

One thing about living in a motorhome is that you aren’t tempted to buy a bunch of souvenirs or knick-knacks for the house. (‘Course we can’t afford some of the really cool stuff in this town!!) I did, however, find a Native American flute which is something I’ve been wishing for for some time now. Now we’ll see if I can learn to play it! I discovered later, through a little internet research, that it was made by an M. Mirabel from the Taos Pueblo. Don’t know if he’s a brother, or some other relative, or even not a relative, of the famous flute musician Robert Mirabel, but it’s close enough for me!

Another wonderful shop we discovered was “Weaving Southwest”. If any of you are ever looking for a really great rug, check this place out.

Well, we were now tired of “shopping” so we walked back to the condo, ate a quick lunch, hopped in the car and headed for the country. First stop was to see the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge. Can you believe this is the same Rio Grande River that is near our winter home in south Texas?

Then we spent the afternoon following the 85-mile “Enchanted Circle Scenic Byway” through Questa, Red River and Eagle Nest.

Here’s a view of the Red River ski runs for our sons…

Before heading home, we took a short side trip to check out Angel Fire and saw what may possibly be the longest straight ski run in the U.S.

The Sangre de Cristo mountains are just beautiful and we really enjoyed the drive.

Back in Taos, we headed for a local pizza place. We were the oldest folks there by a long shot, but the pizza was great!

Then “home” where we relaxed and watched some of the tornado chasing in northern Texas. It was near where we drove through last fall and close to some friends of ours, so we were glad to hear the next morning that there weren’t any injuries or damage. Sounds like more weather on the way for that area though….

A short dip in the hot tub and time to call it a day.