Category Archives: New Mexico

Day 48, Santa Fe, Taos, NM, May 21st

174.4 RV miles today, 7,558 total

Santa Fe is recognized as one of the most intriguing cities in the nation & earned the nickname “The City Different” due to its unique architecture, as well as for its long and varied history. The name Santa Fe means “holy faith” in Spanish. It was voted the fourth most popular travel destination in the U.S.  At 7000 feet above sea level, it is the highest state capital in the US. The meshing of many cultures have given Santa Fe a distinct and beautiful appearance, and much of Santa Fe’s attractiveness arises from its setting in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Thirteen years before Plymouth Colony was settled by the Mayflower Pilgrims, Santa Fe, New Mexico, was established in 1610, making it the oldest colonial city in the U.S. The San Miguel Mission is the nation’s oldest church, established in 1610, and the Palace of the Governors is the nation’s oldest public building continually in use, built in 1619. After lunch, we walked around the Plaza & found an inlaid stone necklace from Adam (aka “Six-Five”) to remember our adventure. We visited the Loretto Chapel famous for its “miraculous staircase.” We then headed up the winding road through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains on the High Road to Taos Scenic Byway passing through high desert, mountains, forests, small farms, and tiny Spanish Land Grant villages, Pueblo Indian villages & even a Family Dollar Store in the oblivious town of Panasco!?

Taos is nicknamed “Soul of the Southwest” & is a historic art colony and world-class recreational mecca. We visited Taos Pueblo, the oldest continuously inhabited community in the US tracing back thousands of years. The existing sacred village structures are well over 1000 years old.  We drove 10 miles north to walk the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge. At 565 feet (172 m) above the Rio Grande, it is the second highest cantilever bridge in the U.S, the tenth highest bridge in the United States, & the 82nd highest bridge in the world. After picking up a mocha Frappe at McDonald’s, we drove past Eagle’s Nest to Cimarron for the evening. From New Mexico, Land of Enchantment, m, b & t

“In the magnificent fierce morning of New Mexico, one sprang awake, a new part of the soul woke up suddenly and the old world gave way to the new.” — D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930, English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist)

“We have lived upon this land from days beyond history’s records, far past any living memory, deep into the time of legend. The story of my people & the story of this place are one single story…”–Tribal Manifesto of Taos Pueblo

“You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.” –Warren E. Buffett (American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is widely considered the most successful investor of the 20th century)

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Day 47, Shelby Flies Home from Albuquerque, 9000 Mile RV check-up, Santa Fe, NM, May 20th

236.2 RV miles today, 7,383.6 total

We left the Newmans at Rehoboth for Albuquerque to drop Shelby off at the airport to fly back to Fayetteville, NC (She arrived safely this night). Then we went by the Mercedes Benz dealership to go ahead & get “Thumper’s” 10,000 mile check-up a little early.  We drove up I-25 to settle in Rancheros de Santa Fe RV Campground at the #1 site. Toby loves to travel as you can see in his perched photo!?!  We went into town around the Plaza for a cursory scouting report traveling on the original Old Santa Fe Trail, the 19th century roadway to the west that tamed the priarie, before having another delicious dinner at Harry’s Roadhouse Diner. From the “City Different,” m, b & t

“So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you’ll wait for me
Hold me like you’ll never let me go
Cause I’m leavin’ on a jet plane
Don’t know when I’ll be back again
Oh babe, I hate to go.”–John Denver, Lyrics written 1966

The Santa Fe Trail
(James Grafton Rogers, 1911)

"Say, pard have ye sighted a schooner
A-hittin' the Santa Fe Trail?
They made it here Monday or sooner
With a water keg roped on the rail,
With Daddy and Ma on the mule-seat
And somewhere around on the way
A tow-headed gal on a pony
A-janglin' for old Santa Fe
   Oh -- Ah - Oh --
A-janglin' for old Santa Fe..."

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Day 46, Mesa Verde National Park, CO, Rehoboth, NM with Newmans, May 19th

200 RV miles today, 7,147.4 total

We spent the day at Mesa Verde National Park. We took the Cliff Palace & Balcony guided tours & the Spruce Tree House hike. The park was created in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt, to protect some of the best-preserved cliff dwellings in the world. The Spanish term Mesa Verde translates into English as “green table.” Scattered nomads began roaming about the Southwest about 7,000 B.C. Projectile points dating 5,000 years have been found on Mesa Verde.The Anasazi inhabited Mesa Verde between 600 to 1300. In the late 1190s, they began to build the cliff dwellings for which Mesa Verde is famous. We went down into a Kiva, the spiritual place of these ruinsthat celebrates Father Sky & Mother Earth. We headed south traversing an intense sandstorm & witnessing a small tornado enroute to visit Ana & Jonathan Newman & Ana’s brother, Tim.  Ana prepared a feast & we stayed at the mission compound RV campground.

“Far above me, a thousand feet or so, set in a great cavern in the face of the cliff, I saw a little city of stone asleep. It was as still as sculpture — and sometimes like that. It all hung together, seemed to have a kind of composition: pale little houses of stone nestling close to one another, perched on top of each other, with flat roofs, narrow windows, straight walls, and in the middle of the group, a round tower. . . . I had come upon the city of some extinct civilization, hidden away in this inaccessible mesa for centuries, preserved in the dry air and almost perpetual sunlight like a fly an amber, guarded by the cliffs and the river and the desert.—From “The Professor’s House,’’ by Willa Cather on the Anasazi civilization at Mesa Verde.

“Never stop being a kid. Never stop feeling and seeing and being excited with great things like air and engines and sounds of sunlight within you. Wear your little mask if you must to protect you from the world but if you let that kid disappear you are grown up and you are dead.”— Richard Bach, ‘Nothing by Chance,’ 1963

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Day 11, Rehoboth, NM, Petrified Forest, Sedona, AZ, April 14th

271 miles today, 2,784.7 miles total

Sunday morning we attended church services where Ana & Jonathan Newman performed along with a native Navajo flutist. We had lunch in Gallup, New Mexico at the Route 66 Railway Cafe before heading into Arizona’s Petrified Forest enroute to Sedona. The petrified trees we saw were present when dinosaurs roamed the earth. Our Thumper voyage to Sedona had even gustier winds up to 40 MPH, providing our most challenging driving experience to date!?!? We settled into Rancho Sedona RV Park for our RV cooked dinner. We are now 3 hours behind the east coast time zone. AhóÁ, Nizhónígo Nee Ado’áát (Cheers, good health, & have a nice day in Navajo),   m, b & t

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.”–John Muir

“Loyalty to petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul.” — Mark Twain

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Day 10, Rehoboth, New Mexico, April 13th

149 miles today, 2,513.7 miles total

We headed west from Albuquerque in gusty winds 20-30 MPH & stopped by El Malpais National Monument to see the ancient lava flows from multiple volcanoes erupting in the ancient past. You can see one of the black lava fields in our m, b & t picture. We made a picnic lunch at the continental divide…7,275 feet…next to a low-tech covered wagon adjacent to ours!?! We arrived to visit Jonathan & Anna Newman, teachers at Rehoboth Christian School, elevation 6,500 feet, established ~ 1903. There is a tribute there to the Navajo Code Talkers, who literally turned the tide of World War II. The Navajo language remained an undecipherable code of an unwritten language of extreme compexity.  We have had wonderful fellowship with Jonathan & Anna hiking Pyramid Rock and enjoying her homecooked dinner. They were gracious to put us up for the night. m, b & t (aka the NewMillermans)

I have been to the end of the earth, I have been to the end of the waters, I have been to the end of the sky, I have been to the end of the mountains, I have found none that are not my friends.”–Navajo Proverb

“In the American Southwest, I began a lifelong love affair with a pile of rock.” — Edward Abbey

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The Navajo Beauty Way Ceremony

 

In beauty may I walk
All day long may I walk
Through the returning seasons may I walk
Beautifully I will possess again
Beautifully birds
Beautifully joyful birds
On the trail marked with pollen may I walk
With grasshoppers about my feet may I walk
With dew about my feet may I walk
With beauty may I walk
With beauty before me may I walk
With beauty behind me may I walk
With beauty above me may I walk
With beauty all around me may I walk
In old age, wandering on a trail of beauty, lively, may I walk
In old age, wandering on a trail of beauty, living again, may I walk
It is finished in beauty
It is finished in beauty

Day 9, Amarillo, TX to Albuquerque, NM, April 12th

306.2 miles today, 2,368.7 miles total

We left Amarillo this morning almost having traded our RV in for the one with Beth in the picture!?! Looks like something the Clampetts would have on the Beverly Hillbillies. We both drove some coming to rest in West Albuquerque at American RV Park in time for the gorgeous sunset and delicious dinner prepared by beth. m, b & t

“On the road again. Just can’t wait to get on the road again;
Goin’ places that I’ve never been;
Seein’ things that I may never see again;
And I can’t wait to get on the road again.” –Willie Nelson

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