Utah à Colorado à New Mexico
Saying “See you Soon” to Utah:
For our last morning in Moab, I woke up a little bit early to go for a run along the road and be surrounded by the big red rocks one more time (also because we had a nine hour drive ahead of us and I didn’t want to get antsy). The run was amazing – I think I saw one other person and maybe a few cars, but mostly it was just me and the red rocks all around.
Then I came back and woke Krista and Chase up and we headed out for breakfast before our long drive to Santa Fe. We lingered for quite a while around the breakfast place because it was so fun to hang with Chase, but finally we got on the road and drove out of Utah, looking wistfully behind us at what had been a beautiful few days (the longest time we have spent anywhere since SF).
Our only stop before dinner was in Mesa Verde National Park. Because we purchased the "interagency national park pass" we're like super VIPs in all national parks, so we have sort of unofficially decided to go through as many as possible. Mesa Verde was 1) at a very high altitude, 2)a loooong way into the park because of traffic, and 3) completely different than the other parks we have been to because it is a park mostly because of the human-created cave dwellings that exist in the park. You can hike down to a variety of locations where people built bricks out of the clay and mortar out of rocks, clay, water, and sand to create huge dwellings underneath overhanging rocks. The dwellings can't quite be described as homes, because they're too expansive - they're more like cities built into the rock.
We stood inside one of the rooms and tried to imagine ourselves transported back to a time when this was where people lived. We ended up feeling pretty inadequate in any of our survival skills - there is just no way I would be able to construct a sound house, much less an entire underground city out of clay and sticks. amazing.
DURANGO, CO
We stopped in Durango for dinner and to stretch our legs. It just so happened that they were having a street market and we walked around checking out the different tents. Then we saw that the Cliff Bar tent and the Keen tent were right next to each other and for some reason, we felt the need to tell both groups of people how much their products were helping with our trip (we’ve eaten cliff bars as meals or snacks probably every day of this trip and have hiked every hike in our keens). This resulted in one of the Cliff bar guys donating 2 BOXES of cliff bars to our travels. SWEET! Then we went to Steamworks Brewery for a delicious dinner and got back on the road.
SANTE FE, New Mexico
We rolled into Santa Fe late last night, per our usual, but about an hour before we did, we both had the same realizations: 1) we felt really, really dirty, 2) we sort of needed the kind of sleep that is not so possible in a tent, 3) it was pouring, and 4) we didn’t REALLY know where the campgrounds we were supposed to be sleeping in were.
Solution? Splurge on a hotel: the Santa Fe Sage Inn let us check in close to midnight and gave us a room with a king size bed, a shower, and told us the hours the gym was open and when breakfast would be served. I immediately took a shower and Krista immediately jumped into the bed to pass out. After returning a few emails, I joined her.
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“A wizard is never early, Frodo, nor is he ever late. He always arrives precisely when he means to.”
-Gandalf the Grey (from LOTR)
…and yes, I know this is my third(-ish) JRR Tolkein quote. They just feel so appropriate in this journey.
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