Our First Trip to Taos

We had somehow never been to Taos and stopped there for just a couple of days on our way back from the trip to the Pacific Northwest. I don't know what it was about that town that reminded me of Marin County, California back in the days when I was growing up there--the small town feeling, perhaps;  maybe the beautiful gardens and funky little houses or the relaxed vibe. We just loved it there. 

The first photo (above) is of one of the common rooms for reading and relaxing at the Hotel La Fonda de Taos, where we stayed right there on the Plaza. You can see lots more pictures of the hotel interior at their website. Our room was small but comfy and furnished like an old hacienda. The lace-curtained window looked right out on the Plaza, which was perfect when we were resting up from a day in the sun but still wanted to see and hear what was going on. 

The view from our window

And there was plenty going on. One night there was Native American drumming and dancing by a group from the nearby Taos Pueblo, and the next night was one of the free concerts that take place all summer on Thursday evenings. The Plaza was just starting to fill up for the concert, as you can see above. We heard a rousing performance by the local Damn Band, while having a takeout picnic in our room. Click the band's link and you can listen to some music while reading this post. 

Adobe building in the center of town; note the famous Northern New Mexican blue sky

Taos is a great place to take photos. On the way in to town on the road from Colorado you pass an outpost of the highly-imaginative Earthship homes, built off-the-grid with sustainability and creativity in mind. I didn't get any pictures of them but we have since found that we can rent one for a weekend, so we'll be back up that way for sure. 

Wall mural outside of a shop

After passing the Earthships, the road crosses the Rio Grande Gorge. The bridge is 565 feet above the river and that would have been a great photo op, but there was a movie being filmed there and we were waved through. I did my best to search for famous faces as we drove across--no luck, but there was lots of action. We'll have to go back there, too.

Adobe buildings abound

An interesting stay was made even more so when a cable was cut up in the mountains, taking out the town's Internet for a day. At first I thought it might just be relaxing--no constant checking of email or posting photos to Facebook. Then the little inconveniences started to make themselves known--no GPS or altimeter or map apps via our iPhones. We were still handling our day of stepping back into history (like the early 1990s, I guess), but then the bigger effects started showing up. 

We don't carry much cash when traveling, figuring our debit card is much safer, but that theory wasn't working for us that day. Want lunch? Sorry, cash only. Access to the cash machine? Sorry, no can do. Even the bank was locked up, leaving the arriving employees wandering around on the sidewalk. So, maybe we should just leave town. Guess what? No gas available, either. We started to feel like stupid fools, so attached to our technology that a little quirk could bring us all to a halt, but we had plenty of company. The poor owners and employees of the shops and restaurants, so dependent on the tourist trade, lost plenty of business that day. 

We "made do" with the lovely restaurant at the hotel, which put our meals on the room tab. But, oh, we wanted just one more ice cream cone at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory down the street.

The Internet was eventually restored late in the day and the town and its tourists all heaved a great sigh of relief. We have so many reasons to go back (carrying some extra cash this time); so many little back roads to wander, so many museums and galleries to visit, and so many ice cream flavors to sample...

Love Story

Way back when Beez and I first got married in 1981, we bought our first new furniture. My favorite piece was a small-scale wing chair with red Colonial plaid upholstery. It was the perfect size for me because I am short and the chair allowed my feet to reach the floor.

I sat in my comfy chair to read and to think. When we moved from Washington state to New Hampshire, the little chair came along and fit right into our 1770 Colonial home (see The House on High Street for more about that historic house).

Through the years, sitting in my little wing chair, I read about raising children, adoption issues, and going back to college as an adult. I studied for my classes in that chair; classes that helped me earn first a Bachelor's degree and then a Master's. I learned to knit there and made a lot of sweaters.

As I grew older, I also learned to take a quick nap while sitting bolt upright in that chair. Of course as I aged, so did the chair. An overenthusiastic puppy chewed the chair's legs and ate the upholstery right off one of the arms, so I learned to make slipcovers. Then I learned that slipcovers made out of thin fabric don't last. When the first yellow gingham slipcover got worn out too quickly, I made another slipcover out of a sturdy flowered fabric that I didn't like much. From that I learned that stuff you don't like just never gets any more attractive.

The third slipcover was made of plain and sturdy white canvas that I really liked. It lasted a very long time and went with everything, even this red room I painted in New Hampshire.

Red living room with dog basket and white wing chair

We moved to New Mexico and retired. By and by the white slipcover wore out, too, and the poor little chair looked so shabby. I threw a quilt over it but eventually decided, not too long ago, that it was time to say goodbye to my loyal and comfy companion. I asked Beez to please take it to the dump, right away before I changed my mind. He loaded it up and drove away.  

It was like deciding to put down a beloved old dog. I had really thought that it was the right time and just didn't have it in me to make another set of slipcovers, but I was haunted by the thought of my good little chair down in the pit at the dump, lying there at the mercy of the big bulldozer. 

That was almost a month ago. Today I came home from a morning at my knitting group and walked into my special little reading room. There, standing once again in its usual corner, was my beloved little chair--all reupholstered in fine new fabric, with its formerly scratched-up wooden legs refinished and gleaming.

And there was dear smiling Beez, who (after 30-some years) knows me better than I know myself. 

Road Trip, Part 7: Back to New Mexico!

Let's get this road trip finished up! After we left Green River, Utah (Crossroads of the West) we headed down through some beautiful country: Red rocks, and even some arches. 

In southern Colorado, there was a cattle herd traffic jam. I took a video because I was trying to capture the sounds of the herd, but you can mainly hear Beez and me chuckling. The cowgirl (the one with the dog) said "Thank y'all" to us for waiting for them to get situated, but we owed the thanks to her and her wonderful herd, heading down the mountain.

                  

And then, suddenly, we were heading down ourselves. From a high of 10,800 feet, we could see down into good old New Mexico. It had been a wonderful trip, but it was so good to be home again!

Road Trip, Part 6: Tacoma and its Glass

Something big has happened to Tacoma since we left in the mid-1980s: Glass as art, and especially the glass works of Dale Chihuly. A native son of Tacoma, Chihuly's influence is seen everywhere in the downtown area. 

A dilapidated train station when we last saw it, the refurbished Union Station is now leased by the Federal Government and houses federal courts, is also used as a wedding and party venue, and has an amazing display of Chihuly glass pieces in the rotunda. 

Because of security concerns surrounding federal court business, we were asked to take our photos of the higher parts of the dramatic rotunda only, so all my photos are angled upward. 

This hanging piece was immense! 

Just past Union Station, we strolled on to the famous Bridge of Glass, which is a 500-foot long pedestrian overpass that takes you to the Museum of Glass. My pictures do absolutely nothing to give you an idea of the scale of the glass pieces on the bridge, above: Each one was at least two to three feet high, and this is just a tiny section of the side of the bridge. Go to the Bridge of Glass website for some lovely photos. 

This is a small part of the ceiling of the Bridge--all Chihuly glass pieces--and it illustrates the thought that kept occurring to me: Tacoma's skies can often be gray and overcast, so the introduction of colorful glass that captures and changes the available light is the perfect pairing with the city's climate. 

The next two photos will illustrate my point--check out the gray clouds, then imagine all this glass lit up at night. 

Once we were inside the Museum itself, we spent some time admiring the creativity happening in the Hot Shop, where art is made from molten glass. 

 

Here is the interior of the Hot Shop's chimney, a 90-foot tall stainless steel cone that we could see from our room at the Hotel Murano.  As I may have mentioned before, the hotel itself was filled with glass pieces like the suspended glass canoe, below.

Road Trip, Part 5: LeMay-America's Car Museum

Once we arrived in Tacoma, Washington, we kept noticing a large new (to us) metallic structure over by the Tacoma Dome. The Dome itself was built in 1981 and was still all shiny and new when we moved across the country to New Hampshire. Remember, we hadn't been back to Washington State since living there in the early 1980s, so there were lots of new and newish things to see. 

We discovered that big metallic thing was the LeMay-America's Car Museum. You can check out a photo of the exterior on the Museum's website. Once we were inside, I made a beeline to a car that looked something like one my dad might have driven. We strolled the length of the huge building, admiring the shining antique cars lined up along either side. But that was just the beginning: The 165,000 square foot building has four floors that you visit by walking down big ramps. It can house up to 350 cars and trucks, both those from the LeMay Family collection (which eventually numbered a jaw-dropping 3,500 vehicles) and from private owners. 

The cars were stunning. They were shiny. Because there were so many people there--it was Father's Day, and what better place to take Dad or Granddad--I spent my time taking close-ups of details of all that shininess. 

If you want to see more photos of entire cars, you can go to the Museum's collection page.

As we walked and walked, and walked some more, all those beautiful shiny cars started to blur together, and I began to watch the people instead. Not to be sexist, but I did notice that the farther down the ramps we went, the more I could see that the women's smiles were starting to look a bit strained. The children were getting kind of crazy. And the men? They all had a kind of goofy, glazed look to them--you could tell they were remembering their first car, their first car payment, their first flat tire, their first oil change...

I could show you a sampling of the photos I took of Beez, drooling over those cars, but I don't want to embarrass him. I had to turn away myself. The look on his face... well, some things are just best not described. 

Road Trip, Part 4: Richland, Washington to Tacoma, WA

View from "our" patio

As I have mentioned before, Beez did a wonderful job of planning this trip and finding great hotels along the way. When we pulled into the Red Lion Hanford House in Richland, Washington, we had just driven for another long day that ended with a smoke-filled highway and backed-up traffic. There were some wildfires getting underway and that highway was closed not long after we passed through. The hotel looked nice enough, but the road in front of it was filled with traffic, it was hot, and we were tired.

Our room, however, was around back and, seemingly, in a far more peaceful world. It faced the Columbia River, which was a surprise to me, although not to that clever Beez, who always does his research. We had a private little patio of our own, the hotel bar supplied glasses and a bottle of wine, and we had a lovely time unwinding and looking out at the river.

Sunset over the Columbia...

...and sunrise the next morning.

The next day we traveled through the Cascades and it rained! We were fascinated to see that our windshield wipers actually functioned, especially since we hardly ever have a reason to turn them on in the desert. Once we arrived in Tacoma, the furthest point of our trip, we settled into a great room at the Hotel Murano. This was a special treat! The hotel itself is like an art gallery filled with glass treasures, with a different artist's work featured on each floor.  Here is the view of Tacoma at night from our room...

... and during the day. That's the Tacoma Dome over on the right. From here you can also see the Bridge of Glass, the Museum of Glass, and America's Car Museum. More about those in future posts.

And beautiful Mount Rainier came out for a while and obligingly floated above the city. When we lived in Washington, long ago, we could see the mountain from our back porch--when it was "out" which, as any Washingtonian will tell you, isn't every day!

Road Trip, Part 3: From Provo, Utah to Richland, Washington

Modern day "prairie schooners" make their way easily up and down hills and through mountain passes

I didn't take many photos as we made our way from Provo to Washington state, going across a little corner of Idaho and another little corner of Oregon, but I did notice every single speck of water. Back home in the desert of New Mexico, in the middle of a drought, we dash out after every tiny rainfall to take pictures of the teeniest puddles (New Mexican Facebook friends, you know who you are! We all do it).

These two water photos are all I have to show our progress for this part of our road trip. However, I was constantly aware that some of the routes we traveled were along the historic Oregon Trail. As we tired from a long day in the car, I couldn't help but think of those long-ago covered wagon travelers, inching across the map toward a new life in an unknown and strange land.

As a child, I was always fascinated by the idea of a family packing a Conestoga wagon and heading west. In our neighborhood in San Francisco I got my friends to play covered wagon; one child would sit on a gate pretending to be the driver holding the reins of the pretend oxen; the other kids would sit behind and would be the family.

Here is a photo of the interior of one of the wagons that might have traveled the Oregon Trail. I've borrowed it from the website for the National Oregon/California Trail Center at Montpelier, Idaho. According to the Center, a wagon needed to be strong enough to carry a load and passengers for the five month journey, yet light enough not to exhaust the oxen pulling it. The wagons had no springs: I thought about that as we comfortably and safely drove over smoothly paved highways, up and down mountains, and over rivers.

According to the Wikipedia article on the Oregon Trail, the main Oregon Trail was 2000 miles long, an east-west large-wheeled wagon route that ran through the present-day states of Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Idaho, and Oregon. Again, from the Wikipedia article: From the early to mid-1830s and particularly through the epoch years 1846–1869, the Oregon Trail and its many offshoots were used by about 400,000 settlers, ranchers, farmers, miners, and businessmen and their families. 

If bouncing along unpaved, rutted trails for months at a time wasn't difficult enough, the dangers were many: River crossings were most dangerous, but folks traveling this way were also at risk of being run over by the heavy wagons or shot when loaded firearms were accidentally discharged. Weather, diseases, stampeding animals, snakebite--the list of hazards goes on. See the article, Trail Basics: Dangers for more.

Traveling in our little Prius, by contrast, was quiet and comfortable. We had an adjustable cabin temperature, comfy seats, GPS apps to guide our way, access to constant weather and news reports, and even an altimeter to figure out the height of the mountain passes. We could stop to admire the view or to get a snack whenever we wanted. I wish we might have invited one of those travelers from the past to ride along with us.

Road Trip, Part 2: Navajo Bridge

The day's ride from Flagstaff to Provo started out in the mountains, came down through some desert areas, and then these beautiful mountains (rock formations? mesas?) appeared in the misty distance. 

We pulled into the rest stop for the Navajo Bridge, which crosses the Colorado River where it passes through Marble Canyon. Before the bridge was opened to traffic in 1929, the only way to cross the Colorado in that area was via Lee's Ferry.

I'm a fan of strange signs. This one, if you have trouble making it out, explains that there will be "no jumping from bridge." It's over 460 feet to the canyon floor, by the way. However, when I googled Navajo Bridge I noticed some entries about bungee jumping (you can imagine the language you'll hear if you click the link and view the video). There's just no accounting for the actions of folks way more adventurous than I am. 

After leaving the bridge, we continued on our long day's drive ending in Provo, Utah, where we had hotel reservations.

I'm putting in this last photo to remind us that we really shouldn't attempt such long driving days. That is one tired man, barely able to hold up that beer that night at supper. He managed to choke it down, though. 

Going on a Road Trip: Flagstaff, Arizona

A few weeks back, we took off for the Pacific Northwest on a road trip in search of rain. Along the way we stopped very briefly at an Arizona gift shop featuring petrified wood and other rocks and minerals. I liked this column in front of the building, which featured some of the rocks to be found within. 

Beez did a marvelous job of booking accommodations for the trip. First stop, downtown Flagstaff's Weatherford Hotel, which dates back to 1897. The halls were long, a little dark, and appropriately creaky. 

Our room contained Victorian furniture and a woodstove for colder seasons, but my favorite part...

... was the bathroom, claw-foot tub and all.  You can see more photos on the hotel's photo page, where the second photo shows a wider shot of "our" room.

The little mountain town was lively at night, with street musicians and bands playing in alleys and on restaurant patios, and people cheerfully dancing most everywhere. This is a shot taken just at dawn, when all the partygoers were still asleep and we were ready to hit the road once more.