Along the Santa Fe Trail

Our route today is to go to Santa Fe, we will take the old Route 66 to Santa Fe, and join the Santa Fe Trail, hence the song title of today's post - Along the Santa Fe Trail.

Starting on the I40 we will turn onto the US84. While from the late 30s on Route 66 went direct to Albuquerque following the current I40; it originally ran on what is now the US84 up to Santa Fe and then down the I25 route to Albuquerque, so for our last piece of Route 66 we are taking a route that looks like this:

Breakfast

I woke up at 4.00 am, as we will again be changing time zone today, this will feel like 3.00 am by this evening’s time.

I completed the blog of our first real Route 66 day and posted it. I then completed the photo upload to Flickr, so, apart from last night’s dinner, all the photos are up-to-date.

I made Drew his morning coffee at 6.30 and he got up at 7.30. Following our ablutions we went to breakfast at 8.15, both of had sausage patties and biscuits (the eggs were still cooking) and then Drew had his treats: these were three Danish, on with apple and cinnamon and with vanilla and the third with strawberry and chocolate – he enjoyed.

We left the hotel at 8.55 and and drove 1/4 mile to a Shell filing station. The petrol was slightly dearer than in Oklahoma; higher taxes here, at $2.569 compared to $2.339 in Oklahoma.

On the way to New Mexico

We left the petrol station at 9 and headed to another Route 66 favourite; Cadillac Ranch. An odd, but oddly impressive site. Drew snapped plenty of shots, two are here, but the rest are on Flickr.

We carried on the I40 and at 10.24 came to the New Mexico Stateline, our 12^th state of the holiday. As New Mexico is on Mountain Time the clocks went back to 9.24 am.

New Mexico

We crossed the state line at Glenrio and 40 miles later decided to stop for a coffee at Tumucari, famous in its day for a large Tumucari Tonight campaign to get visitors to stop here on their Route 66 adventure. At Tumucari, there was a roadside McDonald's where we both had coffee. The McDonald's was unusual, not only was it's carpark the site of the local Greyhound Bus service (Greyhound is a long distance bus company), but inside it had this most amazing mural depicting Tucumari and New Mexico life through the perspective of Ronald McDonald:

  

After Tumucari we carried on the I40 and a few times on this route we crossed the Pecos River, this river flows from high in New Mexico through Texas and down to the Rio Grande and into the sea. During our 2002 visit Drew and I followed the river through rugged Texan countryside from Ozona to the town of Pecos, TX and it provided us with one of the best memories of that holiday because of the landscape and the absence of petrol stations for long periods, enough to start us worrying. So as we saw this Pecos we remembered that day 13 years ago - More of Pecos later. 

As outlined in the map above we opted to travel up the US84 (the old, old Route 66) and did so by turning off the I40 at Junction 256. The US84 is a great road, only two lanes, i.e. one each way, but it runs through the most amazing mountain country that is truly picturesque.  

The route heads up towards Las Vegas, the Las Vegas formed here by the Spanish on their first exhibition North, indeed the Pecos River was their route for their great push to engage in the land now called New Mexico. The road runs through the Santa Fe Forest, which has high trees in rugged backgrounds, well worth seeing. This leads on to Pecos State Park, yes, back to Pecos, this, of course, is Pecos, NM and the park is a site of very ancient peoples who lived in this area 9,000 years ago. The river was as important for them as it was to become for later explorers including the Spanish and, after annexation, for the Americans on the Santa Fe Trail a key route between Missouri and New Mexico and the title of today's title song.

While the pictures on Flickr might do this some justice, the actual beauty is hard to capture except by being there and being surprised by each new vista.

We drove on and stopped for Lunch just outside Santa Fe, we stopped at a modern suburb area called Eldorado at Santa Fe and had lunch at the lovely La Plancha. A very welcoming place with a Spanish, though I guess Mexican air.

For lunch I opted for Stuffed Chili Poblano with rice, beans and salad, it was really excellent. Our first Mexican food this holiday, and where better to experience it than in New Mexico.

Drew opted for Loroco Omelette which was an omelette full of spinach, spring onions, mushrooms, tomotoes, loroco buds, cheese and chorizo with a red chilli poured over it. Drew really enjoyed it.

Shopping in Santa Fe

People who have read my holiday blogs over the years will know that since 2007 we have adopted the approach of returning from the US with more clothes than we take with us. This tradition started at a J C Penny's in Aurora, Oregon and has continued in my holidays here in 2011 and 2013. In each of these years I was able to find a state with no tax on clothes, making an additional saving. There was no such state on the route, or near it, this time. So with the help of Google and Wikipedia I discovered that New Mexico had the lowest tax on clothes (8.3% compared to an average of 14% in the others) so had planned a shopping trip for this afternoon.

As we arrived in Santa Fe we went straight to the store, arriving at 3.15. I am now two trousers, four shirts, 2 packs of underpants and 1 of socks better off than I was at the start of the day. Drew also has 2 new pairs of trousers, socks and underpants. 

We checked in to the hotel, the Comfort Inn, Santa Fe, at 4.30 and copied over the photos for later uploading.

Downtown Santa Fe

We left the hotel at 5, we had planned to get a Taxi to Downtown, to save trying to find parking, but Santa Fe doesn't have many taxis and the one company who does run cabs could not have one available before an hours time. So I drove to Downtown and managed to find parking opposite the Lensic Theatre. I mention the fact as we got discounted carpark tickets courtesy of the Lensic who had a concert on that night - Brahms and Mozart!

We walked around the town with Drew oohing and aahing at the amazing use of adobe in the building structures and the stucco use in various places, including the Lyric for example, to set it off.

We walked up to the Cathedral, where some street theatre was taking place. But as it was 6 pm now we didn't get to see inside.

Santa Fe has a very compact downtown with all the key things close together, so it was great to walk around. It was also great to see the Hotel St. Francis, where my sister, her husband and I stayed for two nights when we visited Santa Fe on our Route 66 holiday in 2000. I have great memories of those two days in this pleasant location. Indeed, while the whole of this area is new for Drew - from Springfield, IL to Santa Fe we have followed the same route that I did in 2000. Tomorrow we will move off that route.

We had hoped to eat at Cafe Pasqual, both because of its reviews, but also we liked how its menu read. However we didn't book and found we would not get a table until 9, way to late for us. 

We walked around town looking at various places and came across the Blue Corn Cafe, which strangely was one of the places, though the venue has changed, my sister and brother in law and I eat on our last visit. 

The food here was immense, both in quality and quantity, but we were up for it. We started, while reading the menu, with Queso and Chips, a lovely mix of standard corn chips as well as the eponymous blue chips.

For appetisers Drew opted for Tortilla Soup, a healthy chicken broth with vegetables and tortillas, and chillies, full of rich flavours. I had the Hot Wings and Blue Cheese Dip, imagine being two weeks in the US and not having chicken wings, I'm sure I've never left it this long before. They were great, very meaty and the hot sauce had my tongue singing, nicely cooled off by the blue cheese sauce.

For mains Drew opted for something called a New Mexican Shepherds Pie this was the ingredients you would expect from a Shepherd's pie but with green chilli sauce, topped with cheese and with tortilla chips added as decor. Drew's principle was that as he had red chilli at lunch time he should have green at dinner, and that worked well.

I opted for Carne Adovada (note the Mexican spelling it is Adobada in Spain). This was marinated pork with red chilli, salad, beans, rice and flour tortillas - a thoroughly rich and flavourful dish. I'd certainly have it again. It was richer in the warmth of chilli, than any version of it I'd eaten in Spain.

Full and content we headed back to the carpark and drove back to the hotel, getting there at 8.37, which in this timezone is already dark. My first drive this holiday in the dark, still US roads are so well lit it was not a problem.