Santa Fe is a beautiful little city. I used my first of only 2 days in the area just relaxing off the bike. After the drop the night before I just wanted to sit back and relax. I woke up late and lazed around. Life is good. On day 2, I rode up into Hyde Memorial Park in Santa Fe National Forest to watch the Aspens change. Hyde Park is a whole lot of sweepers and twisties with beautiful scenery.
Here I am with my invisible friend Sam:
Something that struck me while I was in New Mexico, was how clean the air was. Especially up on the mountain. Clean and thin. At 7000 feet, walking around an overlook and taking pictures was enough to have me breathing hard but still feeling great.
The next day I set out for nearby Las Vegas, NM. I realized that 2 days would not be enough time in the area, so rather than impose on my Santa Fe hosts, I scheduled a couple nights in Las Vegas. Las Vegas, New Mexico is a charming little town that was established in 1835 and is a pretty chill little place.
The whole reason I wanted to stay longer in the Area was to get up to Taos. Taos is an art town just north of Santa Fe, and has an approximately 1000 year old pueblo on the North side. I went with my host but we didn't get in to the pueblo because we left a little late, and we kept stopping along the way for pictures:
And that is totally ok. I don't regret not getting in to the pueblo. It would have been cool but we had a great drive up there. We walked around town for a bit, and then went back through the same windy and scenic mountain road we took up there. The moon was so bright that night up in the mountains we actually drove for a solid 2 minutes with the headlights shut off and could see perfectly. It's exhilarating, driving without your headlights at night. If there was anyone coming up the road we would have turned them on so they could see us and it really was bright enough that it wasn't dangerous; but it's just something that we as drivers don't do. It's a step out of the comfort zone and just a peek into recklessness. Seeing lightning out the side windows, we pulled over at an overlook and watched a thunderstorm for a little while over the valley. The perfect way to end the day.
And, dear reader, do you know what the perfect way to begin a day is? Soaking in a natural hot spring.
If it didn't start raining on us, I probably would have just stayed there all day and had to stay an extra night. After the hot springs, I packed up my stuff, picked up some Octane booster because my bike has expensive tastes and 90 Octane gasoline just isn't high enough to keep her from complaining, and headed out to Gallup, New Mexico.
Gallup is also a pretty cool place to visit. It might not have much going on, but it's along Route-66 and is right next to Red Rocks State Park. New Mexico is beautiful and the area surrounding Gallup is no exception.
Unfortunately, my hosts were busy all day at work, so I got in touch with another couchsurfer and we went hiking in Red Rocks Park. Red Rocks park is a great place to go hiking and has some mind blowing scenery. I wish my camera could properly capture it although the fact that it was overcast didn't help with the pictures.
My host suggested I head on over to El Rancho, so I did. It's an old hotel with a lot of character and I'd say if you're going to pay for lodging in Gallup, El Rancho is where you want to stay. Rooms start at $82.00/night which seems pretty good to me.
I had a great time in New Mexico. Right now I'm in Grand Junction, Colorado but I've stayed up so late typing this that I feel ill so I'll have to finish catching this blog up in a few days. I'm going to sleep.
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