Road Trip: Southwest

Day 12: Saturday, May 03, 2025 - Sante Fe, NM

Day's statistics:
Weather: mid 70s
Steps: Steve 8,829; Linda 7,078
Travel: 169 miles

The morning ritual is only mentioned when there is a bump in the road.
Today, the shower head was a little too low for my six-foot height. I had to bend over backward a little to get my head under it. Not the end of the world, but a little but of an inconvenience.

Breakfast was in the space off to the side of the lobby.
There was another couple eating there too.
Linda had a bagel with cream cheese, as did I, but I also had a yogurt.
We returned to the room, brushed, and headed out.
As we were loading the car, "Look, up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's ... a hot air balloon!"

Once again, today is a day we visit a National <mumble from the other room> oh, a day we are NOT visiting a National Park. Today is a day we visit a state capital instead. <mumble from the other room> OK... so we aren't doing that either. So what ARE we doing? <mumble from the other room> We're visiting a museum.
But first, we had to get there. And we had 10:30 tickets that were part of the Bank of America® Museums on Us® program.
We arose a half-hour earlier than normal just to make sure we could eat and then make the two and a half hour drive with some room to spare. Along the way, we saw some interesting sights.




After about a half an hour, at one point we found ourselves back in New Mexico.

And then saw more sights, driving more than two hours further.










A mile after this sign we actually saw the entry arch to the Ghost Ranch (but didn't get a picture of it). While we didn't know it at the time, it is a rather famous ranch. Even some of the movie Cowboys and Aliens was filmed there. Georgia O'Keeffe also spent a good amount of time there, even painting it.
It would have taken a fair amount of additional planning to actually have stopped there, primarily because of the timed Georgia O'Keeffe Museum tickets.

But we soldiered on.






As we got closer to the capital, the houses looked more... shall we say "local". As if they were adobes or constructed out of clay rather than wood. Though it may not be very evident from the highway, below grade, and at speed.

We finally crossed into the city limits.

In and near the capital the retaining walls and bridges were artsy.

The Google® machine pointed us to the museum. And we were now in the city, and apparently in the art district.

But there was no parking in the immediate vacinity.
Plus there was some localized construction. We eventually found a spot a couple blocks away across from the First Presbyterianb Church and Preschool (I acctually took this picture as a marker for where we parked, not for architectural purposes - else it would have been a better picture), shoveled a half dozen quarters into the meter, and headed to the museum.

Down a couple blocks, and over one, and we were there.


We checked in and acquired our tickets. And then the tour began. Admittedly, I am not specifically a fan of O'Keeffe (and I HAVE heard of her), though Linda is. But I do know decent art when I see it.
It was a smaller museum. MOST of the pieces have titles and descriptions. Most.


















We pretty much walked through the museum to the right (as we do in most museums). The advantage to this is that it assures everything is viewed. The disadvantage is that we got to the end where there were some personal artifacts that would have "wrapped up our tour", but we had to do everything on the left on the way out.
So in addition to numerous works, we saw the personal artifacts that even included a couple recipes.






Then we headed back toward the entrance / exit and saw more works.

As we got on the road early, had already driven for more than two hours today, and were dragging our wagons a little, we decided to pay the local Starbucks® a visit. We found one in the app that said it had seating so we could sip and surf for a bit. But when we got there, the seating? Not so much.
Admittedly, this location was constructed in keeping with the adobe theme.

So we then decided to just skip the coffee and go to lunch.

Today's lunch was at Subway®. We just didn't feel like trying to find anything else for some reason, even though we had a few options pre-selected like we do for most cities we visit.
We shared the Foot Long of the Day, Cheddar Sun Chips®, and water.
The employee was working alone. He did a good job, but I could tell he was tired.
Across the parking lot we saw this store, though the zoom on it wasn't quite as clear as I thought it was going to be, otherwise we would have just driven over there to get a better picture.

Two of the last three days we visited two national parks in one day. While we weren't visiting two NPs today, we WERE visiting two museums.
After lunch we drove over to the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture.
We found a spot, walked across the lot, up a couple short flights of stairs, and found ourselves in the plaza with a number of buildings, including a restaurant, and some sculptures in various locations and gardens.











We finally headed inside.
There were a number of different rooms with various items, some of it themed.
Also, the placards described the artists (they were award winning and or apprentices and or new budding artists).














This work was on a decent-sized wall segment that had another wall in front of this one which made taking a good picture challenging.

Continuing on.
























On the way to the car, we saw another sculpture that we didn't see on the way in.

It was late Saturday afternoon, and time for Mass.
We preselected The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, punched it into the GPS, and headed over.
The parking was scarce, but we found a large lot and after telling the attendant we were there for Mass, she told us to park in any spot except for the ones marked "Staff". We did, and started our walk. However, we weren't going straight to the basilica, but first were stopping by to see the suspended staircase at the Loretto Chapel Museum.




Upon arrival, we found that there was a charge to go inside. We didn't need to see a staircase that badly, so we decided to not bother, though in hindsight, perhaps one of us could have gone inside to take a picture...
As we approached the basilica from the side, we headed to a small garden area.



And then we made our way to the front.





We went inside and awaited Mass to start. I didn't take any pictures before Mass because I wasn't comfortable, so I just waited until it was over - which also helped as there were probably fewer people milling about too.
One interesting aspect of this service was that half of it was in Spanish.





















We stayed in the church for so long - with my picture taking and Linda's talking to other parishioners - that they were locking up and we could no longer leave out the front, but had to go out a side entrance. It was a little closer to the car, which was good, but it was just starting to rain when we were making our way to the car.

The hotel was merely about fifteen minutes away.
As lunch was on the lighter side, we didn't want too much. So we decided to hit up a Trader Joe's® - which just so happened to be in the plaza / strip mall where the Subway® was where we ate lunch.
We picked up a couple of salads - a Greek salad, and a as we still had some wine and cookies left over.

We finished the short drive to the hotel, Coyote South, and I checked in.
Then we made our way to the room that certainly had a southwest theme to it.



We got situated and enjoyed our light dinner.

We needed ice. For something.
I grabbed the ice bucket and room key, and headed out on a quest to find ice.
I went down the hall near the stairs - no. I went downstairs to the lobby area - no. While downstairs I went near the stairs - no. Hmm. I headed back to the room. Somehow I spied a small sign on the wall that said "Ice machine in the lobby". Oh, OK, I guess I missed it.
Upon returning to the lobby, I didn't see the ice machine. There was a guy sitting in the lobby reading. I said "Excuse me, did you happen to see or know where the ice machine is?" He looked around "No, sorry."
The clerk was away from the desk, but I waited a couple minutes and then he appeared.
"Can I help you?" "Yes, where's the ice machine?" "It's over there." pointing to the room to my left next to the check-in counter - that was locked when he wasn't here. No wonder I didn't see the machine.
I filled up the bucket, and went back to the room.

After relaxed a bit, watching some TV, and washing up, we went to bed.

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