The Ferret

We're on a DC-9 to Dallas

Sunday morning in Albuquerque, our last in the sunny South West before our return flight via Dallas to Detroit and then our drive home to London on the 401. It will be good to be home again.

Click on the image for a photo album.

Kate and Reg are up early and walked to a nearby Pancake House to get some coffee. They find it's not open — a Pancake House! not open! on Sunday morning! New Mexico seems quite paradoxical in it's attitudes towards restaurant hours, alcohol service and many other things. They have drive through liquor stores where you can buy a liquor miniature and a glass of ice (for your sore ankle) without ever leaving the car, but you can't buy liquor on Sundays and you can't get breakfast on a Sunday at a Pancake House! The downtown stores all closed at 5:00, even Friday night. What is going on? Kate blames most of it on the proximity of Utah and the "Morgans" (that's what Kate and Reg like to call the Mormons/LDS). Alcohol, coffee and God don't mix.

Since there is no coffee available nearby we start driving towards the airport by way of the University of New Mexico area. Here we find a 24-hour place that is open. We park the car but before we reach the restaurant we are stopped by some street people hawking a newspaper the homeless have put out. The woman asks for some money to feed her pet ferret that she seems to keep up her sleeve — quite spooky.

The restaurant is really hopping; lots of people and activity. Reg is quite fascinated by an armed guard/policeman and a woman wearing extremely tight pants and an uplift bra who are emptying the cash from a video rental machine. I guess he's her guard; they fear the homeless might rob her. The cop is also reading a wanted poster and seems to be scanning the crowd for suspects. Luckily that kind of wanted folk are found to be wanting today.

After Reg has his breakfast and the girls have their coffee we continue driving towards the airport and find a proper coffee house along the way that advertises espresso! This coffee shop is next door to a woman's feminist bookstore. We're excited; finally an alternative to the "brown water" they call coffee in this part of the world.  Here we all order espressos to jolt us awake. It's great to have some real coffee, although Cindy finds hers too strong.

We find our way to the Alamo car return and within minutes are whisked to the airport in a shuttle bus. The driver keeps up a non-stop conversation with us (we're the only passengers) about the weather. Apparently he gets up at 4:00a.m. everyday and watches the Weather Channel so he can have these conversations and then verify the forecast. "Today in Albuquerque it's going to be sunny and warm." Check! But isn't it always?

Reg has a window seat for the flight to Dallas but there's nothing much to see. There was thick cloud cover most of the way. But there's a final note from him in the diary: "As I write this I discover we're on a DC-9 from Albuquerque to Dallas. We'll see Dallas from a DC-9 although not at night." His homage to the Flatlanders.

From Dallas it's another flight to Detroit where we pick up Cindy's car and head home to Canada. It's been quite an adventure: Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico from April 24 through to today May 3. Over 1,000 miles travelled with lots of scenic country and lots of stories to tell.

These notes, originally composed by Kate, Cindy and Reg at the time of the trip, were transcribed '21/07/08 with the help of Google voice recognition.

Albuquerque

After dinner liquers, Maria Teresa Bar, Albuquerque

On our last night in Santa Fe, in the "baby rooms" at the St Francis Hotel where we are staying, Reg pays ... at about 4:00 a.m. he is awake with a terrible allergy attack. His nose is completely full, stuffy as all get out and he cannot sleep. He spends the rest of the morning in their bathroom sniffling, sneezing, reading and waiting for the antihistamines to take effect. This allergy attack may be related to crawling home last night.  As they say, "I wish the hard life weren't so easy for me." Kate is left to catch some much-needed shut-eye.

Click on the image for a photo album.

They're doing a photo shoot this morning on the veranda of the St Francis Hotel. A photographer, with an assistant and two models, is trying to capture the European look. The model reads a paper in the morning light with a continental breakfast — an espresso with some croissants. This looks like fun work but they are up awfully early. I find them busy at 7:30 and they're not done until about 8:30, I don't know how long they've been at it. I assume they're trying to catch the "golden hour" early in the day when the sun is just right (the gold reflector migh help too).

There's also a row of about five polished and chromed Harley-Davidson motorcycles parked in front. I asked the photographer if they were part of the shoot but apparently they're only guests at the hotel.

We say goodbye to the Saint Francis Hotel and historic old town Santa Fe and head south to Albuquerque (what a spelling nightmare that word is). Albuquerque is about 60 miles south. The city is on the Rio Grande and it is large with about 700,000 people. It's sprawls with a tallish downtown — banks, hotels and the convention center. There is an old main street with angle parking as in most small towns out west. This main street is the old route 66 which we had drove on before in Arizona. The street, Central Ave, has bordered up stores, seedy bars and pawn shops. It's not very inviting.

We head to the "Old Town" — a tourist trap with a treed plaza, old adobe church, and verandas in front of each shop. This is the old city for sure and reminds us of the town squares in Taos and Santa Fe.

We're looking for a motel that's a bit cheaper than the Sheraton at Old Town (yes we checked) and find one rated by the AAA on old route 66. It's the Monterey Motel ("simple lodging with an outdoor pool") on Central Ave SW. There's tons of mom and pop motels along that street and some are really ratty, like $10 a night, but this one is nice enough for all of us. We cannot check in until 2:00 and Reg is asleep on his feet with his allergy problems.

Kate and Cindy ask the motel clerk, a woman with a kid that looks all of 14, for a mall to shop. Kate is getting worried having not found any throws for our couches back home. The mall she sends us to is much nicer than the one we found in Santa Fe.

In the mall the girls shop and Reg is left alone. He finds a DOA (Canadian Punk) CD in the only record store; it's quite a poor record store but they do have DOA. We can't find the artist that Pat has sent us searching for. But we did buy a couple of car tapes during our trip. We have a "Best of Kris Kristofferson", an audio book "Skin Walker" by Tony Kellerman we got in Canyon du Chelly (the story is set in the reservation), and finally a Jeff Walker "Best of" for our drive to Albuquerque from Santa Fe. This hasn't been a trip for music — unlike our Austin adventures. We read the Santa Fe has a vital music scene but no venues and no one supports it. Huh? Apparently, Albuquerque has a better music scene and more clubs but we're not there long enough to investigate. The DOA CD suggests that the music scene here may be more hard care than country and folk.

Kate and Cindy find some throws at a department store called "May D&F" (aka May-Daniels & Fisher). This department store is a very small chain with a store in Denver and this one in Albuquerque; there's only the two. It's a big Eaton's kind of department store with lots of nice things on many floors. I guess it's what they call an "anchor" store for the mall. It turns out they don't accept any charge cards other than their own. So, what to do? The clerk suggests that we open a charge account with them and notes that you get an additional 10% off your first purchase if you do. This is just too weird but is in fact what we do! The throws are 30% off in the first place and here's a bit more off that. Kate and Cindy also decide to take advantage of the first time 10% off deal and buy "Superpercale" sheets which are already at 50% off. Kate is surprised to find the pillow cases cost as much as each sheet. We, of course, settle the bill when it arrives later back home in Canada.

Finally Reg is tired and on his knees. Kate is happy because she has the throws and a quilt and matching pillow sham for her parents 50th anniversary. So we head back to the Monterey Motel to check in. Kate and Reg get an enormous room with two queen size beds and Cindy gets a pretty big one with one bed and a mirrored headboard — there are just too many strategically placed mirrors in her bedroom. Cindy is sure this must be a "hot pillow" joint. Although it seems respectable enough and is own and managed by the "Bugg" family. No bug references please.

Reg takes a nap to try to kick the allergy and Chardonnay blues while Kate and Cindy head over to the shopping plaza/square in the old historical town. The walk is several blocks and the weather feels the hottest we've experienced so far. They decide the first thing they'll do upon arriving at the plaza is find a place for a drink (alcoholic that is). This is easier said than done — most restaurant type places don't seem to be open. They finally find one that's open, walk onto the outside veranda and are told that alcohol can't be drank outside. Inside they find that in order to have a drink, food must be purchased. The waiter, who hails from Washington State, agrees it's weird but it's the law. Apparently, alcohol can't be served within 300 ft of a church in New Mexico without food in case people go all crazy and disturb the either the church or the church goers.  And of course there's a big old adobe Catholic church, the San Felipe de Neri Church, at the one end of the square. However, the force feeding turns out to be okay — they have nachos that are done differently than at home. They are really good.

After lunch the girls explore the plaza stopping at nearly every store picking up a few souvenirs here and there. At 4:00pm Reg shows up having had his much needed nap. There's some more shopping and soon enough it's time to find a restaurant for dinner.

Two blocks from the plaza we find a restaurant called Maria Teresa housed in a huge old Spanish hacienda dating from the 1840's. At one time grapevines grew around the house and all the rooms opened onto a central patio. There have been several renovations in history of the house and the grape vines are no longer in evidence nor do all the rooms open onto the patio. In any case, it's a very interesting place with quite a remarkable women's restroom -— all tiled with an analyst style couch in case of the vapors. 

A note about restrooms in Arizona and New Mexico. A few have been lovely —- the Inn of the Anasazi in Santa Fe and this one with bright tiles and every amenity. Others have been quite awful or just plain wretched — high toilet seats, low toilet seats, two toilets, no doors, doors that won't let two people in and doors that require the toilet seat be lifted to open. Such is life on the road.

Our waitress at Maria Teresa is an interesting old cow, but the food is only fair. The first part of our meal is disrupted by a family with two little kids who are busy screaming away. Things become more interesting when the family leave and two young couples in formal attire arrive for dinner — they're dressed to the nines for a high school graduation/prom. Or perhaps it's for Cinco de Mayo? Or perhaps a debutante's ball? Who knows!

After dinner we retire to the bar for a liqueur. The bar is very old with mirrors and ornate carved wood. Kate has a Spanish coffee, after grilling the rather smart mouth bartender about how she will make it. [You will recall this is the south west where coffee is barely brown water.] Reg has a Drambuie, and Cindy has a sherry. The room with the bar is too smoky for us so we retired to the second lounge which features this six or seven seat judge's bench in red leather. The bartender tells us that Cinco de Mayo is the May festival celebrating the birth of the Holy Mother Mary and all that kind of Catholic stuff. Later Kate and Reg see something about it on TV where the reference seems to be about Pancho Villa (the Mexican revolutionary). It's one of life's mysteries. 

"Cinco de Mayo (pronounced [ˈsiŋko̞ ðe̞ ˈma̠ʝo̞] in Mexico, Spanish for "Fifth of May") is an annual celebration held on May 5, which commemorates the anniversary of Mexico's victory over the French Empire at the Battle of Puebla in 1862". Wikipedia 2021

On the way out of the restaurant at about 7:30 we hear that without a reservation people need to wait 1 hour to be seated! Seems there mustn't be much good food in Albuquerque if that's the case. We see several more well dressed young couples arriving with their reservations. The girls seem to favor a deep blue for their dresses. The boys are in tuxedos. We hope they enjoy their dinners.

The walk back to the hotel through a residential area is interesting. People all seem to be Catholic — lots of BVM's (Blessed Virgin Mary), etc. Some houses are immaculately kept with well landscaped yards, while others are quite neglected. It's a mixed neighborhood.

We're to bed at the Monterey Motel in decent time. This is our last night on this adventure through Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico. Tomorrow we fly home via Dallas and Detroit.

These notes, originally composed by Kate, Cindy and Reg at the time of the trip, were transcribed '21/07/07 with the help of Google voice recognition.

Taos

Taos Pueblo, NM

This was our day to see the famous Taos "art community". Taos is a small town about 70 miles north of Santa Fe in the upper reaches of the Rio Grande river. It's supposed to be a really neat place according to our friend Rae although later, after we had been there, we've come to doubt that she had ever been there herself. The other reason for going was to see the Taos Pueblo.

Click on the image for a photo album.

The scenery was quite lovely on the way up; we are following the Rio Grande River for part of the way. There are magical mountains on the way, the "Land of enchantment", and winding mountain roads that cars take at high speeds — even passing we slow tourists on solid line curves. On the way we passed several wineries and on the way back we stopped in one for a tasting. The one we stopped at had awful wine but a great gift store.

Taos is a mountain town and as you arrive looks much like the small towns in the mountains of BC. However, the tourist area in the old town, with lots of adobe, is arranged around a square, a plaza, as in Santa Fe and Albuquerque. We parked in a lot adjacent to the plaza for $3 rather than driving into the plaza and parking for 25 cents. Oh well! The traffic was bumper to bumper in the square the whole time we were there. It's a busy town but most of the traffic seemed to be beat up pickup trucks.

Although we expected Toas to have some high class tourist shops, in fact most of the shops, especially in the plaza area, were more on the order of Niagara Falls tacky. We did manage to find a few interesting stores, one with expensive but interesting hippie clothes, and another with very nice pottery. We also toured the nearby Kit Carson cemetery and saw where the sainted explorer, or nasty murderer depending on who you believe, was buried.

"During the late nineteenth century, Kit Carson became a legendary symbol of America's frontier experience, which influenced twentieth century erection of statues and monuments, public events and celebrations, imagery by Hollywood, and the naming of geographical places. In recent years, Kit Carson has also become a symbol of the American nation's mistreatment of its indigenous peoples." Wikipedia 2021.

On the way to Taos we saw signs for several Indian pueblos — these are communities with buildings of mud adobe that Reg was expecting to see in Canyon du Chelly. The ones in Canyon du Chelly are mud and stone built by the ancient Anasazi not the current active adobe pueblo communities built by the Pueblo indians. Each of these Pueblos seems to have bingo and "pull tabs" — they advertise on the roadside. The latter are, we believe, some kind of number game. Kate is not at all keen to visit a pueblo, Cindy is indifferent, and Reg is really keen. Our plan therefore is for Reg to visit the Taos Pueblo a few miles to the north of the town while Kate and Cindy shop. But we shop together for a while to get a feel for the town and so Reg can buy some souvenirs for his workmates and shoot some photos of the town. It turns out the shopping is enough and we all head out for the Taos Pueblo.

The Taos Pueblo is built along a swift-flowing tributary of the Rio Grande. The creek is the water source for the village. The village has been occupied for over 1,000 years making it one of the older towns in the United States. On each side of the creek is an open space, quite large and quite dusty. Behind the open space, on each side, is a rambling three story Pueblo community built of red clay and straw. These aren't the permanent concrete and stucco erzatz adobe of the city. Santa Fe has all that adobe in the historic center on purpose — it's a tourist draw and a local building requirement. Likewise for Taos and Albuquerque. On the other hand, here there's a crew of fellows who are reworking the adobe on some homes with fresh clay and mud. You can see fresh adobe and other areas where the adobe is quite worn away by the rain. Maintaining the Pueblo must be a full-time job!

It costs us $5 to enter the Pueblo and park our car along the creek. In addition Reg pays $5 to use his camera; Kate and Cindy decide to rely on his photos and postcards. There is a guided tour of about half an hour but we decline that as well and just wander about unattended. However, our first job is to find a loo. We approach that a idea with some trepidation for the Pueblo is quite dusty and dirty. And, within the Pueblo there's no running water or electricity! Fortunately there's a tourist restroom at the entrance that's clean and bright.

Kate and Cindy decide to explore some craft shops and Reg explorers things on his own. The shops are in public buildings and are, in general, cool and tidy with the usual Indian crafts (silver, pottery, jewelry, etc.). We see a nice T-shirt, "Custer's Last Shirt"; it is covered in arrows. Some shops have gas lights but skylights are more common and make things very bright inside. Interiors are whitewashed, floors are usually covered but I'm sure it's packed earth underneath.

Several stray dogs wander the plaza at the creek mooching food. We meet one mutt who is paralyzed in his back legs, very skinny, but it manages to shuffle about dragging its hind quarters along! Really pitiful. He must have had a run in with a car some time ago. Unfortunately, he survived. Kate and Cindy feed the fellow some pretzels and have nightmare dreams for days about him — what should we do? Reg thinks he ought to have been put down and out of his misery.

The Pueblo is supposed to have some 1,500 permanent residence and is certainly big enough for that. Kate and Cindy were talking to a native who tells them that most people live outside the Pueblo — especially since the arrival of electricity which isn't allowed within the village. Those who live outside return to their homes within during the summer for special occasions, e.g. religious ceremonies, dances, etc. .... and to sell trinkets to tourists like us.

On the way back we saw some white water rafting on the Rio Grande between Taos and Santa Fe. The river is pretty wild in spots. We stopped to take some photos and Reg caught an upset where two were dumped into the river. One they pulled back into the raft very quickly. The other made it safely to shore. We ask ourselves, "Is this really fun?"

Back at Santa Fe we decide to try out the restaurant in our hotel. We are plesantly surprised and glad to discover that the hotel has an enclosed patio out back with trees, a fountain, running water, umbrella tables and lots of birds. The finches are especially noisy — they're busy with spring mating. These are small sparrow sized birds that are brown in color with reddish heads. Is this what we call a "house finch" back home? The restaurant has a gateway on Water St but I think the main entrance is through the hotel. It's aptly called "On Water". 

We have an excellent dinner — not as exotic as at the other places but probably the best in a while. There are so many good restaurants in town. Kate and Cindy have sworn off the chardonnay but Reg orders a glass and lets them have a sip. They change their minds and a bottle is ordered. The girls are pretty moderate.

After dinner we wander the narrow side streets for a while and find a club several blocks from the square but within easy crawling distance of our hotel. It's done up as an English pub but Reg avoids the fancy imported beers and sticks to the Budweiser on tap. Kate and Cindy are "on the wagon" but Kate has a few sips of a glass of wine (the restaurant only serves beer and wine). We have to buy some chips and salsa with our drinks — this is an old practice we had in Ontario years ago. It must be due to licensing requirements for "restaurants".

We're about the first to arrive at around 9:00 and take a table near the front. We engage the singer in conversation. He's a lanky cowpoke kind of character named Jerry Ferris. He's originally from Brownsville Texas and moved here in 1963. One reason we get to know him so well, apart from the fact that we're the only ones there, is the beers we buy him.

Jerry is quite a good singer and sings his own songs. Kate says it wouldn't be a good idea to make any Guy Clark request. At the break, this is a literal break in that the sound system quit, he comes to our table, we buy him another beer, and we find out most of his life story. He knows people we like.

"Jeepster" — that's what he calls Gary P Nunn. Kate thinks it's a derivation of Gary P, to GP, to Jeep, and then Jeepster. That makes a lot of sense but at this point we have no data or any other theories. We asked Jerry about the extreme weather in Santa Fe. Is it anything like Canyon du Chelly where they get cold winters?  We've seen a lovely frame photo in our hotel of the plaza covered in snow so we're curious. We're told that the summer seldom gets over 100°! Say Jerry, that may not be as hot in Brownsville but it certainly is hot enough for us!

Reg stumbles back to the hotel with the assistance of Kate and Cindy. It's within crawling distance and it's our last night in Santa Fe. He pays for it later that night ...

These notes, originally composed by Kate, Cindy and Reg at the time of the trip, were transcribed '21/07/07 with the help of Google voice recognition.