Blogs from Gallup, New Mexico, United States, North America

RV Travels Gallop to Gallup - If you love Native American Art Leaving Flagstaff, happily coming down off mountains at last, we head across 40 East and detour North on 87 (You know we don’t like the roads most traveled). In this case, we should have stayed on 40. The journey through the Navajo Nation Reservation consists of bad roads after bad roads and more desert to look at. I know all the dishes in the cabinets and goods in the pantry will tumble out on my head if I forget to open doors carefully. However, we made a very interesting stop at the Hubbell Trading Post in Ganado. It is the oldest continuous operating trading post in the west. Beginning in 1876 Juan Hubbell traded in Navajo country and his story of settlement of the ... read more

Hi Everybody! We are ready and rarin' to go. All our possessions are in storage, cars are sold, backpacks packed and ready. We leave Farmington on Sunday and leave the country on Tuesday. We will post some cool pics and a new entry from Capetown next week. Next week! Holy Cow, I can't believe it's here already. I'm excited and scared, packing up and going off to have an adventure is easier said than done. I guess that's why most people only dream about it instead of really doing it. It's exciting stuff. I'll "talk" to you all soon. Carolyn ... read more

All this area is pretty spectacular, known as the 4 Corners…Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. I mean where else can you have your body in 4 different States at one time. Throughout this area we pretty much camped the whole time which I thought was pretty good going considering the temperatures got down as low as 26F…we used all 4 sleeping bags and were glad that we decided to invest in an airbed. There were mornings when we woke to frozen bottles of water left on the table. Chaco Canyon - was a major center of Puebloan culture between AD 850 and 1250. The Chacoan sites are part of the homeland of Pueblo Indian peoples of New Mexico, the Hopi Indians of Arizona, and the Navajo Indians of the Southwest. Driving toward Monument Valley we ... read more

On our way home, we took a short side trip tp Acoma Pueblo, Sky City as it's also called, or Ak'u in the Keresan Language of the people who have made their home there for over 1000 years. Acoma sits upon a 350 foot rock mesa with sheer sides. It is the oldest continually inhabited town in North America. It's people migrated from the north in the distant past and called it Haak'u or Ak'u, the place prepared, as they believe that it was there, prepared and waiting for them. When we arrived at Acoma, we made aquaintence with a local artist/activist who informed us of all this. He introduced us to the saying : Ammu Han'u, Aamuu Haatsi. Beloved Land, Beloved People. This reflects the worldview of the Aku'me, people of Acoma. The inseparable connection ... read more

Sunday the 11th, the group arose bound and determined to make more than 200 miles, and were airborne at a record-early 9 am local from Santa Fe. This time the headwind finally abated and the turbulence was fairly mild. We made better time under less demanding conditions than probably any time since departing GAI, and certainly much better than the previous two days. We overflew the high desert in Canyonlands territory, with Geoff offering muttered curses for the poor visibility for photography that the elderly windows of 624 could offer him and his ten pounds of cameras and film. The group sent out a "safe arrival" ping from the SPOT transmitter in Gallup NM at 1:05 EDT -- halfway between Albequerque and Flagstaff on the AZ-NM border, close to Four Corners, and a mainstay of the ... read more