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Published: October 16th 2010
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We got up this morning at about 6.45 to watch sunrise over the mittens. Sat on our balcony drinking coffee watching the beautiful sight! Got showered and changed and headed across for buffet breakfast - for once we didn’t pig out too much....but I did make the mistake of helping myself to coffee and juice when it was table service...oops. We walked around the gift shop and info centre before checking out of the hotel. First destination was Goosenecks State Park, Utah about 45 minutes from where we were staying. The drive there was nice as got nice views of monument valley in the background, so took a few photos out the window. Goosenecks was pretty cool, although not as good as some of the photos I’d seen. The geology and formation of the river and rocks is really amazing - just a pity the water wasn’t higher and bluer! Only stayed a few minutes to get some photos, before heading to 4 corners - where 4 states meet - Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona. The drive there was nice, we passed Valley of the Gods National Park which looked really amazing, but we just didn’t have time -couldn’t really
stop to get a photo either. Four corners is part of the Navajo reservation, and there was not much there other than the monument and lots of stalls featuring Native American art. Got some photos of the monument so we were standing in 4 states at once and then bought some things from the stalls.
From here we began our journey to Roswell, which was about 750km. We weren’t sure whether we would make Roswell or not but we thought we’d see where we ended up. We passed some amazing scenery in Utah, Arizona and the beginnings of New Mexico - lots of rocks and canyons and cool looking scenery. The other thing we passed lots of was Navajo houses - called Hogans. They build the houses with doors facing to the East where the sun rises and octagonal, as they believe that evil spirits live in the shadows and in square houses shadows lurk in the corners. However, in an octagonal house when the sun rises in the morning and fills the house with light, all the shadows disappear along with the evil spirits. There were heaps of the houses that we saw today. The other interesting town we
saw along the way in Arizona was Red Mesa. It is a really small town in the middle of nothing. Suddenly after driving along looking at scenery to the left of the car was a block of houses that looked like long campers all in a row. Then another 100m up the road there was a high school with the kids all riding horses, then another 200m up the road there was a pretty new looking medical centre and another block of houses, but this time very modern looking 2 story houses that all looked identical. It was a really strange town. Then just as quickly as it appeared -went back to nice landscapes.
The drive from Shiprock New Mexico (where we filled up with fuel), was pretty uneventful however we did experience a fair bit of roadworks. Scott drove for a few hours, then I took over. We seemed to be looking at long straight roads for a long time but had nice views out the window. We were also able to drive at 75mph for most of the time which is about 120kph - that was until we got off the I-40 and onto the road into Roswell.
For 2 ½ hours we looked out at the window at flat grass either side of the car and no scenery to look at...soooooo boring. We decided that we would stay at Roswell as there was not much before it - just 2 towns Encino and Vaughn that really resembled ghost towns, lot of businesses shut down and vandalised and lots of empty houses. A weird thing happened on the way in to Roswell though, Scott had the lights on the dashboard go off for no reason and we kept seeing something flying around in the air that we couldn’t figure out if it was a plane or what.....so we decided for sure UFO!!! Got into the Main Street just after 7.30pm and checked into a Best Western, I’m sure we could have found cheaper somewhere else but had been on the road since 9am and wanted some dinner. After checking in headed across the road to Denny’s, where I got a Veggie burger and Scott got fried chicken strips. My burger was pretty good and Scott really enjoyed his strips. The only downside was that we really felt like a beer and they don’t serve alcohol!! Ah well. Just
settled in now for some free WiFi before going to bed. Tomorrow we get out some UFO stuff in Roswell.
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Mum
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UFO's
The lights going out, strange flying things in the sky? You didn't hang on to a few of those super size margaritas did you? Luv the photo titles, rock, road ahead, rock, road ahead. Very original!!! Luv ya Mum