Santa Fe Days

---

Well, I've gotten way behind on my reporting again, and it's all my fault. I can usually try to blame it on no connections, but that is not the case here in Santa Fe. The RV park where we are staying has OK wifi, and our cell signal is good. In my defense though, we have had busy days here, and after dinner I find myself struggling to keep my eyes open. So let me try to condense our goings-on of the last few days in one report.

We checked the rig carefully before we left Gila Hot Springs, as we knew we had a major climb and then descent before we would get back to civilization. What I didn't know, due to my poor knowledge of New Mexico geography, was that we would have another pass to go over before we could reach I-25. The Black Mountain Range stood in our way, and it turned out to be a whopper. The total climb of Emory Pass was about 5500' -- very impressive! After we got up and over that one, it was on to the interstate for the long drive up to Santa Fe. We stopped in Truth or Consequences, NM (yes, really!) to re-supply at the Walmart. As we pulled in, we were surprised to see sunshades over all the rows in the parking lot -- odd. When we got out and looked up at them, we realized they were actually photo-voltaic panels -- a Solar Walmart -- wow!

We arrived at Santa Fe about 5:00, and found a space at a nice RV park for 3 nights. This is the most expensive place we've stayed ($36/n) but it is convenient to the places we want to go, and it has all kinds of amenities too. We are situated on a rise of land just south of the city, the view here is lovely, day and night. We decided on a plan of action for our two full days here. Tomorrow, I would drop Cathy off in the old downtown area for a day of shopping and sightseeing, while I would then drive a bit north and east, into the mountains to fish on the last day of my 5 day license.

It dawned pretty cold that morning, which is to be expected, as we are over 7000' here. We made the short hop to downtown, and Cathy was released to ramble about. I headed back onto I-25 for a bit, then off onto NM Rt 50 to head into the Sangre De Cristo Mountains, and the headwaters of the Pecos River. Rt 50 was an unexpected pleasure, as it turned out to be a remnant bit of old US 66, the gloried "Mother Road" from Chicago to LA. After I reached the town of Pecos, I turned north and headed up into the high country. Like many of these sort of mountain roads, the farther it went, the narrower, steeper, and twistier it became. It got so narrow after a while that I pulled my mirrors in on the truck, I'm not sure it was wide enough for two cars to pass. These places are always full of surprises too, like the large and beautiful Benedictine Monastery that was found along the way. The road was in a canyon that held the Pecos River. It was funny to see it here, so different near it's beginning then at it's lower end, where we had been kayaking on it in Texas, just a couple of weeks ago. Along the river here I was seeing fishermen too, a good sign after having seen no one else fishing down on the Gila. I stopped a talked to a few of them, and while none had yet caught anything, their presents alone was hopeful.

So, a little farther along, I parked the truck, rigged up my rod, and had at it. I had just a wonderful few hours of wild stream fishing. A few hours completely unencumbered with the annoyance of dealing with actual fish. I did SEE a real beaut in one pool. He came to the surface slowly and rolled, briefly holding his huge pectoral fin aloft. It could have been my imagination, but it seemed that the center vein of that fin was held jutting out in a provocative manner.

I talked to quite a few other fellows who were fishing, and nobody was doing any business. They were mostly older Hispanic guys, and friendly as could be. One guy said that he had seen me coming down out of the forest, where I had walked well upstream from the road. He asked me if I had seen a bear up there, and I said no. He told me that he had started up there earlier, but had smelled a bear, so he came back down. Well, OK -- I have heard of "The Horse Whisperer" -- but "The Bear Smeller" is a new one on me. Another old gent I talked to asked me where I was from, so I told him "Northern NY". He said that I was lucky to be here, because he had seen on his "television tube" that we were getting terrible snow there. Such a funny phrase the way he said it, I had a hard time not laughing right out loud. So no fish, but believe me when I tell you that I was neither disappointment or surprised with that outcome. I had a great few hours of just concentrating on stream fishing. I made a few good casts, and a bunch of the other kind. It was a fine day.

After that I drove back down the road and into Santa Fe. We had made no arrangements on where to meet, just that I would call and we'd get together. I thought I would find a place to park first, and that was a problem. The streets of "Old Town" Santa Fe were not layed out with huge dually pickups in mind, and I soon found myself in a bit of a pickle. Again, the wide mirrors had to be pulled in, and in some places I could feel my rear tires rubbing on the curb as I squeezed through. Eventually though, we did meet up, and then went to the new railway plaza area for some refreshments at a brew pub -- nice. Cathy too had a fun day, she had finally bought herself a hat, did a bunch of walking, and visited the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum. After all that, it was back to Fred to plan for our next day -- skiing at Santa Fe Peak.

We were on our way back through town (on marginally wider streets) by 8:30 the next morning. The drive up to the lodge was short (less than 20 miles) but again, twisty and steep. We arrived in due course, parked and walked up to the lodge. Cathy got her stuff on (she had brought her own equipment) while I went to the rental shop to get fitted out. That took very little time, and we were ready to go. The chair from the base is a non-detachable quad, the like of which we had seen many times. This one though had a short "people mover" conveyor at the loading area that we had NOT seen before, and it took a little getting used to. Be that as it may, the lines were short, the snow was great, and a good time was had by all. I hadn't skied in maybe 5 years, but I pretty much remembered how it's done, and Cathy skied great.

It was sunny (of course) and warm, with a little breeze. It always amazes me how well western snow holds up in warm weather. Back home, with the temperature in the 50's, the snow would turn to slop in no time, but here it held up well into the afternoon. Only by about 2:30 did the "mashed potatoes" effect begin to take place. And even then, if you kept to the shadowed parts of the runs, most of the snow was fine. We were getting tired then anyway, so we skied down to the mid-station patio bar and had a beer. I expected only bottled beer to be available, but they had draft too -- excellent! Now get this -- I looked at their list, and they had SPATEN!! Oh, that lovely elixir, Nobelist of lagers, sent all the way from far Munich to tickle my pallet -- just imagine my joy. We were well ready to call it a day by that point, we had made many runs, and the altitude (10,000' at base, 12000' at summit) had taken the starch out of these low-landers.

It was another wonderful day, but tomorrow, we start heading back east. With the weather being what it is back home, we're in no hurry. Our plan is to duck the superslabs for as long as possible, and take secondary roads across North Texas. We plan to hit some of Cathy's old stomping grounds, including her old home town of Paris, Texas. I know, as in the old song, it's supposed to be "April in Paris" but for us, March will have to do.

---