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After Texas, we entered New Mexico. To my recollection, I had never been to New Mexico before so I was quite excited. I had visions of vast nothingness, filled with sand, millions of cacti and the odd American Indian. I was close, but it’s much more beautiful and interesting than that. We started off in the South East at a place called Carlsbad (not Carlsberg unfortunately). Carlsbad Caverns National Park covers 73sq miles and includes 100 underground caves – that’s all we knew before we got there. But, we all know from the Waitomo Caves blog (New Zealand) that I don’t like caves and I don’t like going underground, so the whole way there I was telling Kav that I wasn’t promising I would be able to do the caves but I would take a look and see. I was adamant I wouldn’t enjoy it or be able to do anything so had comes to terms with the fact that I would be spending the day in the car or in the visitor’s centre while Kav had all the fun. But, as usual, Kav rushed us in, bought 2 tickets and we were off to the cave mouth to do a 2 and a half hour walk down 800ft underground before I could even make a decision! We hadn’t even got to the cave mouth entrance when we were told that a group of noisy school kids were about to start the walk down and that we might be better off taking the elevator down, doing the loop walk down in the cavern and coming back later. We walked back to the visitor centre and got in line for the elevator to take us down 800 feet!! For those who need a relative distance, that’s as tall as the Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas or 2 and a half Big Ben’s – it’s a long way down. Your ears pop and it takes about 15 seconds to get all the way down. As you can imagine there were silent tears rolling down my quivering cheeks and the most dreadful visions going through my head. I was not in a happy place at all, but I was determined to at least try. The best thing was knowing there was an elevator right there and it would only take 15 seconds to get me to ground level again. Once at the bottom we stepped out and saw the most incredible sight ever. To describe it, it’s one mammoth chamber 1800 ft long and 255 ft high, with lots of big caves and ‘rooms’, and takes around an hour to walk around on a specially laid path. There are amazing stalactites hanging all around you, some bigger than you, numerous ‘lakes’ and even a ‘bottomless pit’ (proved not to be bottomless years after it was first discovered). We started walking and the further I got away from the elevator the more panicked I became, more tears fell and I wanted to turn back. Even though you don’t feel claustrophobic or trapped because it is so vast, my ‘worst scenario’ brain was imagining what would happen if it all caved in on us, if stalactites began to drop or if there was an earthquake etc etc. Kav had to keep reminding me that this cavern had been there for millions of years and hadn’t collapsed yet, so why would it today, of all days?! Logical I thought, but I still couldn’t get those nagging thoughts out of my head the whole time I was down there. I am very proud to say however that I did it and I am more proud and glad of doing this than anything else I’ve done on this whole trip. I did the whole hour loop walk, and was totally and utterly astounded by its beauty and sheer enormity. Because it is underground it is very dark, but it is lit perfectly, is incredibly quiet with wonderful acoustics and all you hear is people whispering and the water dripping creating the incredible stalactites.
The story doesn’t end there though. After we took the elevator back up to the top, Kav decided we should do the 2 mile walk back down from the cave mouth and take the elevator back up again. You can imagine the stunned look on my face and the scream “What? Why????” that quickly came out of my mouth! Kav never gives me a verbal answer. His answer is written all over his face. First, it tells me I’m going to do it whether I like it or not, and then I see the face that tells me what I already know – if I don’t do it, I’ll regret it. Works every time dammit! The walk down is 2 miles, very steep and windy (lots of curves, not wind!). It’s a tough walk down with lots of smaller crevices to walk through but stunning. I was just as nervous doing it even though I’d been down earlier, but I think my body was still in shock that I was going in for a second time! I speedily got us back to the elevator and was back on ground level again, ready for lunch and start our drive to our next destination. All in all a terrific place and I really would suggest you see it if you find yourself near New Mexico.
The next day, again not knowing much about it, we turned up at the White Sands National Monument. We paid our entrance fee, watched a quick 10 minute orientation video at the visitor’s centre and then jumped into the car to take a drive around the park which is filled with beautiful white sand dunes. The sand is so pure and white it looks like snow, but when you touch it is far more course than you expect. The road through the dunes is quite narrow and covered in white sand and you can stop at various places to take a walk on the dunes, look at the plant life or animals that live on them or just take photos. It is a breathtaking experience and one that we absolutely did not expect. I urge you to either look it up online or take a look at our photos up on Snapfish.
Continuing on our journey through New Mexico, we stopped in Santa Fe for a couple of hours on our way north towards Utah. Santa Fe is a wonderful town with lovely Mexican architecture and a great vibe about it. It’s known as quite an arty town and is filled with lovely galleries and lots and lots of jewelry shops selling beautiful turquoise gems. There is a cute little square in the middle of town with street sellers and taco carts and a very pretty church which holds the oldest statue of the Madonna in the USA. Unfortunately though when we went in to see it the church was closed due to a wedding being in progress. The other unfortunate element was the rain that hadn’t stopped since the morning. In fact, so far we hadn’t had much luck with the weather and Kav was constantly driving through torrential and sometimes very scary rain.
It did hold off however, long enough for us to be able to walk around for a while before we headed to Taos Pueblo. This little town was built around AD1450(!) and has been continuously inhabited ever since. It is also the largest existing multistoried pueblo structure in the USA and one of the best surviving examples of traditional adobe construction. Although they charge you to go in to see it and try and sell you all kinds of overpriced souvenirs, it really is fascinating and beautiful and you can’t believe people actually still live there! Their tiny church is just gorgeous too. It’s big enough to hold around 30 people and has stunning glass windows and a minister who visits from Taos to take services each week. We took a quick walk around and lots of photos and decided to get on our way – we had lots to do that day!
Straight afterwards we drove a few miles to see the 2nd highest suspension bridge in the USA – the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge. I wasn’t too impressed as we drove up to it, or even as we got closer. But let me tell you, you only get the whole effect when you walk over it!! For me it was like doing the Sydney Harbour Bridge walk all over again! It was incredibly high up over the gorge and didn’t feel particularly safe as cars were speeding straight past you making the whole thing bounce up and down. Needless to say, I took a quick look and was off quicker than Kav reaching for a slice of pizza! Plus it was quite unnerving seeing a crashed car half way down the gorge! Didn’t want to know the story behind that.
After that it was a quick stop at the San Francisco de Asis Church in Ranchos de Taos. It was built in the mid 18th century but didn’t open until 1815 for some reason. It was tiny, made out of what looked like just mud and water and was in a cute little street that now had a few houses and a shop on it. All very odd, but incredibly sweet and pretty.
Our last stop in New Mexico was the Four Corners National Monument.
If you think so far I’ve mentioned rather a lot of national this and national that’s then you’d be right. In fact there are 8 different national parklands in the USA! Check out the list:
- National Park
- National Preserve
- National Monument
- National Recreation Area
- National Seashore
- National Historic Park
- National Historic Site
- National Military Park
So, you may be hearing a few of these over the next 6 weeks!
Anyway, the Four Corners National Monument is where 4 state corners all meet at one point – New Mexico (South East), Colorado (North East), Utah (North West) and Arizona (South West). When we arrived it was packed. We were mid Memorial Day Weekend so everywhere was incredibly busy for 4 days. We parked up and joined the queue to have our photo taken right on the four corners marker. Quite underwhelming when you actually do it, plus the joy was sucked out of me having read a few weeks ago that they have now discovered that the marker is about 40 miles out of where it should be, so I kinda knew I was standing in the wrong place! However, we did get to try the famous Navajo fry bread which is like a popodum shaped fried taco with powdered sugar on top – just yummy! There were also many Navajo people with stalls selling tomahawks, jewelry, dream catchers and other souvenirs which we took a stroll around.
Close by is the entrance to the Monument Valley. Now this place is cool as well as a bit eerie. As you get closer you notice that you are driving on an incredibly straight road with flat red nothingness around until you see these huge rock monuments in front of you. They look like huge statues coming out of the ground. Again, to get in and take a drive around you need to pay, which we duly did, and then stopped at the only restaurant to have some lunch. I had a sandwich made with fry bread instead of normal bread and it was one of the best sandwiches I’ve ever had! Plus we also had an amazing view of the valley with stunning rock formations all around us. We took lots of fab photos and then drove the 5 mile road to take a closer look. But actually, what you realize is that you’re better off seeing it and appreciating it from a distance instead of paying money to be closer. You’re too close to take photos and the potential damage to your car could be expensive thanks to the unpaved dirt track they called a road!
We started driving west towards Zion National Park, our last stop before Vegas, but 10 minutes after leaving Monument Valley we got caught driving through a sandstorm. We’d seen the stereotypical tumbleweeds on the road but this was something else. The wind suddenly picked up, the sand started flying off the ground either side of the road and suddenly you couldn’t even see the bonnet of your car. I was getting hysterical, trying very calmly to suggest to Kav that we should turn back, but he was being very brave and kept driving, at about 3 miles per hour. We also had a huge truck behind us which was comforting as they were obviously used to these types of weather changes and kept driving as well. Unfortunately, a few moments later he over took us and we were suddenly all on our own again, a very lonely place in the middle of a desert sandstorm! I’m happy to say though, we made it through and came out the other side wiser and stronger! But it wasn’t pleasant at all.
The next day we drove it to Zion National Park and we weren’t disappointed. As we drove down into the valley towards the town of Springdale we were surrounded by enormous, beautiful white, pink and red rock. The drive winds around miles of the stuff until you reach a one way 3 mile tunnel which goes though the rock to the other side where the actual park is and where you can do all types of hikes and trails and other activities. There are plenty of gorgeous B&B’s, shops and restaurants and a special tram service that takes you from the town and runs through the park dropping you off at certain points for all the different hikes and trails. We picked up a map and drove out to find somewhere to stay for the night and come up with a plan of action for the next day.
We woke up early, put on our stunning walking gear, parked at the visitor centre and hopped on the tram ready to jump off at Zion lodge to do the carefully chosen Emerald Pools hike. You can just ride the 90 minute tram that takes you all through the park instead of hiking, but seeing as we there we wanted to a gentle but fulfilling walk. The map said this trail was “easy” with stunning views and a waterfall. Two minutes in, I decided that someone was lying when they said it was easy, then realized that I hadn’t been walking in a few weeks, but had swapped that sport with cheeseburger eating instead, so was finding it a bit tough. I eased into it though and a few minutes later it leveled out and we found ourselves a couple of hundred feet up and walking through a great forest area towards a waterfall we could hear in the distance. When we arrived it was beautiful, a big waterfall falling off stunning red rock into one of the 3 emerald pools on the trail. We took some wonderful photos and video footage and then wondered back down the other side of the loop trail. We hopped onto the tram again and stopped off at the famous Narrows trail (the most popular in the park) which took us around an hour to do and then on our way out stopped for a truly deserved lunch. It’s a shame we didn’t have longer to spend at Zion as you could spend a week there and not see everything, but hopefully we’ll came back again once day.
The next day on our way to Vegas, we stopped off at Hoover Dam. Kav was very keen to see it as he sees it as an amazing feat of engineering. I on the other hand couldn’t have cared less. It’s a dam – enough said. We paid a ridiculous fee for the most boring and ridiculous ‘tour’ ever. It took 90 minutes and all we saw was the inside of 2 elevators (which took 10 minutes to load each time because they stuffed 50 people into them), the powerplant room and some other room with pipes running through it, and waited in line for the elevators for 30 minutes of the tour, I’m not kidding! It was terrible. Then we took a walk around the top of the dam, looked down, it was high, I was bored and we left. I think I was a bit over excited about Vegas too and I just wanted to get there and start my birthday weekend and get drunk!
Vegas is a whole other blog so will stop here for today and let you imagine what kind of stories you’ll read about in Vegas! But don’t worry, they’re quite tame compared what I can only imagine is running through your heads at this point and before anyone asks, no I am not Mrs Dadfar!!
Catch you next time.
Oh and for those still pining for me each night, don’t worry, I’m home in 6 weeks!
Much love,
Sally xxx
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