Saturday, April 14, 2007

On the Road Again

It's exhilerating being on the open road. Whenever R and I travel, we get to the next state, pull out our wine glasses, open a bottle of our favorite and toast to the words Carman Miranda sang oh so many years ago: "Cuanta le gusta, le gusta, le gusta,(2 more le gustas), cuanta le gusta, le gusta, le gusta. We gotta get goin' where we're goin', what're we gonna do? We're on our way to somewhere, the two of us and you..." So every new exciting landscape promoted this ritual.

This week my sister and I headed for Santa Fe and the prospect of hiking the hills around the area and around Abiquiui. We made it to New Mexico by Thursday night, staying in a casino hotel near the Acoma Reservation. It just happened to be the only place to stay after missing an exit in Albuquerque. However, we were close to the place where we'd tour the Acoma mesa, meaning we could sleep later than usual. When we awoke on Friday morning, we were greeted with a snow slush that had fallen during the night. Quite a foretelling of what to expect on the Acoma reservation.

The tour was under slushy rain that only made the dirt streets a sea of mud, slippery to execute in places, but 15 interested souls got their best walking shoes caked with mud, followed the tour guide, and rejoiced that the Acoma were increasing bringing back their young and building homes to live in during ceremonial days.

And the weather was cold! We wondered if there would be more slush and cold weather, whether the hiking would be limited during our week. After all, this is an Elderhostel trip, and we didn't know the ages or health of our future fellow hikers. That is to be seen on Sunday night in Santa Fe at the Ghost Ranch campus in the heart of town.

1 comment:

MojoMan said...

Have a wonderful trip! New Mexico has long been on my list of place to see and I look forward to reading all about it.