Santa Fe

We were very excited about our chance to spend 10 days in the Santa Fe area.  We started out our stay with a trip to the Bandelier National Monument.  This is the home of a Pueblo tribe dating back 11,000 years.  We had planned for it to be cold for our hikes, but it ended up being hot and we spent the day wishing for shorts and t-shirts.  The area is fantastic and I highly recommend it to anyone who visits santa fe.  We then went to Taos to see the ski hill and resort town.  Both of the areas were not what we expected.  It was 50+ degrees when we got the lower lodge at Taos Ski Valley and there was very little snow at the parking area and lodge at 9K feet.  The snow and skiing looked marginal and the town of Taos has less resort and more poverty than we expected.  I'm not sure we would come back to ski/board.  However, we stayed at a cool hotel for the night that has been open since 1936 and the food was great, even if we were the only people at the restaurant for the entire night.

After we got back to SF, we went on an amazing food tour with a new and great friend Carlos.  He took us to 4 different and amazing restaurants in the old town area.  He has a great knowledge of the area, buildings, people and the food scene.  We highly recommend going on one of his tours.

https://foodtournewmexico.com/

We spent a day enjoying the old town area of Santa Fe and visited the Basilica and the Lorreto Chapel.  What an amazing staircase.  It is one of the powerful and moving places we have visited.

As we got towards the end of our stay in SF, we went out to see the pueblos and national park at Pecos and visited a very psychedelic art display at Meow Wolf.

Santa Fe is on our list to re-visit when the temperature is better and there is no wind.  Did we mention the wind????  It turns out the late winter and early spring are the windy season in ABQ and Santa Fe.  We are ready to get back to Phoenix to Taylor and the warm weather.

Santa Fe Skies RV Park

The park has a small number of sites, probably in the range of 50.  The roads and sites are all gravel and therefore not very level.  We had a site on the edge of the park that gave great sunrise views over the desert ranch to the east of the park.  We had to do some adjusting to get our rig into our site, but after that it was fine.  There are several of the sites occupied by long term visitors or people who live here full time.

The guest house/office area is the high point.  The bathrooms are large and very clean.  They have several showers and everything looks to be well maintained.  There is also a kitchen area with stove and dishes for people to use as needed, an outdoor picnic area with grill and tables, and a large common room where they hold events such as line dancing classes.

We rate this part a 3 out of 5, but would have no issues staying here again as visit the santa fe area.  It is a little too far away from the down town area, but it has been quiet and easy for our stay.

Dealing with high wind

High winds in your RV can be scary and loud.  While we were in Albuquerque, we had 50+ MPH winds on several nights.  The noise from the small slide toppers covering the slideouts was enough to keep us awake at night and worry us about potential damage to those coverings.  After a quick internet search on the problems and solutions, I went to the nearest Home Depot to get a sheet of styrofoam.  I cut pieces to match the openings on each slide out and used duct tape to hold those pieces in.  This is not my best engineering work, but it worked, which is the litmus test for all engineering.  Adding some foam or other material to block the high winds from blowing under the mini-awnings will drastically reduce the noise within the coach and also help prevent the material from being stretched and failing.

Packing your grill

We do a lot of cooking on our Traeger because we love the way it cooks our chicken, fish, pork and steaks.  However, as with all grills, they get messy over time.  I clean my periodically, but I still was not looking forward to packing up the grill and the table that we put it on to store in the RV.  I debated various options and ended up going simple.  I buy a cheap roll of saran wrap and wrap both the grill and the table before putting them into the side storage on our RV.  This keeps the storage area clean of any grease from the grill and ash from the fire pot.

Fun fact: saran wrap was invented in 1949 by Dow.

Albuquerque

We were able to spend two weeks in Albuquerque and very much enjoyed our stay.  We found a great gym in town, Liberty Gym, which then allowed us to focus on exploring the area after our workout.  We started our adventure off with a Segway tour, which ended up being only average due to the areas of construction our guide took us through.  We then went to Petroglyph National Monument, which had some interesting rock carvings from the Navajo and Spanish settlers, then we took the tram ride up to the top of Sandia Peak.  Even though there was still quite a bit of snow, as the locals were still skiing, Danelle reluctantly agreed that she liked it at the top and actually felt the urge to make a few turns (!!!).  We then went on a food tour, which is always a huge hit, where one of our stops was the Candy Lady shop where they made all of the blue "rocks" that were the props for Breaking Bad.  We got some good pics of us in the Heisenberg hat and glasses.  After a quick side trip to Taiwan, I was back in ABQ to wrap up our stay with a Breaking Bad tour.

Route 66 RV Resort

For our time in Albuquerque, we stayed at the Route 66 RV Resort.  The resort opened in August, so everything is still very new.  The RV sites are long and wide with a picnic table and fire pit at each site.  The hookups are good and very convenient.  The landscaping has not yet had a chance to grow, so expect it to be flat and open.  Wind in this area for the spring is normal and we had a couple of nights of heavy wind.  There is a rally barn with several gas grills and a large number of tables in a covered area.  They also have a bathroom facility with shower and laundry in the middle of the park that is clean and nice.  The clubhouse has laundry, showers, workout room (3 pieces of cardio equipment), and game room with pool table, shuffle board and large screen TV.

Most of the people staying at the park during our visit were there for only one night as they moved through the area.  The park started to fill a bit towards the end of our stay with ~20 sites occupied.  The resort is right next to the casino, which is a positive for those wanting to walk to the tables or the restaurants.  The main negative for us was the distance from the park to downtown.  The Liberty Gym, where we worked out, was 23 miles from the park.  Old downtown was 18 miles each way.

Overall we rate Route 66 RV Resort a 4/5.  The lack of mature landscaping and distance from the town are the only negatives we have for the park.  We are already planning to come back and stay here for the balloon festival in October.

http://www.libertygym.com/
http://rt66rvresort.com/

Breaking Bad Tour

We are in cold Albuquerque now.  ;)  I keep hearing, "normally it's not like this here" but all I know is that it is TOO COLD and it's time to move!  :D   Haha!  Honestly though, despite the cold and the snow (only overnight one time) ABQ is a very beautiful place.  It reminds both Gary and I of Boise.  It has the mountains, the causal vibe and the friendly people.  There is a big difference in the arts.  The arts are very big here.  The city commissions or buys works of art for every infrastructure project they do, sort of a 1 for 1.  As a result there is art everywhere.  The state of NM also has a rebate program for the film and tv industry.  They give the industry a rebate of 30% as long as they agree to use the locals for 60% of the extras in their project.  It generates a lot of revenue for the state and as a result, a lot of what you see at the movie theater and on tv was filmed here.  The most famous project so far was "Breaking Bad".  For those that aren't familiar with the show, it was a show on AMC that ran for 5 seasons starring Aaron Paul and Brian Cranston.  Aaron Paul is from the Boise area (home) so that made us big fans of the show.  Such big fans that today we took a Breaking Bad tour.
The tour started in Old Town ABQ where we boarded a RV (one that looks just like the one on the show) and took off from there.  We visited a lot of the places that were featured on the show for the 5 seasons and there were prizes for people who answered trivia questions about the show correctly.  (I won a prize!)  We also got to stop at the restaurant that was featured for a full season of the show.  It has a different name on the show but in real life it is called Twisters.  They have the most fantastic burritos!!  The toritillas tasted homemade and the carne adevada was tender and spicy! I would definitely go back!  The tour is 3 hours long and so much fun!  Our guide was very entertaining and he made the 3 hours go by so fast.  Absolutely loved the tour!!

El Paso and Las Cruces

After more than 3 months in Phoenix, we decided it was time to head out to explore some more of our great country.  Our first top after Phoenix was the El Paso area.  While El Paso has limited tourist type attractions, the surrounding area offers a lot of options for those willing to look.  Our first stop was the Border Patrol Museum.  It is a small museum but has a lot of interesting displays honoring the history of the Border Patrol and their officers.  We then visited the Old Mesilla Village in Las Cruces.  This site was the major city connecting San Antonio with California.  It is here that Billy the Kid was a frequent visitor and tried for his crimes.  While in Las Cruces, we also visited the campus of New Mexico State.  The campus is beautiful and represents well the architecture of the area.  We also stopped at UTEP to explore that campus and then drove over to the bridges that link El Paso with Juarez.  Danelle wouldn't let me go across...

We wrapped up our stay in the area by visiting a the old historic missions and then spending the last day at White Sands National Park.  White Sands was the highlight for me.