This year, there was no spring break road trip – adios, Albuquerque.  Adios to the best week of the year.  Adios to the canyons of the Southwest.  The only novel adventure this year is named Corona – and I don’t mean the arch in Utah.

Albuquerque is about 6-8 hours down US Hwy 550.  In fact, that highway starts in Montrose and ends in Albuquerque.

When I think of Albuquerque, I think of my 2014 road trip with my new dog, Maizzy, and my new Honda Fit, Mini Pearl.  I had plans for Chaco Canyon and for Route 66, and what lie in between was a mystery – my choice of which way to turn on the open road.  The first couple of years, I didn’t get reservations until the day I left the previous motel.  More dogs = more planning.

I don’t like cities, so I was zooming as quickly as I could from US Hwy 550 to I-40 (Route 66) when I noticed a sign for Petroglyph National Monument.  I was like – “Well, that sounds interesting”, so off I went.  There was a dog friendly section where we hiked until mid afternoon.

Road trips through the Southwest are geology on wheels.  I found these petroglyphs stunning because they were on volcanic rock and not red sandstone like I am use to.  This one looks like Charlie Brown with a baseball cap to me.

 

From there, we headed west on I-40.  I saw signs for El Malpias National Monument, so we stopped there for a short scenic drive.  It was like a combo of volcanic rock and red sandstone.  I realized they what I realize most everyday of every road trip – that I play too long and run out of time before I want to stop.

The other cool place near Albuquerque is Salinas Mission Pueblos National Monument.  We didn’t run into these 2016.  That was another serendipity where we were on a stretch of highway with nothing to do between point A and point B – then there was this photo on the wall of ruins – and I had to find them.

Last year, our trip took us through that area, again – so I went with all three dogs.  I love the big old mission buildings as a background for my small dogs.

Kachina, Sazi, and Maizzy at Salinas Mission Pueblo Ruins National Monument – 2019

These trips to me are Albuquerque – unique in culture and landscape.  Adios Albuquerque was added to my daylily garden in 2016, I think.  After these trips that are forever engraved in my memory.  I put it in my Southwest garden with (mostly) other Ned Roberts spiders.

The garden was put in where there was only rock garden – on the easement between the sidewalk and the street.  I have no back yard, because it is a split lot – so I actually have almost all of these daylilies in buried pots in case the water main ever busts there.

I like the bloom – it is subtle.  Albuquerque was Ned’s home until he moved to Colorado for treatment – at least that is my understanding.  He, no doubt, loved the New Mexico culture.  It is different from Colorado . . . it must have been hard for him to say Adios, Albuquerque.  Fortunately, I have his daylilies to take me on a road trip on the year of the pandemic.