Route 66 Day 21 Oct 29, 2019

Started the day off by doing list items in the Santa Rosa area. Went to the car museum, which was closed because it was too early. Checked out the “Blue Hole” which is a natural spring and popular scuba location. It was cold and I don’t scuba, so that was a quick stop. Jumped back on Route 66/I-40 and continued west. One of my points of interest was really far off I-40. I started following the GPS instructions, but a few miles in, I realized that it was way off path, so I turned around. Jumped back on I-40 and hit the next POI into the GPS: Pecos National Historical Park. GPS sent wanted me to turn around and go back up the road I just left. As its a National Park, I wanted to do it and it was worth going that far off Route. About 20 miles up this strange backroad, I finally saw a Route 66 pre-1937 sign. Hooray! I wasn’t actually off route, I was just on a different alignment. I’d done the I-40 portion 20 years ago, so I was excited to explore a new area.

Pecos National History Park is a nice park and is the ruins of the indigineous people of the area. Very little is left. One of four churches is still there and the maintanence is being maintained by the park personal. There are two Kivas that are being maintained and you can actually climb a latter to view the inside. Mostly, its just foundation stones of previous structures. I hiked the loop and then decided to follow the directions to a secondary hiking trail at another site a few miles away from the visitors center. I followed the map and once I turned only the main road of the site, I was told the road dead ended at the site. Welllll....I drove and drove and ended up on questionable roads and the middle of no where. I never did find it and there were a number of turn offs and in the end I’m not even sure I was on the right road. I finally got too scared to go forward and feared I would damage my car. On the return trip it soon became evident I was on a different road and I had no idea where I was. No GPS signal and only a quarter tank of gas. I had some concerns. But my new road was actually better than my old road and I soon began seeing signs of civilization. I think I came down on a different part of the mountain but soon found myself back on Route 66 and heading towards Santa Fe.

I had plenty of time to do my Santa Fe list items before dark and first thing in the morning, I could head to Albuquerque. However, I knew I wouldn’t be leaving so soon by the time that dark fell. The downtown historic section of Santa Fe is beautiful, filled with art and I knew I wanted to see more. I was also given a suggestion from one of my Facebook friends: Kasha-Katuwe Tent National Monument. So I decided to do one more day in the area. Found myself a nice Walmart to stay at and a McDonalds with great Wi-Fi (I usually update my Netflix every morning at Walmart, but this particular location had a very weak signal. However, McD’s WiFi rocked and I was able to update from the parking lot. I also swung by their drive thru as a thank you for the service.



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