Spring Break New Mexico Trip

 Scott and I work for different public school districts, so our time off does not always perfectly align.  This year was special, though; our spring breaks were at exactly the same time!  We decided this happy coincidence called for a trip.  We had been wanting to visit the southwest for a while, but that's probably not the best trip to do in the summer, so we decided that would be a good trip.  We decided on New Mexico after determining that there were a lot of sites and activities in a relatively small area so we could cut down on long driving days.

Essentially, we visited Albuquerque, Santa Fe, and the Taos Pueblo.  We had hoped to visit the town of Taos as well, but between time constraints and construction in the area, we saved that for a future trip.

We flew into Albuquerque and spent time there first.  We stayed in the old town area, which has the San Felipe de Neri church as its focal point.  The present building dates from 1793.

San Felipe de Neri Church

One of the famous sites in the Albuquerque area is the National Petroglyph Monument.  This is actually spread out; there are several places to park with several different hikes you can take.  These hikes vary in difficulty, number of petroglyphs to see, and accessibility of petroglyphs (whether you need binoculars to get a good view).  I've forgotten the name of the trail we chose, but we chose one that did not require binoculars to see the petroglyphs, and that was probably somewhere in the middle in terms of difficulty.  There was a fair amount of inclines and scrambling over rocks.  With my famous clumsiness, I spent a lot of time crouching down to move (all the squats I've been doing at the gym paid off!).  I'm only going to include one petroglyph picture that I particularly liked.  We saw a lot of cute lizards scrambling around, and one roadrunner, who was presumably hunting them.  I didn't get to photograph that particular roadrunner, but we saw one later in the day who patiently stood still and let us get reasonably close.

We also did some hiking without any specific sites like petroglyphs in mind.  It is beautiful as  long as you like deserts, but even in April, the sun was strong, so the usual precautious of a hat, lots of water, and sunscreen apply.

Both Albuquerque and Santa Fe had a dizzying number of souvenir shops where you could buy all kinds of southwestern and Mexican souvenirs.  Particularly for people interested in buying jewelry, I recommend the Portal market in Santa Fe.  My mom found out about this before our trip and let me know about it.  If you want to support Native American artists, this market is strict about who is making and selling the items available.  Also, it creates a manageable amount of selection.  I bought two pieces from one artist and enjoyed talking with him and hearing more about his process (and his daughter's process, since he was selling some of her pieces, too). I was honestly pretty suspicious about the sheer amount of "Native American" jewelry being sold in some of the shops; someone I met later in the trip confirmed my suspicious and said that shop owners were being busted on the regular for selling items they were claiming were made by Native Americans, but were actually made overseas.

The San Miguel Chapel in Santa Fe is said to be the oldest church in the US.  I particularly enjoyed seeing all the milagros that were placed there.

San Miguel Chapel

Milagros in San Miguel Chapel

While we were staying in Santa Fe, we took a side trip to the Taos Pueblo.  The Taos Pueblo is a UNESCO heritage site, and the structures there have been continuously inhabited for over a thousand years.  While most members of the community live in the surrounding tribal lands, there is a small, rotating community of people living in the traditional buildings and adhering to rules designed to preserve condition.  For instance, while gas stoves are allowed now, electric ones are not.  The guide told us that doors to get into the buildings were more recent innovations; traditionally, people used ladders to climb in through the top.  

I know I wanted to visit Taos Pueblo as soon as I read about it.  I want to assure anyone who wants to visit, but who might be concerned by the less-than-clear driving directions that once you are close, it will be obvious what to do.  Once we got close, there were signs, and a tribal police officer showed us where to park.  There are also clear signs while you are there that let you know where you can and cannot wander.  

Church in Taos Pueblo

New Mexico is famous for its food, and that was another attraction of the trip.  I studied in Mexico for a semester in college, loved the food there, and was curious what the food in New Mexico would be like.  Generally speaking, I would say that New Mexico cuisine is less hot and spicy than Mexican food.  It is generally very flavorful, though.  The state is famous for its red and green chile sauces; if you want both with your meal, you can usually request "Christmas."

Huevos rancheros in New Mexico

The trip was great, and we hope to go back and explore more someday.  We did have an adventure getting back to the airport.  When we were driving to Taos Pueblo, Scott noticed that he was getting a warning about the tire pressure of one tire.  He added more air to the offending tire on the way back to Santa Fe, but we were concerned since we would have to drive to Albuquerque the following morning to catch our flight.  Well, the tire lost a lot of pressure overnight.  We ended up driving the car to the Santa Fe car rental agency (where, naturally, they charged us for leaving the car somewhere other than Albuquerque.  I think it would have served them right if we'd just driven the car on the highway until the tire went completely flat and then made them figure out how to retrieve it).  We then took an Uber to the airport.  Not a cheap endeavor overall, but we made our flight.  Also, our driver also worked as a tour guide, and was very entertaining company on the drive.  He is the one who confirmed my suspicious about many of the jewelry shops in Santa Fe.

All in all, it was a very successful trip.  Given the atmosphere of the DC area at this point in time, it was particularly nice to get away and have some very new experiences.

Midwest Trip, Summer of 2024

 This is another "better late than never" sort of post.  After our trip to Alaska and Washington state with my family, Scott and I went on a trip to the Midwest.  We started in Chicago, then went to Madison, Wisconsin (where Scott went to grad school and we got married), and then to Minneapolis.  We hadn't visited Chicago since 2012, and hadn't visited Madison since 2011.  Both places seemed to be in somewhat rougher condition than they had been when we last visited.  I think the pandemic took a toll everywhere, and the addiction crises may have played a role, as well.  One thing we particularly noticed about Madison was that public spaces were becoming more closed off.  There were a lot of signs regarding loitering near the university.  The university library has an area with tables that had been open to the public in the past.  This time, there was a sign saying that it was for university students and staff and everyone else needed to register.  Full disclosure:  we ate our lunch there one day, and no one asked us for ID or anything.  But the change in the situation made me think that maybe they had dealt with some difficult situations and were having to tighten security, or at least have a pretext to ask people to leave when necessary.  

There is not enough time in the world to go into detail about this, but our time living in Madison (as well as our subsequent visits) were always a mixed bag.  This visit was very pleasant, though, beyond our concern about what time and circumstances had done to it.  This time, there were no job or academic stresses, just a chance to enjoy a nice city.  We ate at some restaurants we remembered (as well as some new ones), took some walks we used to take when we lived there, went to a bead store that I frequented all those years ago.

This was our first time visiting Minneapolis, and we were very impressed.  We only had a few days there, so we're hoping to go back soon and explore more!  We took lots of walks outdoors (when the weather permitted--we got rained out one day) and got to see a number of their famous lakes.  We also got to eat at Owamni by The Sioux Chef, which I was curious about as soon as I read about it (highly recommend, by the way).

For much of our visit, the upper Midwest was having a heat wave.  However, their heat wave was still cooler than the weather we were having in the DC area (which, honestly, was alarmingly hot last summer).  The Midwest can really be a fun place in the summer time, which is a lucky think since the winters can be challenging, particularly for those of who grew up without a lot of snow or the ability to pick a favorite winter sport.

Here are a few photos from the trip:

Deep dish pizza in Chicago

My favorite ice cream from the UW student union (orange with chocolate--yum!)

Butterfly wings, Minneapolis

Minneapolis

Minneapolis

Sequim Trip, Better Late Than Never

 Well.  I didn't intend to go this long without blogging.  I got busy at the beginning of the school year and had additional stress in the lead-up to the US presidential election.  And, let's just say the stress has been increasing ever since said election took place.  So I haven't been feeling very inspired.  At the same time, I wanted to post some pictures for my own benefit, at least.

After visiting Alaska last summer, while we were still on the west coast, we went to Sequim, WA to visit my aunt and uncle.  They chose well as a place to live; it's beautiful with pleasant weather.  An interesting feature of Sequim is that it is famous for growing lavender.  Dairy farming had been the mainstay of the economy, but they pivoted to lavender (I would probably remember when this had happened if I had not waited so long to write this post!).  There are multiple lavender farms in the area, and we were lucky enough to be there during their lavender festival.  In fairness, not every member of our party thought this was a happy coincidence, but I enjoyed it.  I think it comes down to your tolerance for crowds.  I don't love crowds, but living in an urban area, I found the crowds associated with the lavender festival to be less stressful than my daily commute.  

View from our Airbnb in Sequim

Field of lavender

Close-up of lavender plant

Lavender drying