Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Las Vegas to New Mexico and Colorado and back…



I haven’t blogged in a while… it is time to start again… 

Gael and I live in Henderson Nevada (aka East Las Vegas) in a house on the hills above Las Vegas with a view of the strip… 

I run a railroad museum… The Heritage Rail Alliance (the association of railroad museums and tourist railways) was having a conference in Santa Fe, at the La Fonda Hotel… Santa Fe’s grand old historic hotel… I was asked to participate on a discussion panel…  It was both a chance to participate in a conference, but also a chance for a South-West Road trip…  The conference suggested that this could be in part a work trip (preserving that precious time off) and my boss approved the plan… they wouldn’t pay for the conference but would let me consider time at the conference to be paid work time.

Gael and I have been together for just over a year, and married only a bit over 6 months… we have traveled a bit… and seem to be road trip compatible… so a trip was planned…The plan suggested that we would drive from Las Vegas to Santa Fe, then take our time getting home.  The trip towards home through the Four Corners/Indian Country area of the South West.  The AAA Indian Country map, of fable and literature (Tony and now Anne Hillerman) covering much of the geography… maybe the greatest map ever… 

The trip didn’t work out exactly that way… 

The plan called for us to leave Boulder City about 3:30 on Tuesday, driving a few hours towards Santa Fe… I believe in a short first evening to break the “suction” of home… its much easier to leave early from a motel than from home… Then a drive through Petrified Forest/Painted Desert (both Gael and I are fond of rocks, and Petrified Forest is all about rocks…  Then the conference (in Santa Fe!) then a slow trip back…  

As suggested above… that isn’t exactly what happened… 

As planned, we left later Tuesday afternoon… driving to Williams Arizona… to the “Next” Best Western… (The “Next Best Western” is the title of a song, written by David Shindell and performed by Lucy Roche (among others)…   It can be found on Youtube here) It was a couple hundred miles and about three hours… To a really nice Best Western, which Gael noted looked like a motel in a ski area… Williams is near 7,000’ elevation… there were already traces of snow on the ground…  so snow might be expected… While we drove Gael was in contact (ain’t cell great) with her daughter, Natalie, who was driving westward from Rhode Island to Las Vegas, as of 9:00 somewhere in eastern New Mexico… we checked in, then went down-town and found one of the local brew pubs for dinner…  After dinner we head back to the hotel… (the “Next Best Western” of song) a bit of TV and to bed (or to bed with a little TV)  Gael may have checked in with Natalie… then radio silence (us, not Nat).

The next morning (aka Wednesday) we awoke later than expected… (there was a time zone change) and got up (this always a good plan)… Gael called Natalie… “Where are you”… (expecting “New Mexico”) but instead she heard “Across the Hall”… (aka “here”)   We gathered and took Nat and Kevin (boyfriend) out to breakfast… downtown… looking for a restaurant that Gael remembered from a previous trip… This was Kevin, the boyfriend and the parents Gael, mother, and myself, step-dad meeting Kevin for the first time… Kevin ate eggs… for breakfast., for his first time.,.. I don’t think we scared him un-necessarily. (eggs or parents or such).  We detoured to look at the Grand Canyon railroad’s depot and shops… (repair shops, not shopping shops).

So, with a late start we headed east… to Flagstaff, to Winslow where we took photos on a corner and bought coffee…  Then on to Petrified Forest National Park, with a stop outside at a rock shop… This is , not just a rock shop… it is the “mother of all rock shops” Gael bought rocks… and post cards… (be afraid Richard… you know who you are, I know where you are)

Then on to Santa Fe, with a deadline in mind…  A deadline made a conference opening at 6:00pm… We make it… 

The conference is wonderful…  The La Fonda Hotel is wonderful… The card at the back of the door suggest the highest charge for the room was something greater that $700.00… We paid less…  Much less… This was an opportunity to visit, to enjoy, this place.

I am consumed by conference sessions… I, with friends and colleagues (aka Kyle) are on a panel that discusses the restoration and rehabilitation of wooden railroad passenger cars… This is a subject that I am consumed by… we present twice…  I attend sessions on railroad regulation, on steam locomotive restoration, on social media and marketing… Before, between and after sessions there are breakfast, lunches and banquets… A partner, Rail Explorers is here… They operate a rail bike program on my railroad.  Their program in many ways is a key to success at our museum.   Their owners and staff are more than a partner…  They are friends, and Mary Joy and Alex were the witnesses at our marriage…   

There is little time to explore Santa Fe… With MJ and Alex we have dinner at Sazon.  A couple of days later we steel away for a lunch at Café Pasqual sitting at the public table… I skip one session, so we can go to the Georgia O’Keefe museum… One evening we visit a local brew pub… otherwise I am at the conference.  The conference includes a trip to Chama New Mexico, to the Cumbres and Toltec railroad.  It includes a ride from Chama to Cumbres Pass on the train… a double-headed, steam powered train… the last car a restored wooden passenger car… a car that I and friends wrote the planning documents for.  For Kyle (one of the colleagues) and I it was a celebration of a successful project.  After the ride we visit the workshop in Antonito where the car was restored.
The conference ended on Saturday night… Saturday morning we drive north towards an unplanned two day stop in southern Colorado…   Kyle and I are to spend two additional days meeting with the restoration staff in Antonito about the passenger car restoration program.  Its a paid gig…  a continuation of a project from 4 years ago…  The same project that turned out the passenger car we rode up Cumbres Pass.

Sunday morning, we pack, we gather… we have breakfast at the hotel, then loading the jeep we leave… pausing at the local supermarket to buy chili ristas… not from a tourist store… but from the supermarket…  it starts to snow… not sticking but snowing… We should have taken it as a warning… 

It is only 2 hours from Santa Fe to Alamosa and our motel for the evening… having all day (aka more than two hours) we decide to drive via Taos… Taos had recently seen hail… While we explore it starts to snow… By the time we leave everything was white… The mix of hail and snow was treacherous…  We slid while stopping for a pedestrian…  On true off road tires)… We saw several cars who had skidded off the road while turning…  Then, out of town, in deeper snow a spinning yellow pick-up came very close to hitting us head on…  We found a local brew pub, the Taos Mesa Brewing Company and stopped for lunch…  by the time we finished there was near 6” of snow on the ground…

Back on the road, the snow stopped by the time we hit the main highway north…  with flurries starting as we reached Antonito…   We explored a bit, finding Indiana Jones’ boyhood home, the weird local castle and the oldest church in Colorado… We see one Amish wagon... then north to Alamosa and our motel (another “next Best Western”)

Sadly the really weird steak house between the sports bar and the slaughter house is now a pizza place, so we settled on the San Luis Valley Brewing Company for dinner…  Its cold outside… the Jeep is carrying a significant amount of ice and even ice cycles…  Winter has arrived in Southern Colorado…  Back to the motel… to bed… 

Up the next morning… eating breakfast at the motel… Then south to Antinito, and the Cumbres and Toltec railroad’s shops… both the car and locomotive shop where they maintain the tourist railroad equipment and are restoring a early Baldwin 4-6-0, No 168, but also the car shop for the Historic car project, and the Friends of the Cumbres & Toltec Railroad’s shop…    Gael takes the Jeep, Kyle and I find Stathi and start our work…  Our project had started 4 years ago… first with feasibility study, then with restoration planning documents, a restoration budget, and CAD drawings of each of the 4 cars (by Mike Collins, another associate… 

We had ridden in one of the two coaches last Saturday… today we inspected the second coach, now a skeleton, the RPO, now a mostly restored body, and eventually toured Pay Car F with the restoration staff.  We were here to transfer research files, to discuss restoration progress and findings, changes to the plans and to make additional recommendations… The work done is good… it is extensive…. It is sensitive to the cars and their historic fabric.  There is a new car body present, a baggage car.

We eat lunch at the Dutch Mill in town… (the only restaurant?) with Stathi and his parents… here from California for a visit and doing baby sitting duty while Stathi was in Santa Fe at the HRA conference.  In the afternoon Gael returns from Alamosa to pick us up…  she has spent the day exploring and writing…We return to the San Luis Brewing Company… only to find Stathi and his parent and wife and kids at a nearby table… 

The next day, Tuesday was much like the day before… Except that at the end of the day, when Gael returns she and I head east instead of North… Kyle stays with Zell, the C&TS restoration expert…

Gael and I drive about 3 hours west, and spend the night in Durango… at still another “Next” Best Western…  It too is the home of a narrow gauge railroad, but we are here not for the railroad but because it is a good location to stop on our way back to Nevada… We find “Ken & Sue’s” for dinner… a really wonderful dinner not at a brewpub…   Back at the Best Western we discover that the artwork on the 2nd floor includes a poster of “Eureka” a steam locomotive with which I have a personal connection (as in spending time in the fire box with a 3lb hammer and a cold chisel…) 

Again, up early… this time to heading home… with an appointment to make…  a hard deadline… but before we make that appointment, we have 10 hours of desert driving… 

West from Durango we take fuel in Cortez, near 4 corners… then north into Utah, visiting a ancient Puebloan ruin in Bluff… then south through Mexican Hat and Monument Valley…  The Monument Valley of John Ford and "Stagecoach" and other films... For me this is a special place I have visited before… for Gael this is new… 

We take time in Monument Valley to visit the Navajo National Park’s visitor center.  We are making good time and have time to spend on this spectacular place…  Then on, first south… then north and west towards Page and Lake Powell and into Utah… We take gas in Page…  then again west.. to Kanab, then south to Fredonia Arizona and the Arizona Strip… a historic no man’s land… reaching I-15 and a quick southern run home… 

We reach home about 5:00… we have time to pause, relax and take a deep breath… then off to the Moth Radio Hour Live show at UNLV… 

Life is hectic but good…








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