Monday, August 31, 2015

Travel Bloopers

No flat tires this trip, at least so far. However, I have run into a few....bloopers.

Alex and I left Flagstaff after doing a bit of food shopping, edibles and cold stuff carefully tucked into the big new cooler with ice.  Edibles included Blake Forbe's delicious homemade fruit scones and chocolate chip cookies.  If you are wondering why such staples of the road were in the cooler, just think "arf.

We'd eaten breakfast at Miz Zip's, huevos rancheros for me, and I grimaced over the coffee.  I am picky about my coffee; I want half and half, not milk!!  I'd last been in Miz Zip's 40 years ago.  Coffee excepted, it's comforting that some places are still where they are supposed to be.

 Except for my mother's biscuits and sausage gravy, huevos rancheros and Eggs Benedict are my breakfast favorites.    

Fortunately for me, I've never been to a restaurant that offers both.  My inability to choose .....  























Tummies full, provisions stashed safely away from canines, we set out on a relatively short 200 mile jaunt on Rte 89 to the North Rim.  Our journey would take us up to Marble Canyon , then cutoff on 89 Alt through Lee's Ferry, over Navajo Bridge, up to Jacob Lake, and then that gloriously beautiful drive to the Rim.

Chatting away about old times, new lives, the grandeur of the country through which we were passing, we barely noticed a sign with weak electric lettering positioned awkwardly a few miles past the turnoff onto 89A.  We crossed the bridge, checked out the small community which serves the river rafters, eagerly recalled our own trips down the Colorado, then....... (You saw this coming back at the sign, didn't you??)  Yes, amidst this stunning scenery


a torrential downpour had pushed tons of thick, red mud (there is a reason the area is called the Vermillion Cliffs) onto 89A in several places over about a 20 mile stretch.  Imagine this road deep in mud:


This stuff:
And this: (More on these photos in another post)


Now imagine what went through my head and then past my lips as I realized we had to back track 20 miles, making a total of 40 miles out of our way.  Grrrrrr........Aarrggg.......  Back to 89. North to Page. Detour in Page around construction; poorly marked.   Grrrrrr........Aarrggg.......  Up through Kanab, down through Fredonia.  Grrrrrr........Aarrggg.......   It's beautiful but over 100 miles out of the way.  Could have been there by now, with a cold beer or lovely glass of wine.  Another sign in Fredonia.  This time I pulled a U turn to make sure we read it, carefully, slowly, methodically.  Hmmmm....neither of us certain.  Could we make it to Jacob Lake?  We asked at a nearby Forest Service ranger station.  No way were we going to make the same mistake again in the same day.

Fortunately for my sanity, the sign referenced the road closure south of Jacob Lake, so on we sailed, stopping in Jacob Lake for gas and both canine and people comfort stations.  Surprisingly, two vehicles filled with polygamous youth looking to be in their teens were in the parking lot.  Not difficult to identify them as polygamous.  Girls in that odd style dress and hair in one vehicle; boys staring fixedly at Alex and me from the bed of a pickup truck.   Later that day at the North Rim check in station, I asked about their presence.  On a picnic a few days earlier, between Jacob Lake and the Park boundary,  a 5 year old boy had wandered off, and the search was still underway.  His body was eventually located.

The lovely drive


brought us to the North Rim and our campsite.  We got everything squared away....had wine and cheese and fruit for supper, savoring the clear air, the clean skies, headed for bed.

And then my bed fell!  As those of you who have small campers know, a table lowers to make a bed.  In my ALiner, two wooden slats attached to the bench seats hold the table; firm cushions go on the  lowered table; my not-so-firm-body adorns the top.  One of the slats fell off.  Bed caved, me with in it.  I had to laugh.  Fortunately, I have two tables, ergo two potential beds, so I just made up the other one.
And the next day, Alex and I spent most of the day in the camper.  Rain, rain, rain, rain.  And 8,800 feet in altitude.  I fell asleep three times, a combination of the rain on the roof and the altitude.  We decided to drive to the Lodge rather than cook and arrived in time to eat with clearing skies....this:



A rainbow smiling on us

It was the beginning of a wonderful week.








Friday, August 28, 2015

Route 66 and I-40

Remember those road trips back in the day?  Before the bland anonymity of interstate highways and cookie cutter hotels?

Back in the late 50s or early 60s, we took a family trip to Key West, Florida, to spend Christmas with our cousins:  Cary and Bill Howard, and their children Betsy and Susan, Woody not yet born.

We loaded up our 1950 Chevy, without air conditioning or radio, with a back seat that we could, and did,  get lost in, topping out with a speed of 65, though the roads most likely kept us to 50 or 55.  For this was before interstate highways, and US 1 would have been our route shot to Key West.  My strongest memory is of staying in a motel, my first, and it had a bed with "Magic Fingers."  For my very tired parents, my begging for a quarter to put in the bed and then wriggling around on its wonderful vibrations must have been road trip hell....but what a memory for a little girl.

Today, I speed down a smooth (usually) highway, so well-marked that I couldn't get lost if I drove it blind.... And driving interstates is driving blind:  We see nothing expect the white line, mesmerized by the nothingness that envelops us, as we listen to Sirius XM or tunes on our IPod.  We are hermetically sealed in a pod of glass and plastic and tin, against the world.

Yet, between Albuquerque and Flagstaff, I dipped again into that older world of our road trip to Key West, this time in Gallup, New Mexico, and a few smaller, decaying towns on Route 66 .


Gallup is perhaps more fortunate than other bypassed Route 66 towns, and it has done some sprucing up in the past 20 years, attempting to acknowledge its Native American neighbors and influence.

I think this pot is modeled on those from Acoma Pueblo; it stands about 5 feet tall, too large for me to steal.  Acoma Pueblo, the Sky City, is astonishing.  If you have a bucket list, add Acoma.

And a famous old hotel still opens it doors for customers, the El Rancho.  It is one of several hotels along Route 66 that touts its history of catering to the many  movie stars who shot films in the vast openness of the American West.



Unfortunately, with the exception of the cookie cutter motels where I-40 and Route 66 meet, much of Gallup looks like this:


Back in the day, it might have been quite nice.  Now it's deserted and boarded up.  Even though Route 66 is a mere shadow of its heyday, the streets are still wide....four lanes here in Gallup and in many other towns.  Town on the left, street in the middle, and the railroad on the right.  The railroad is about the only enterprise that brings steady income to Gallup and other Rte. 66 towns.  And I do love taking RR photos!


Burlington Northern and Santa Fe
Remember all those kitschy, ticky tacky places we begged and begged our parents to take us to, as we drove to Grandmother's or Aunt Vivian's?  Rock City....Live Alligators.....Tweetsie Railroad???  The road west has its own kitsch:

The blue dinosaur is especially attractive, I think.  Unfortunately, they did not seem to be associated with a commercial venture, so I was deprived of the opportunity to spend money.   However,  a
Gen -U-Wine tourist trap shortly presented itself:

Complete with:
The skeletal figure appears to be more Pueblo Indian than the Apache of Geronimo, but perhaps the artist was taking artistic license.  In fact, Geronimo seems to have confined his activities to what is now southern Arizona and southern New Mexico, so putting him in northern New Mexico may be more artistic license.   Or rather...commercial license, as the name Geronimo is familiar to most of us baby boomers.

Mickey D's does not call to me. Nor does Taco Bell or Arby's or Denny's or other eateries of their ilk.  Yet such are the sine qua non of the interstate.  Not only do they not call to me, they won't let me bring in the canines, even in carrying cases.  So BAH to their sterility and cardboard food.  Here's where I dined that day, with the canines in the seat across from mine:


Cool, comfortable, good food.  No complaints about the canines.  What more could I ask for, along the fabled Route 66..... Except a glimpse of the Corvette and those two dreamy guys.  Step back into youth.     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zw1tiNGQ4wI





Monday, August 10, 2015

Friday, August 7, 2015

Lazing in Albuquerque

Several of you have wondered as to my whereabouts and activities.  I landed at Cousin Betsy's in Albuquerque, where, in between getting a spare car key cut so I could lock the dogs in the car with the AC on, buying dog food since traveling with my homemade stuff is not easy, and getting a new touch pad for my McBook Pro, I've been playing with  LLAMA FLEECE.

A friend in Wise gave me the fleece from her two llamas.  I've been wanting to wash, card, spin, and weave it, just to be able to say  "Oh, yes. I washed, carded, spun, and wove it myself."  Of course, if I really, really wanted to be a fiber snob, I'd grow the llama and shear it myself.

I started with one tub of llama fleece....unwashed, but, fortunately, not too dirty.

 Then, I wrapped a portion of the fleece in mosquito netting and immersed it gently in tepid, soapy water.  These activities take place in the back yards and back porch.


I swished very, very gently, so as not to turn the fleece into felt.  I let it sit for awhile, then swished again.  After half an hour or so, I lifted the netting, heavy now with wet fleece, out of the tub and onto

 Betsy's clothesline, where I let it drip while I emptied the water from the wash tub, refilled, and gently immersed.....  Repeat until water runs clear, 3 to 4 times.

It is at this point, looking at all the water I'm using for a very small batch of fleece, that I begin to wonder how the Navajos wash sheep fleece in arid Navajo country.  Betsy and I postulated stock tanks.  After the final rinse, I spread a sheet on the ground and scattered the wet fleece around to dry.

Gradually, clean fleece accumulated

until I had a pile and was ready to card.  A friend of Betsy's had lent her a drum carder


which  turns fleece into spinnable fiber, called a batt,  much easier than using hand carders.  I tried with a hand carder once, for about five minutes and knew I would have been an abject failure as a pioneer.  I fed the fleece into the drum carder, turned the handle, and voila, something resembling a spinnable object began to appear.


I moved to the front porch as the back porch faces west.  A wonderful work space. The batt  produced by a novice (moi) resembles a Halloween fright wig.


Trust me.  A professionally carded batt does notnotnot look like a Halloween fright wig.  But I'm new at this so.....  I now have a small stack of Halloween fright wigs


which will one day become yarn.

All of the above supervised, gently and with love, by












Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Dwiving With Waze

I was looking for road trip apps and a cousin getting ready to set out on a family RV jaunt from Wise to Washington state shared WAZE.  It seemed potentially useful so I downloaded it to my phone, a smart phone the IQ of which certainly exceeds mine.

Day 1 from Columbia to Tupelo, I decided to test WAZE, since I couldn't get lost on I 20 between Columbia and Birmingham. 

WAZE provides basically the same GPS function as  my Android Mensa phone, but it apparently is interactive, in that users flying down the highway at death defying speeds can enter information that other users who are also flying down the highway at equally death defying speeds can access.  Some of this information is extraordinarily useful:

Vehicle on Shoulder,  Miz WAZE tells me in a voice which, I admit, is much less nasal than that of my GPS.  So now, as I am flying down the highway at a death defying speed, my eyes wander toward the shoulder, waiting for Vehicle on Shoulder to appear.  Miles pass and vehicle does not appear.  Did I miss it, I worry.  What if the driver in Vehicle on Shoulder was a retired college professor on Medicare with two little canines, and she needed assistance?  If I didn't see her, was I not fulfilling my responsibility as a  WAZEr?

And if the Vehicle on Shoulder wasn't there, where ever there is supposed to be, should I remove my eyes from the road and my attention from the wheel long enough to locate the cute little WAZE icon which would allow me to notify my fellow WAZERs that Vehicle on Shoulder was no longer Vehicle on Shoulder?  Such a dilemma.

In addition to providing important information such as Vehicle on Shoulder, WAZE apparently enables me, as I am flying down the highway at a death defying speed, to interact with other WAZERs.  Some of you may have read my previous post on Things I Don't Tell Mother When Traveling, so you are aware of my previous unwanted encounter with an interstate motorist.  Now, thanks to the blessing of technology, I might choose a wanted encounter with a stranger in the middle of Oklahoma.  Here's how I envision it might go, keeping in mind that I am flying down the highway at a death defying speed, typing on WAZE via my cell phone:

"Hi male person driving at furious speed on I40.  I'm a female traveling alone, typing as I drive at furious speed on I40."

Response from male person:  "Hi beautiful solo lady traveling alone all by yourself in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma."  

 Balloon over male person's vehicle reads:  Boy O Boy!!!!   Yippeeee!!!!  Got me a sucker on the line!!!!!  All by her little lonesome far from home way out here in the middle of nowhere!!!!!!!!!!!  Thank you Jebus!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Text response from male person:  "Oh beautiful lonely lady who is so far from home in the middle of this dreadfully hot weather in the middle of nowhere. Let us meet at the wonderfully cool Casino at the next exit and I will purchase for you a lovely glass of cool wine....."

Balloon over my vehicle:  Why would I be so dumb as to contact someone via WAZE?  Either I'd kill myself "texting while driving" or he'd slip me a roofie......








Tucumcari and Route 66


 Perhaps this photo exemplifies the lure of Tucumcari, Route 66, and RV travel for me.  I want to be Betty Boop....tee hee!  And this little RV is about the size for me and the canines.  Speaking of canines, here they are in the Sun and Sand Restaurant  (https://www.facebook.com/SunSandRestaurant), just down Rte. 66 from Betty's abode.


One per carrying case, otherwise they fight, really, really fight.  I didn't try to conceal the cases as I entered the Sun and Sand, not that I could have, but neither staff nor customers cared that I was probably violating health codes....unlike another place east of the Mississippi which had evicted me because some customer had complained.  The staff was sympathetic; they'd rather have evicted the complainer and let me stay.   New Mexico seems to be a bit more mellow than Mississippi......just saying.

While I would occasionally catch a glimpse of Marty Milner and George Maharis driving insouciantly in their dashing Corvette, it was just out of the corner of my eye, and I never did catch up with them.  I did see a number of places they might have stayed, including

this wonderful, now delapidated, closed old motel. I'd much rather stay here than in a cookie cooker Days Inn or Ramada.  Of course, I do stay in KOAs..... 

And as with folks everywhere, Tucumcarians are not reluctant to provide evidence of their political proclivities.


Not mine of course, but clever nonetheless.  Now I'm off to Albuquerque!

Monday, August 3, 2015

Westward Ho!

https://www.google.com/search?q=youtube%3A++amarillo+by+morning&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

Given the photo, the astute reader may surmise that I am in Texas, and you would indeed be correct.  The KOA at which I reside this evening offers free limo service to the  Free If You Can Eat It 72 Ounce Hunk of Dead Moo.   (http://bigtexan.com/72oz-steak-rules/)

No longer an eater of Dead Moo, I passed and ate my humble sandwich at a picnic table in a lovely, cool breeze. 

Last night was also a KOA night.  A KOA is a bit like Olive Garden or Reno's Roadhouse:  Nothing fancy, but you know pretty much what you'll get.  Clean bathrooms, flat sites, swimming pool, dog area, play ground, friendly (sometimes too much so at the end of a long drive) hosts, with sites a bit closer than I'd like but not too close that I get claustrophobic.  After all, I'm not backpacking in the wilderness as I did in my stronger-backed younger days.

I'm on night 3 of the 1600 mile trek from Columbia to Albuquerque.  I could have done it in 3 days rather than 4, but the last time I did that, I utterly exhausted myself.  And why rush?  It isn't as if I have to get back to work.  Tee Hee......

Unfortunately, I have only one key with me, although I will have another made in Albuquerque. 

Why???

It has been hot hot hot, and humidity to go along, and that has presented a real problem.  With the car windows even cracked, the temperature inside would reach over 100 degrees within a very, very few minutes.  Wide enough open so  they wouldn't die, Abbey would be out like a shot, trailing me to my location.  That has meant that  I cannot leave the canines in the car long enough to go to the bathroom.....
And with that to puzzle you, I'm off to bed.