South by southeast

We are ready for home. But not before taking in some southwestern color. Two

Estes Park, CO

days ago, we camped at Ft. Collins, CO and spent a day driving the Trail Ridge Scenic Highway from Estes Park west through Rocky Mountain National Park. It is the highest highway in the US and we topped out over 12,000 feet. My grandparents brought me through the Rockies when I was about 6 years old and I vividly remember frolicking in snow in my summer clothes. Precious little snow here,

Two miles high

even at the highest elevations.

We had lunch in an open air restaurant in the resort town of Grand Lake then we took another, equally beautiful route home through national forest land back to Ft. Collins. We have loved all of this but are getting saturated with it and running out of ways to photograph what we really can't capture.

Oh, those Rocky Mountains

We headed out of Ft. Collins down through Denver then down, finally, through more endless plains, interrupted by tree-covered buttes--something new. We'd seen lots of buttes, but always nearly barren, especially towards the tops. These were covered with thick trees all over. A pleasant change, but still endless. Yes, we are ready for the Uwharries.

Grand Lake, CO

Most of the places we've been so far have been pretty isolated, and in areas of very low population so we haven't had much traffic. We expected a lot at Rocky Mountain National Park as it was Labor Day and it was heavier than we've experienced, but still pretty mild. So we were out of practice navigating heavy traffic when we hit Denver.

Welcome to the Mile High City

The Coors Stadium was pretty impressive--loved the moving lines. And I have never seen a tractor pulling three trailers. It did get a little dicey at moments with 5 lanes of heavy traffic. I was pleased to see that they had an excellent system of electric trains. The tracks paralleled the interstate and the trains were frequent, full and fast--fast enough I wasn't able to get a picture, but you get the idea.

Denver Coors Stadium

From Denver, we continued south, through endless prairie to finally arrive at Santa Fe. We are staying in a hotel for two nights as a treat before we start the long haul home. Early this morning we got the oil changed and tires rotated on the truck and then spent a lovely morning and early afternoon in Old Santa Fe visiting galleries, jewelry stores and rug merchants. We had a great lunch and some Hagen Das sorbet and felt fully satisfied that we had completed our trip.

When we got back to the hotel to hook up the trailer for an

Be careful passing!

early exit in the morning, I saw my Check Engine Light. Our morning exit will depend on the dealer's ability to get us worked in today. I'm not too worried, but I'd sure rather be packing up to go. That said, this will be my last post for this trip. I may add a picture of Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo, TX if we are able to stop, but this is pretty much the trip. We will be cannonballing home just as soon as our cannon can fire properly.

So enjoy this few pictures of Santa Fe and send some good thoughts for our machinery on the way home. Very much looking forward to seeing you at the end of the trail.

I now have a dog...

 

The work was fabulous!

 

SO much to see, we almost didn't get downtown!

 

Restaurant Old Santa Fe

 

Palace of the Governors with natives selling their wares in the shade. Did I say "necklace"?

 

Center for Performing Arts

 

Wine Bar

 

Museum of Art

 

Public Art

PS. The truck is fine. A shout out to Fiesta Nissan who checked the codes, updated the software, assuaged my worries, paid for Uber to and from our hotel while we waited and didn't charge us a thing. Kudos to kindness.

PPS. My friend, Linda, gave me a journal to log all the states I've visited with my old girl. When we get home, LibraryAnn will have rolled through 31 states and 3 Canadian provinces. A shout out to the Scamp folks as well.