28F in Albuquerque this morning. A good night's sleep and down to breakfast in the Hotel Albuquerque at 9:00. Omelette and poached eggs today, neither of which were very good. The turkey sausage with green chiles was so bad I could only eat one of two patties. The strawberries and the V-8 juice were good. Not a whole lot to show for our $45.
We drove the Old Town area to get a feel for this tourist attraction. Similar to our Old Market but with a southwestern feel. No national brand stores or restaurants, so that makes for an enjoyable feel. As nothing is open on a Monday morning, we hit the I-40 and headed west.
The temperature held steady at around 30F for most of the day, dropping to 29F as we crossed the Continental Divide. As is evident in the photo, there was plenty of snow on the ground, but none in the air. The roads were totally clear as was the sky. Bright, sunshiny and cold. We stopped at the Continental Divide to fuel up, de-coffee and re-coffee for the balance of the morning.
We eschewed My Antonia this morning in exchange for the Original Cast recording of Alexander Hamilton, all 46 songs of it. It did make the time flow more quickly. Crossing into Arizona just after Gallup was easy, no border guards to halt our Blue car in this red state, although we are a bit nervous about our "My Cat is a Democrat" bumper magnet. We may pull it when we reach the Phoenix area.
We transferred to I-17 in Flagstaff. There was quite a lot of snow on the ground in Flagstaff, but, again all roads were clear and clean.We turned south and headed down the last hour and one-half towards our final destination of Anthem. We arrived at 4:20 and promptly unloaded and switched to sandals and swimming trunks for me. It is still cool, around 62F but not enough to stop me from hopping into the hot tub !
We capped off the evening with cocktails, grilled brats and a fire in the chimnea. A long, three day jaunt of 1,535 miles. Our little 4-cylinder chariot averaged 26.4 mpg up and down the mountains and against some 50 mph headwinds. Not too bad, all in all.
