Awake in Oklahoma City. Cool and 55F. Homewood Suites includes a breakfast that wasn't bad as these things go. Sausage, Cheese Omelette (somewhat suspect,) Sausage & Biscuits, Waddles (actually waffles, but the spell correct word is what we would feel like if we ate them,) toast, bagels, hot oatmeal, but strangely, no fruit in sight. We dined heavier than we should, but then we are on vacation, right?
We packed up and loaded the blue chariot for another day of travel. We were out of OKC by 10:00 headed west on I-40. Twenty minutes out of town, it dawned on us that we were going to stop by the Afred P. Murray building memorial to the bombing - we will make a note to see it on the return trip. First stop was for fuel somewhere east of Amarillo, Texas. At this point the temperature had increased to 62, but, with the heavy breeze, felt much cooler than that. We continued onward through Amarillo and through the upper panhandle of Texas.
The scenery was rough and as boring as it ever is on any stretch of interstate highway anywhere in the country. The only thing visible was an occasional cow and, as the wind picked up, tumble weeds coming out of nowhere and committing suicide on the front of our chariot. In honor of the "One Book One Read" program for Nebraska, we had checked out the audible book My Antonia by Willa Cather so were able to listen to this as we traveled. Cather's description of the early Nebraska landscape was a stark contrast to that appearing outside our windows.
We were warned early in the day that there was ice in Albuquerque this morning, but weather reports were that it should be warmer in the afternoon. As we crossed into New Mexico, the winds picked up and our gas mileage was dropping; we were headed directly into the winds. We started up the low slopes leading up to mountains surrounding Albuquerque and the winds picked up. Our original plan was to head north somewhere east of Albuquerque to take in Santa Fe. However, checking the weather it was beginning to snow in Santa Fe and there was no sign that the weather would allow us to take in any of the sights. We therefore reset the needle to spend the night in Albuquerque.
Somewhere up the slopes, we stopped at a lonely fuel station named Milagro for a fill up. As I stepped out of the car to arrange prepayment I was almost blown over. The winds were blowing steadily at what I believe was nearly 60 mph. As I gassed up, hiding behind the rear of the car to avoid the wind, my face was stung by flying sand. I tacked back into the fuel office to settle up and then fought my way back to the car. Deb, smartly, decided to avoid a pit stop and wait for our final stop.
As we climbed the slopes on the eastern side of the mountains surrounding Albuquerque, it began to snow. The scenery was quite unusual, all the drought-brown grass, dotted with green black scrub trees, were being dusted in white. Very surreal. As we crested the east side of the Sandia mountains, the snow let up, although it never accumulated on the roads, it was quite a vision.
We pulled in to Albuquerque, the largest city in New Mexico, lying in the feet of these Sandia Montains along the Rio Grande river. The Old Town, where our hotel is located, was founded in 1706 as Duke City, founded as La Villa de Alburquerque in honor of the Spanish Duke of Alburquerque - the first "r" was dropped over the centuries.
The Hotel is attached to a convention center and we were ensconced on the 11th (top) floor. Quite a view of the surrounding valley and mountains, particularly beautiful at night. As we were tired of chicken and salami sandwiches, we opted for dinner in the hotel on this cool Sunday evening. We enjoyed a Negra Modela, a dirty martini, and some excellent southwestern food. Very enjoyable.
To end a long and tiring day of driving, we tuned into the evening episode of Queen Victoria on PBS and were sound asleep by 10:30, although due to the time zone change it was only 9:30 locally - tell that to our tired old bodies.
