'Are you Taos people?' - Santa Fe day 6

I'm still feeling pretty crummy today, so we're opting for more of a laid back exploration day. We decided to head up to Taos to check out the scene. I plotted a route on the low road towards the Rio Grande Bridge. I've been amazed throughout this trip how dynamic the scenery is. I have an idea that the desert is monolithic and it absolutely is not. Every mile we drove, the earth and rocks around us evolved. Absolutely breathtaking!

We arrived at the bridge rest stop and made the short walk to the span. Supposedly when this bridge was built in the 60s there wasn't enough money to complete the road in the far side. So they created the graceful span some 600 feet over the Rio Grande pretty much as a point of interest. Once you see the views it sort of makes sense, but talk about 'if you build it, they will come'!

From there, we headed into Taos which was... Interesting. We drive arond and looked at the shops and did a little people watching. All in all, we weren't really feeling the vibe. Kris took us past an earthship which is an interesting approach to off the grid, sustainable design.

We opted to head back to the hotel for yet another nap. Along the way we stopped at el parasol for lunch. As we were eating a gentleman stopped by our table and said 'There's an old saying "if you want rain, be nice to somebody" so I hope you guys have a good lunch and have a great day!' Since he stopped  two other people and said the same thing to them on the way to his car, I suspect he just likes saying hi to people. However it was still nice!

After a refreshing and long nap, we headed to the various hot pools on the property. We met a local couple in one. They were from Albuquerque and were visiting the resort for the weekend. She asked us, with some incredulity, why we would possibly want to come to Santa Fe for a vacation. We had a nice chat about how we take for granted the things that are in front of us and how it's sometimes advantageous to be a tourist. We chatted about our various trips and mentioned that we had been up to Taos. She looked at us and said 'so, are you Taos people?' Trying not to offend in case I read the hot tub wrong, I responded that while I could see why people like it, it wasn't really for us. She laughed and said that she didn't really think it was us, in a nice way.

We headed to Paloma for dinner. Aside from the mega annoying foursome from Miami planning /kvetching about their daughter's wedding, it was lovely. Food was amazing and the ambiance was great. Sad to be on our second to last night! 

... the bill comes due - Santa Fe day 5

Some of you know I was battling a cold that Kris lovingly shared with me the week before we left. I didn't take time off from work because too much to do before vacation. And I certainly didn't want to be sick on vacation, so more powering thru. Right?

The plan for my birthday was for me to get up early and tackle a pretty long, challenging hike, then meet back up with Kris for the afternoon. Instead, we headed back to Bandelier and did the short loop of the ruins behind the visitor center. We then went for a long drive thru the park. I had wanted to try a short hike to a Dome, but the approach road was closed, so that was a pass.

Totally wiped out from a 1 hour walk and a long drive, we came back to the room where I totally uncharacteristically took a two hour nap. And still woke up tired.

For dinner tonight, we headed to a restaurant that we have a tenuous personal connection to. A couple of years ago, we took a cooking boot camp at the CIA in Napa. One of the other students, who was there with his father, is part owner of Radish and Rye. We liked his cooking at the boot camp, so... Dinner was fabulous! And for my birthday, we split two desserts. I gotta say, Kentucky butter cake for the win!

Hopefully, the long nap will help me kick the last of this ick... Just in time to go back to work! 

Puppies, chickens, and a big climb - New Mexico days 4-5

Since I've fallen a bit behind, today will be a double update.

Day 4

Today is a bit of a quiet spa day. We decided to make the most of it by exploring two of the on-site activities this morning - The Puppy Pile and the Chicken Chat! In the puppy pile, the resort brings in liters of puppies (5-7 animals at a time as I understand it) that guest can adopt. The Puppy Pile is sort of a pre-adoption meet and greet, although you don't have to be looking to adopt to stop by. They had two litters today - three German Sheperd - Australian Border collies and two Australian Border Collie mix of some sort. Kris and I got in the pen with the three brothers and spent a good time petting and interacting with the dogs.

We decided to take a short swim and availed ourselves of the hot tub and hammocks. Check out Kris' facebook for his obligatory hammock selfie. After a short time-out/nap, we headed over to the coop to partake in the chicken chat. The resort has a flock of ~15 hens and a lonely rooster. All of the chickens are silkies, which apparently are very laid back and friendly, as chickens go. I have to admit, I wasn't sure what to expect. The chickens were a bit skittish about being picked up, but once you got their wings tucked in and their feet secured under them, they are surprisingly cuddly. While silkies look pretty fluffy, I wouldn't say they were soft exactly, but I did enjoy petting them!

From there we headed to the spa - A Head to Toe 'experience' for me and a massage and 'sound healing' for Kris. The head to toe was a scalp, hand/arm, and lower leg/feet focused massage. It was so relaxing that I woke myself up snoring...Twice! The only down side was that the scalp massage featured a lot of oil and despite washing my hair 5 times since, it's still not quite back to normal yet. Kris said that the massage was fine and that the sound therapy was...Interesting. He has now been exposed to all seven of the healing frequencies, so, he has that going for him, Which is nice. All in all a lovely, relaxing day!

Day 5

Today we headed out tp the Hyde Park/Santa Fe National forest. We got a late start so the trail head we had planned to start at was completely packed. We headed back down the mountain to the visitor's center/ranger station and parked there. This, however, meant that we had a 1.7mile/1000+' elevation gain hike to get to our hike. Also, we started late, so we were doing this in the early-mid-day sun. 

Aside from the elevation changes, this hike felt very much like home. Lots of conifers, a surprising amount of greenery, and a ton of butterflies. My favorite part of this hike was a stream crossing at the mid-way point. All told, we covered almost 2K feet in elevation gain today in a little less than 7 miles. I gotta say, the altitude combined with some sustained climbs is no joke. Mt Airy will feel very different when we get home!

After dinner tonight, we hit up La Lecheria Santa Fe. Kris got a scoop of green chili and one of mint chocolate chip. Both were excellent and he claims they worked well together. I opted for a frozen affogato - salter butterscotch with Iconik Coffee ice cream. Delicious! 

Kris bags his first (almost) 10,000' - New Mexico day 3

We opted to stay close to home today and hike in the Santa Fe Forest. We drove up into a residential neighborhood situated at the base of a grouping of mountains. It turns out that Santa Fe has a series of trails called the Dale Ball trails. This covers more than 25 miles of interconnected trails across the city. We opted for the Dorothy Stewart and Atalaya Mountain trails. 

We worked our way up to Castle Rock, and then over to Picacho Peak. Along the way we ran into cousins of Cincinnati's villain/star du jour - the cicada. 

Their coloration is a bit different and the call is also a bit off, but still felt like a bit of home!

We also ran into this guy -

Not sure yet what he is, but he was kind of cute!

We slowly, so slowly, worked our way across a saddle over to Atalaya Mountain where Kris bagged his first 9K+ foot peak! Just look at how excited he is!

The descent was pretty much 2500' of unrelenting downhill over sand and walnut- to baseball sized rocks. Fortunately, neither one of us managed to turn an ankle!

By the time we made it back to the car, we were both pretty tired and thirsty so we stopped by a local brewery. Let's just say that MadTree doesn't have anything to worry about.

Dinner tonight was at a restaurant helmed by a James Beard award winning chef. Unfortunately, I didn't notice that he won the award in the 00's and apparently hasn't changed his food since. To be fair, everything was very tasty, if not nostalgia inducing. The best part of dinner was a bottle of wine from Baja Californian of all places. A Bordeaux style blend, it was superb and surprisingly reasonable!

New Mexico Day 2 - Bandelier

 Today we rectified the rental car situation. I seem to recall the rental process being more - involved in the before times. Today, the guy glanced at my license and sort of threw a set of keys at me. In the middle, my bank started messaging me to let me know that they declined the transaction because, does anyone really travel any more? I never signed anything, and I'm not entirely sure that I've actually paid for the car. We'll see what happens when I drop it off, as planned, at a location different from where I rented!

We decided to head out to Bandelier to take stock of whether or not we want to do the Stone Lions hike later in the week. The drive from Santa Fe to Bandelier is stunning! In addition to the amazing scenery, we drove past one of the Los Alamos giant telescopes/satellite dishes (They must get AAAAAAALLLLL the movies!) We arrived at the park and discovered that our pre-purchased pass doesn't really start until tomorrow. Fortunately, the ranger was good about it and let us in without too much fuss. I was surprised that the parking lot wasn't slammed and we were able quickly find a parking spot. We stopped into the park office and looked at the trails, walked briefly through the small museum, and stopped into the park shop for a few essentials (Bandelier trail map, lip balm with sunscreen - no idea where the 47 other ones I own are...) and some fun stuff (National park passport stamp and a few laptop stickers anyone?).

From there, we headed in the opposite direction of most of the throngs and started up the west canyon rim to the Frijolitos trail. Since we got a pretty late start, we really only want to check out the ascent and the terrain to understand what we are getting ourselves into, especially being flatlanders. While the climb was steady, it wasn't terrible. And having the right gear (A spiffy new birthday day pack thanks to my dad and a sun shirt that actually blocks the sun, but lets the breezes pour through for me. For Kris, sun shirt, long pants, and new trekking poles) makes a big difference. Once we topped the canyon, we were treated to spectacular views of of the ancient dwellings in the opposite canyon wall as well as the mountain ranges in the near distance.

Frijoles Canyon

Dwellings carved into the tuff

We hiked along the rim and debated heading out into the high desert to the next canyon, less than a mile away. However, it was already 11am and we weren't really prepared. As we were having the discussion, Kris' phone seemed to have a heat related freak out (If he phantom texted or called you, sorry!) We ultimately decided to head back down and leave the rest of the trail for later in the week when we can get a much earlier start. We encountered several mule deer; one was no more than 10 feet away from us. I also finally got a picture of one of the 'New Mexico squirrels' we keep hearing skittering through the brush as though they are much larger creatures. I think their lizards are much cuter than our squirrels even though they make the same amount of noise.

Lizard!

Dinner tonight was at Sazon which was probably a bit more high-concept than excellent execution. The cocktails were fantastic and the mains were - fine. The starters knocked it out of the park though. One dish was huitlacoche which is corn truffle or corn smut. I've heard of it, but had never tried it before. It was absolutely delicious! 

The other dish was chapulines tacos. Chapulines are baby grasshoppers that in this instances were poached in olive oil. They had a distinct but mild flavor. They mostly seemed to take on the flavor of the seasonings around them. 

A friend of mine shared some time ago that chapulin is slang for someone who often says exactly the wrong thing or mixes up their words. Additionally, it seems that many cultures have a tradition that if you eat a thing, you are imbued with its essence. Here's hoping I don't pick up any (more) foot-in-mouth tendencies from tonight's dinner!

Santa Fe Day 1

 

Today was our first full day in NM. We were supposed to be picking up the rental car and knocking around Santa Fe today. I apparently speced out the whole reservation, but then somehow never actually completed it. Although no cars are available today, we'll pick one up first thing tomorrow morning.

We're staying at the Ojo Santa Fe resort just south of Santa Fe. We were originally supposed to go to Ojo Caliente on the north side of the city in May of last year to celebrate our anniversary, but - Yeah, not so much. Unfortunately, they had a fire last year and they are still closed. 

Since we're without transport today, we opted to explore the property in the morning. Breakfast was blue corn pancakes, huevos rancheros, fresh fruit, and tons of water. Adequately fueled up, we headed out the back of the property to explore their hiking trails. We figured the ~4 mile would be a good chance to see how the heat and high altitude are treating us before we get into some of the longer hikes we have planned.

Note that north is pointing to the lower left corner of the map. Always a sign of a quality navigation tool!

We walked past the salt water pool and hot tub, and then past the archery range and out into the desert scrub. As we started climbing some of the small hills, the beauty of the New Mexico desert started to reveal itself. We've heard from several people that the weather has been unseasonably warm, so I was surprised at how much was in bloom! We passed by many cactuses outrageous pink and yellow flowers.

We hiked along and through several arroyos, one of which had barbed wire strung both down the sides and across the bottom as well as suspended in mid-air at the height of the surrounding ground. I pity the poor animal that gets caught up in a flash food and swept into that barrier.

After 2 miles we came to a copse of willows and cottonwoods. The cottonwoods are all going to seed right now, so as we enter the shade where grasses and small vegetation covered the ground, the cottonwood fluff looked for all the world like snow!

It was most surreal! We picked our way through the glen, enjoying the break from both the heat and sun. The lizards scampering through the brush reminded me very much of the squirrels back home - super noisy for such small prey animals!

All too soon the trail headed back up and into the scrub and we turned for our temporary home. When we arrived back at the room, we both realized that desert hiking comes with some - odors. Kris and I separately hopped in the shower fully clothed, not expecting the clothed to be cleaned, just hoping they would be clean enough to remain in the room with us until we can laundry.

All cleaned up and well re-hydrated, we caught a Lyft into Santa Fe. Along the way we learned that there are only *8* dedicated Lyft drivers in the city right now. Making us very glad indeed that we're getting our car tomorrow! We wandered around the Santa Fe Plaza area and stopped by the Gruet tasting room for a glass of bubbles.

It was then off to dinner at La Boca, a tapas restaurant. We started with jamon and morcilla pintxos, proceeded to some of the best artichokes I've had outside of Rome, and wrapped things up with Spanish style ribs and chicharrons. All in all, a tremendous start to the trip!

Boot camp Italy - Napa day 4

Today we tackled Italy in boot camp. On the docket was pasta making, mozzarella pulling, and gnocchi making. I was a bit surprised that only one other person in the class had made pasta previously. I drew the short straw on my team and was tasked with making a salad - without a dressing. So, that was a bit of a bummer.

Since I had nothing but time on my hands, I got to float around and see what the other teams were doing. My overall take away is that home cooks don't taste their food often enough during the cooking process. We had a lot of dishes that were either pretty bland or people tried to season once everything was done, so it was super salty in spots and totally bland in others.

Mozzarella pulling is an interesting party trick, but I don't know that for us mere mortals it's worth it. While I didn't get to try my hand at it, I believe I learned enough to finally get over my gnocchi yips. I suspect that I've been too timid in the amount of flour I've added. I also suspect that I actually haven't worked the dough long enough to develop structure. So, in fear of making tough gnocchi, I've erred into making completely structure-less mush.

After school today we headed down to St. Supery. This is another winery that we've driven past for years and have never stopped by. Once again, we were pleasantly surprised here. The wines were by and large very nice and surprisingly affordable. Our tasting host was...too much. Turns out he's going to be in Miami Beach later this month at the same time as us. Fingers crossed we don't actually run into him while we're there.

Dinner tonight was at the newly-opened Hal Yamashita. Excellent little Japanese restaurant! I hope they do well. I find that Asia food is an excellent foil to all of the wine and European cuisine in the valley.