Thursday, April 24, 2014

Spring Break in Red River with Mike and Judy

Rio Grande Gorge Bridge
Shopping in Taos
Hiking at Wild Rivers
St. James Hotel, Cimarron, NM
In the "haunted" St. James Hotel
Getting tamales in Taos
Dorine at "La Junta" Overlook
At the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge

Half-way through our hike
Near the main ski lift, Red River
"La punta de la Junta"
No one can call me "gutless"!

A whole wall ready to fall
A Rocky Mountain Bighorn (ewe)
Me with the Tooth of Time, Philmont Scout Ranch

"Sisters"
Picnic at Wild Rivers Recreation Area

Dorine and I spent most of the Albuquerque Public Schools spring break (April 14-18) on a vacation to Red River, NM with Judy and Mike (Dorine's sister and her husband). We stayed four nights at the Red River Worldmark resort, where Mike got us a two-bedroom suite for very little money. We've been in Red River with Judy and Mike several times now, and it's always a nice, relaxing time. On this trip we drove up to Cimarron, NM, site of the St. James Hotel and the Philmont Scout Ranch. We ate lunch at the St. James and then received permission to go look around the older, upstairs (now unused) part of the hotel, where a number of historical figures stayed back in the latter part of the 19th Century.  (I was interested to find out that Wyatt and Morgan Earp and their wives spent four nights there while en route to Tombstone, AZ and the famous shoot-out at the OK Corral.)  The hotel is also reputedly haunted and, for that reason, has been featured in multiple television shows.  Then we drove up to the Philmont base camp and looked around a little.  I went to Philmont iin 2004 with our son Darren and Mike and Judy's son Aaron (who went back in 2007), so it was a bit of a trip down memory lane for me and an interesting place to visit for Dorine, Judy, and Mike.  Before leaving, we drove down a dirt road a ways and got a few pictures with the "Tooth of Time," Philmont's most-iconic geological feature.

We also spent time in Taos, shopping and getting tamales, and we stopped at the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge for a short hike and some photo-taking.  The next day we went to the Wild Rivers Recreation Area, where the Red River joins the Rio Grande, and we took a four-mile (two miles one way) hike along the canyon rim before having a picnic lunch.  As usual, we ate well, having "USDA prime" sirloin steak and baked potatoes every night.  All in all, a very enjoyable trip, as all of our travels with Mike and Judy are.