Saturday, May 31, 2008

"Memorial Week" in the south west"

Ever since the beginning of time, we have been traveling. Yes we were hunters and gatherers at the time but there is always a small curiosity as to what we would anticipate when you get to a new location. As for me, thankfully I don’t need to travel for food. I love to travel a lot and see new places, different cultures and meet different kind of people for I am a people’s person. Now with new introduction that needs to be worked upon let me talk about my memorial week.

I had a one week vacation at my disposal and due to my visa restrictions; I could not travel out of the US until end of September ’08. So I was left with only two options which was either fly across Canada and go to Alaska which is still a US state or fly into Bahamas (now I don’t even know if this is a US territory). Anyways, I was so bound to travel out of Albany, NY as I wanted to see a scenery way different from the one I see in the North east. Not that I don’t like it there, but just I needed a change from being stuck in the same place for long time.

Then I watched “No country for old Men”. Well it was a movie with no real great Hollywood ending but the characters did a great job. Also, the flat lands of Texas that were shown in the movie was what motivated me to get a shot at checking out the south west United states of America. To boost my idea and to have the idea converted to a Itinerary, I should thank my friend Tony Dibiase who just drew a beautiful pictures of deserts and flat lands of New Mexico in my knuckle head.

Without a second though, I got right to kayak.com found the site with the cheapest ticket of course and made my reservation through United. Oh and before I get into my journey of a lifetime that I just experienced, let me tell you the reason as to why I did not attempt on flying to Alaska. Alaska is a beautiful place (at least that’s what google results kept telling me) but it was way too expensive to fly and spend a week in Alaska let alone the flight which takes a ridiculous 8-10 hours depending on the transit time. I couldn’t do that and hence I was a little restless in finding a new place to explore that I had never been to. I am so grateful to Tony for helping me to push the envelope and making this reservation to Albuquerque, NM.

For those of you who have no clue about New Mexico or who think this is a country by itself, New Mexico is a state in US with Texas to the east, Colorado to the north, Arizona to the West and the country Mexico to the south. This is a state with a population of about two Million people and almost a million living in the state big city Albuquerque. This state has the highest concentration of Native Indian people and reservation in the US. A lot of history, ancient dwelling, native Indian colonies about 1000 years old comes along with each of the reservations. New Mexico is one of the top 5 states when it comes to the area of the state. To put into perspective, population of the city of Bangalore, India is 11 million and size of New Mexico is almost Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh (four relatively large states in southern India) put together.

After my reservation, I had no clue as to what was in store for me. First thing I did after I made my reservation is jumped to Borders and bought a travel book on New Mexico. I scanned through the whole book in about three hours and got excited already. I looked through the internet and started to see the flat lands that I wanted to see for myself. I ran to circuit city and bought a SONY A-200W DSLR. The funny part of this is that the cover page of this travel book that got me so very excited about the whole trip to New Mexico was in Utah. Here below is the picture of the cover page of my travel book. Now this only meant I will have to do the extra 200 miles drive to see the scenic “Valley of the Gods” in Utah.

Before I start losing you guys from reading this never ending introduction, I better start pinning down my 7 day adventure. I started building my itinerary for 7 days with the help of google again and here are the 2 maps. The first one is the one that I made up before I flew out of Albany and the second one is the new one that I just made after knowing what Exactly I did. I can tell you guys one thing, everything was so perfectly timed and went so very well. If I have to redo my trip again would I change my itinerary? Absolutely not. It was a perfect 7 day trip. There are a couple of things I would do a little different. But I will get to then by the end of this blog.

Here comes the day to day description of my mind boggling ordeal.

Day 1 -> May 24, 2008: Flight to Albuquerque
This was the day of the trip. My flight was at 2PM in the afternoon. It was a gorgeous morning. Hence of course, we had to have our session of 9 holes at the Van Pattern Golf Course in Malta, NY with Youri and Emil. After the good game where I had a crappy 62 shots on the 9 holes and Youri proudly claiming his victory as usual, we stopped at his place for a coffee. One thing led to another and I realized that I was already late. It was 11:20AM and I had to drive home for about 30 minutes, pack, wait for a cab to arrive and take the ride to the airport. Fortunately, I call it the God sent Cab, sitting right in front of my apartment with no passenger in it. I convinced the driver to wait for 15 minutes as I pack and drop me to the airport. If not for the “god sent cab”, I would have had a disastrous start to my trip by missing my flight.

I boarded the flight to Albuquerque with a stop at Dullus Intl. airport in D.C. On my connecting flight, I got to talk to Bailey (I hope I spelt it right). I always have to blame my tailbone injury from snowboarding to give myself a chance to stand at the rear end of the flight and talk to people. She seemed like a hitch hiker herself and was interested in visiting India and Hitch hike for three months. I then wondered, maybe that’s what I have to do, Explore India sometime in the future.

As I arrived at Albuquerque, rented a car and drove towards downtown. There came my first and fortunately last hiccup of my trip. Something went wrong with the engine, which made me pull over to the nearest Motel (Stardust Motel) on the Historic Route 66. The motel seemed to have a History of it. Every building for that matter in the old town seemed to have some kind of a history. It was 9PM by now and I had to find a place to rest anyways. Walked to Downtown and grabbed some food and a couple of beers and I was surprised to see the overwhelming number of Hispanic/ Mexican people. Only later was I corrected by the Dibiase’s that they are NEW MEXICAN or NATIVE INDIANS. Some locals would be offended if they were called Mexicans.
Stardust Inn Pictures. Left (history of the Inn), right (Stardust Inn)

Day 2 -> May 25, 2008 Santa Fe, Bandelier National Monument, Ojo Caliante
I stayed over night at that Motel for a staggering 49 bucks (definitely more expensive than 14+taxes when they started in the 60’s). The rate was totally acceptable as the TV in the room had Speed Channel for me to watching F1 at Monaco and witness Lewis Hamilton as he took the chequered flag. Unfortunate Adrenil Sutil had to retire after being rear ended by Kimi instead of clinching the first few points for Force India. In the mean time, Dollar rental got me a replacement car for the broken car that I had. This was the only problem that I had during my trip (unless I miss my connection flight from Chicago to Albany as I am writing this in the flight from Albuquerque to Chicago).

After watching the post conference at Monaco, I started my awesome 1500 mile (2400 Km) loop which I had anticipated or planned as a 800 miles loop when I started. I drove from Albuquerque to Santa Fe which is the capital of New Mexico. I took the Turquoise trail instead of I-25. This route was a very scenic and beautiful ride from Albuquerque to Santa Fe. I now started to get a feel of the different kind of deserts that are present on this planet. For me a desert was just bare land filled with sand. Period. Now I was witnessing the desert of New Mexico which is at a height of about 6000 feel above sea level, dry with small trees or bushes as the only mode for converting carbon Dioxide to Oxygen.

Turquoise trail Pics

Santa Fe was breathtaking. All the building in downtown Santa Fe were made from Adobe style and none of the building were over 3 storey high. Well this is the regulation or a law and you cannot have a building otherwise. This town just feels like its stuck back in time. I just walked around downtown all morning as I kept satisfying my craving for the super famous Green Chili Stew of New Mexico. Here are some pictures taken in downtown Santa Fe. There is a lot of history that goes into Santa Fe, but I rather not get into the details. This was by far my Favorite city in New Mexico. Not the best yet in the US.

Downtown Santa Fe pictures

I then got in touch with Tony as he was in the area road biking. We planned on meeting at Ojo Caliante that night for spoiling myself with natural mineral hot springs. I did have some time in my hand for the afternoon. Hence I quickly drove to Bandelier National monument. This place was the first of its kind I have ever been to. You get to see Indian community built at least 800 to 1000 years back. These dwelling take you (as I put it) to pre-historic times. They weren’t smart people in terms of building cars or ships like the Europeans at the same time, but were amazing hunter-gatherers, social and skilled artistic people. I have plugged in some pictures taken at the Bandelier National park. They had caves carved into the mountains that would keep them cool in summer and warm during winter. They also had this little adobe homes off the mountains which are currently being restored.
Pictures from Bandelier national monument

It was time for me to spoil myself now. Drove to Ojo Caliante (remember anything which has ‘j’ in Spanish / Mexican is pronounced as a ‘h’, hence this is pronounced as ‘oho caliante’, same as ‘San Hose’, ‘Huan pueblo’ etc). This place had some real nice mineral hot spring. I met the four calmest brothers I have ever seen in my life – Carmen, Tony, Virgil and Mario Dibiase. We spent an hour in the hot springs, had some good dinner and headed back to Virgil’s home in Abiquiu. This was yet another beautiful adobe style home smack in the middle of no where. It was a beautiful night as I gapped at the milky way. How often does one get to see the sky almost in all directions on this not so mountainous land. This is what I was here in the southwest for. Bare flat land and gorgeous clear night sky is all I wanted to gape at. I have just plugged in some pictures taken from the Ranch I stayed at.

Pictures taken at Dibiase Residence

Day 3 -> May 26, 2008 : High roads to Taos, Taos Pueblo, Drive to Durango
I wanted now to take the high roads which is yet another scenic drive from Santa Fe to Taos. I got some recommendation from the four brothers as to where to stop and what to do. Also, as I spoke to Virgil, he skewed my itinerary (I am thankful he did) and he asked me to visit the real American town of Durango, Colorado and witness the Rockies. Departing from Espanola (Virgil’s place), I took the high roads to Taos. It was yet another kind of terrain I had never seen before. On my way I stopped at Chimayo to get some pictures of the famous “Santuario De Chimayo”, a church with some history. Grabbed a quick bike at Leona’s restaurant (still eating only green chili stew) and headed to Taos. Here are some pictures from the beautiful town of Chimayo.

Pictures of church at Chimayo and also world class restaurants in the village of Chimayo

As I drove through Taos, I really didn’t find anything that special to stop over at. So I drove straight into Taos Pueblo. Now this place was different. It is a little native Indian community that still lives the old way. It was fascinating to see a living town which was 600-800 years old. Taking the guided tour gave us some good insights on what actually happened to native Americans and their disappearance from the US soil ever since the arrival of Europeans. Here are some neat pictures that will take you back in time.

Pictures taken at Taos Pueblo

At this point of time, I had to make up my mind on if I had to stay at Taos for the night or drive for three and half hour to get into Durango, CO. Thankfully, Marriott had a room for me in Durango. And I started to drive from Taos at 3:30PM. On my way to Durango, I made quick pit stops at Rio Grande gorge, Pagosa springs and some other scenic spots. This was another beautiful ride giving me a good understanding of the Rockies.
Youtube Link : (Rio De Grande Gorge)



While I was at the Rio Grande gorge, I took a quick video of the whole view of the gorge. You guys have to check this video out that I have uploaded on youtube. This was the beginning of the next six to seven 360 video (as I call it). The 360 videos are basically me standing at a point and looking in all 4 directions. This gives you a fine idea of the variety of terrains I witnessed in New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Arizona. Below are some pictures anyways on the scenic drive to Durango.

Pictures taken en-route Durango, CO

After checking into the hotel in Durango, I strolled around downtown. I FELL IN LOVE WITH THIS PLACE. If at all I retire in the US, It will be somewhere in southern Colorado. This place was god sent. So was southern Utah in its own way. Durango had the nicest people I have ever met. I always used to say, the highest concentration of nice people on this planet is in Taiwan. This place doesn’t come close in terms of the shear number of people, but every person I spoke to in Durango was nice… By the way at the base of Rockies Durango stands at 6500 feet above the sea level.

Day 4 -> May 27, 2008: Durango, Scenic Byway, Telluride
Next morning, I walked around downtown Durango. The weather was perfect in the 70’s. Made it to the historic Durango-Silverton Narrow gauge Rail Road (DSNGRR). This was a fun place to see some old trains. These trains were used in the early 1900’s to transport coal from Silverton to Durango. Now this train is used only for tourist purposes in the summer. The next time I come over to Durango, I definitely will take this train. Just got some pictures of downtown Durango.

Pictures of Downtown Durango

Youtube Link : (360 for the Rockies)



Here I had an interesting lunch where I had a hot dog at a local shack. Terry, the owner of the joint came up with a map and asked me to take the 5 hour round trip ride on Scenic byway through silverton, Ouray, Telluride and back. This was the nicest ride as he said “the best place to see the Rockies all around the horizon which were the 13ers (13000+ foot high)”. This gave a real good idea of the Rockies to me. Here in the first picture below you see Terry in his shack, then I have pictures of the scenic byway.
Pictures of scenic byway and Rockies. You also see my hotdog pal, Terry.

On my way back to Durango, I picked a guy who was hitchhiking who wanted to be dropped at Rico. Abe was a funny guy and he lived in Rico, a town with 200 people. I got this feeling that this city is filled with a bunch of potheads. In return for me dropping him to Rico, I scored. That’s all I will say about that. After seeing at least 30 Elks on my way back, I think I had to call it a day. I had a couple of 360 done on this day. Check them out on this youtube link below.

Day 5 -> May 28, 2008 : Shiprock, Four corner monument, Valley of Gods, Mexican Hat

This was the day I had to leave Durango. I really wasn’t in the right mood. On one hand, I was leaving Durango and on the other I was on my way to the most anticipated day of the trip – Valley of Gods and Monument valley. On my way I stopped at the “Shiprock” and at the “Four Corner monument”. This is the only point in the US where four states come together (New Mexico, Utah, Colorado and Arizona)! Here is another 360 taken at the four corner monument.

Youtube Link : (360 at four corner monument)




From here I drove to Mexican hat and checked in at San Juan Inn for the night. I got a map of the area and headed straight to the valley of the god to get the same picture as on the cover page of the travel book shown above. Here are some of the pictures taken in the locations traveled on day 5.

Picture from top left in counter clockwise direction – Shiprock, Mexican Hat, Valley of God, Muley Point at sunset, Goose neck, four corner monument

I had never seen a gargantuous place like this one. This place as I expected just blew me away. I was like on planet Persephone. I had some good dinner at San Juan Inn and next day got back on the road.

Day 6 -> May 29, 2008 : Monument Valley, Window Rock, Gallup

I overheard someone say there are guided tours at the monument valley. I had to take it no matter what. This tour was great and I would recommend everyone going to Monument valley to take this tour. Pictures are going to do all the talking here. I always didn’t understand the phrase “Pictures don’t make justice to the location”. I look at the pictures now and I know exactly what it means. The location in actuality is a thousand times prettier than in these pictures below. Anyways, watch and enjoy.

I got infinite more pictures taken at this location but there is only so much that I can upload. This was the peak or as everyone else calls it ‘Center of attraction’ for my trip.

Youtube Link : (360's at monument valley).. All 3 are awesome. 2nd one is the best








After monument valley, I was up on the longest journey of my trip. I had to get back to Gallup in New Mexico with a quick pit stop at Window rock. On my way I did a max speed of 104. My rental Chevy Aveo is definitely not built for anything more that 90. I feel uncomfortable driving that car above 90Mph. I was let go by yet another cop who turned on his siren moving in the opposite direction just to slow me down and was obviously a virtual warning.

Window Rock and El Rancho in Gallup

Youtube Link : (360 where I almost got pulled over... why would anyone drive slower than 90MPH here ;) )



Gallup is a old town that thrived when this city was a center of Railroad and was on Route 66. Now this city has faded away. This Hotel El Rancho was a famous one with almost every celebrity/ politician of the 50’s and 60’s making a visit to this hotel. Since the city is not booming anymore, this hotel doesn’t have any celebrity coming in anymore but only tourists like me. I got a good 60’s royal treatment at this hotel and stayed overnight.

Day 7 -> May 30, 2008 : Sandia Peak
Last day in the southwest was a day to relax after the 1450 mile drive. I just drove down from Gallup to Albuquerque. Made it to the top of Sandia Peak with the help of the longest tram in the world. Got to the top of the peak, had a couple of beer and called it a day. I was drained by now. Just spent some time at the hot tub and that was the end of my trip.
Pictures from Sandia Peak

So If I had to do anything different here are a couple of things. First I would visit the Georgia O’Keefe museum in Santa Fe, secondly I would visit Monument valley in the evening and valley of gods in the morning. I could have also stayed overnight at Rico with my friend Abe. But I didn’t miss anything so much.
I hope you guys had a good time reading this. All you readers must make a trip to the Southwest to really look a the landscapes and say “WAAW, THIS IS GODS OWN CREATION