Dear readers, looking back at today I can’t believe all the things we did and we didn’t even leave the house until 10 a.m.

First things first, we saw a lizard this morning, and it was tiny and adorable. It was probably about 2 inches long and scurried right up to us on the patio when we were enjoying the morning sunshine. Jacob used his research skills on Google to determine this was a Common Side-Blotched Lizard.

We both slept poorly last night. I’m not really sure why. The bed is comfortable and the house is cool and quiet. For some reason we both keep waking up a lot. This made for another slow-ish morning.

We ate breakfast at the AirBnB and then got ourselves ready to head out the door. Jacob had a day of grand adventure planned, down to the minute. We left just about 10 a.m. and headed off. Along the way we had many beautiful views of mountains and mesas in the distance.

On our journey we stopped to admire the red rocks. I asked the internet what makes the rocks so red here.

“New Mexico’s red rocks get their color from iron and oxygen. Millions of years ago, iron-rich minerals in ancient sand washed into the area’s rivers and oceans. When exposed to air and water, the iron rusted. This creates a mineral called hematite, which stains the stone deep red, orange, and pink.”

Interesting, and beautiful!

There are hikes around this area but we had another destination in mind. We keep learning of all these other incredible natural wonders and we just don’t have the time to do all of them. New Mexico is a surprisingly large state.

Our first destination was the Jemez Historial Site. This site includes the stone remnants of a 700-year-old village and the San José de los Jémez church dating back to the early 1600s. What I also was excited about visiting here is that you actually get to walk into and around the historical buildings. The tour included a map which shared information along the way about the structures we were seeing. The site doesn’t have a happy history and the people who originally lived her fled due to conflict and resettled elsewhere. The church they were forced to built, they also burned in their revolt.

Our next stop was not too far down the road and it was a fascinating geological feature which was annoyingly ruined by people climbing all over it.

What you are seeing here is the Jemez Soda Dam, which is a massive dam over 300 feet long, 50 feet high, and 50 feet wide. According to Google, it was built gradually over 7,000 years by thermal springs depositing layers of calcium carbonate and travertine. It was a pretty awe-inspiring geological landmark. We parked Gertie along the road and hiked down to take a few photos.

Our next stop on this road trip journey was a view of the Valles Caldera. We didn’t drive Gertie down to the visitor center because we read it can be a rough road. She’d already done enough off-roading just stopping at viewpoints along the way.

The Valles Caldera National Preserve is a massive 13.7-mile-wide volcanic caldera in northern New Mexico. It was formed by a giant eruption over 1 million years ago. The caldera is famous for its vast, high-altitude meadows, sweeping volcanic domes, and abundant wildlife. Felt like a good selfie moment.

We continued on our journey which took us through Los Alamos. We learned yesterday all about Los Alamos being a secret site for the Manhattan Project during World War II. Today Los Alamos is the site of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Upon arriving, we had to stop at a checkpoint and Jacob had to show his ID. They explained that this was a public road but that we could not turn right and could not take pictures. Once we got through the next checkpoint and into the town itself, we could once again turn right and take pictures. We didn’t stop here, just drove through, but it was still interesting to see an area so important in American history. (Below is a photo of the Manhattan Project National Historic Park).

We have been all over and seen so many amazing things and we haven’t even had lunch yet!

Next stop, Santa Fe.

I found us a parking lot close to the Santa Fe Plaza which is in the old historic part of town. We needed to find an easy parking lot for Gertie. She’s pretty bulky. While on our way there, I did some Googling and found us a place to eat. Jacob had announced yesterday that he was not leaving New Mexico until he had chili con queso with green chiles. Lucky for us the Plaza Cafe Downtown, right next to Santa Fe Plaza, had this on the menu.

As we arrived in Santa Fe the clouds were getting thicker and it began to shower a little. I put on my raincoat and quickly noticed I was pretty much the only one. Everyone else either had umbrellas or didn’t bother.

Santa Fe is full of amazing shops with beautiful art creations. Much like when we were in Murano in Venice, I didn’t take any pictures of this. But I did get a few photos of other shops throughout the town.

The cafe was loud and busy when we arrived and I knew it was a popular stop but we got seated right away. We ordered the chili con queso as an appetizer and quickly realized how hungry we were as we devoured the entire dish. Jacob ordered a green chile cheeseburger and I ordered a stuffed sopapilla with chicken. This dish was created in New Mexico and I was eager to try it. I got the question they ask in all restaurants, red or green, or Christmas. I went with red and green (Christmas) chiles. For those who know me, you know I am a huge baby when it comes to spice, but I’d had some green chile the other day and it wasn’t so bad so I thought, I can handle this!

I… I couldn’t handle it.

Jacob literally laughed at loud at me as a guzzled water and covered tortilla chips in honey to stop the burn in my mouth.

Once I scraped away the chiles and dug into the sopapilla, it was quite good and I ate as much as a could. However, we’d already stuffed ourselves full of chili con queso. I think looking back that the chili con queso was our downfall. Jacob says he has no regrets.

After lunch we were both stuffed and bloated and needed to walk it off. We checked out the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi. It was a beautiful old church which was constructed in the mid-to-late 1800s. The church had beautiful stained glass windows and intricately decorated ceilings.

We then walked down to view the San Miguel Chapel which is the oldest church building in the country. It was built in 1610.

We then ventured over to the state capitol building and Jacob immediately commented that their state seal was superior to ours. I forced him to take a picture with a sign.

Ok now, you’re probably thinking, “Wow, what a full day! How can they possibly do anything else?”

The walk helped but I was still in agony from eating my weight in cheese. We headed back to Gertie and then were on our way to our next few stops. Jacob had read about some mining towns and wanted to check them out.

We drove through Los Cerrillos. This place is considered a historic, semi-ghost town. The town has unpaved dirt streets and old adobe storefronts. It is supposed to look like a living set from an Old West Movie. In fact they have filmed several movies and shows here including Young Guns, The Cowboys and Longmire.

We then drove to Madrid, which is pronounced “mad-rid” here and not like the Spanish city “ma-drid.” If that makes sense…

Jacob wanted to check out this old mining town that is known for its quirky art scene. He also wanted to stop by the Mine Shaft Tavern which was the filming location for the show Longmire. For those who have watched Longmire, the Mine Shaft Tavern was the Red Pony. Originally, Jacob had planned that we could eat dinner here. We did park right in front of the tavern, although accidentally. We had pulled over into a spot to take a moment to look at the map and figure out where we are going just to realize we were where we intended.

We did get out and walk into the tavern. We contemplated getting drinks and sitting down for a bit, but we were both still so, so stuffed we couldn’t. I didn’t snap a photo because they have someone standing there to seat people and it felt awkward but it was cool to see.

From here we were on our way back, but we had one more touristy point of interest to check out. The Route 66 Musical Highway is a quarter-mile stretch of historic road just east of Albuquerque that plays the melody of “America the Beautiful” when you drive over it. I found the route to the musical highway. Jacob had read it might be faint so once we approached the stretch of road, we turned off the AC and rolled down our windows. I got my camera ready to record and…..nothing.

After a quick search, we learned you can only hear it going east and we were going west. Since we’d made the detour to come here, we turned around and now headed east on Route 66. We got ready again, turned off the AC and rolled down the windows and….. we got about 15 seconds of part of the song. Apparently this stretch of road has been heavily traveled and repaved so only part of the song can now be heard. It was underwhelming to say the least, but we got a kick out of it.

From here it was finally time to start heading back to the AirBnB. We had much laundry to clean and Jacob wanted to watch the Sounders game.

Tomorrow we are heading up to the Sandia Tramway. It should be a beautiful morning! Until then!