Monday 29th June - Colonial Williamsburg

Today has been yet again another boiling hot day with temperature in the 90’s which made sightseeing more of an ordeal than a pleasure.

We spent most of the day in historic Colonial Williamsburg. This is part of the Historic Triangle, and is a huge area of over 300 acres which includes many 18th and early 19th century structures and hundreds of houses, shops, public buildings and outbuildings that have been reconstructed on their original foundations.

Several street re-enactments were staged throughout the morning at various locations and the couple we watched were a female slave speculating how little the ‘Declaration of Independence’ would better the lot of her and her family; and ‘George Washington’ giving a speech stating, among other things, that he was not going to run for another term in office. These re-enactments were very well done by competent actors.

After a snack lunch we wandered up the main street, calling into the occasional shop, the ‘post office’ and a printing press then went for a tour of The Governor’s Palace. Not very grand and hardly a ‘palace’ but it had been dubbed that by cynical locals of the time. It was interesting to see inside and to hear its history.

By the end of this we had had enough! We were both suffering somewhat from the heat so we made our way back by bus to the Visitor’s Centre, where we relaxed with a cool drink in a lovely, leafy courtyard, watching an interesting variety of birds coming down to feed

A Cardinal

An American Robin

From there, it was about a 15 minute walk to our hotel and a well earned rest. We ended the day with a most delicious meal at an Italian restaurant.

Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th June

Sunday 28th
We spent all of today travelling - we arrived in Washington DC around 1pm then had to wait until 5pm for our onward connection to Williamsburg. And …. guess what - the train was an hour late and we didn’t leave until 6pm. By that time we were pretty exhausted. We arrived in Williamsburg around 9.45pm and settled into our hotel for a welcome good night’s sleep at around 10pm.

Saturday 27th
We woke up this morning with the prospect of packing yet again as, sadly, we had to leave Chicago today. We checked out of the hotel at 10.45 but were able to leave our luggage there as our train was not due to leave until 7pm. We spent the morning exploring part of the shopping district on foot and to see where the ‘El’ runs over the top of the Wabash Street - scene of many filmed car chases.

We then went to the Millennium Park. We thought it a good idea to avoid the central part of Grant Park as much as possible as the ‘Taste of Chicago’ started today. This is called ‘the biggest picnic in the world’ and hundreds of Chicago eating places have stalls there for the general public to try samples of their fare. There seemed to be lots of entertainment going on together with a funfair and the whole area was heaving with people. The Millennium Park was pretty crowded too. There were some very large modern sculptures there including ‘the bean’, a shiny kidney bean shaped sculpture:

(if you look carefully around the middle of the pic, you can see me (wearing a light coloured shirt) taking the photo)

which gives a totally different reflected view of the famous skyline, and a water feature consisting of two large rectangular waterfalls which create a big ‘puddle’ for people to cool off in. One of the rectangles had a changing face on it:

Very clever.

By then we both had had enough of ‘wandering’ so we headed slowly back to the hotel where we sat reading and people watching until we got a cab at 5.30 for Union Station.

We went to the station around 5.30pm. As we had a sleeping ‘roomette’ booked on the train we were able to go to the first class lounge and wait for boarding. When we did Terry commented ‘we have more ‘ette’ than ‘room’’ as it is very small, 3ft 6in x 6ft 6in, We had two seats which converted to bunk beds for sleeping. As I had the 'casting vote' I opted for the bottom bunk - Terry had a bit of a problem climbing into the top one! All meals were included in our ticket so we had a very nice dinner in the dining car and breakfast on Sunday morning. Sleeping, for me, was again not very successful on the train but Terry zonked out for he whole night. The train was very bumpy and noisy as the whistle/hooter (or whatever it is called) is sounded very frequently. But having a private room with a bed was a huge improvement to sleeping in coach class even though there was lots personal space there and the chairs recline.

Friday 27th June - Chicago Day 2

We were up and out fairly early (for us) this morning and walked probably almost a mile along the lake shore to The Field Museum - Chicago’s Natural History Museum. It was one of the best I have seen, and houses the biggest T-Rex ever found, called ‘Sue’! The ‘Museum Campus’ includes this museum, an aquarium and a planetarium, and is situated right next door to the huge ‘Soldier Field’ the home of the Chicago Bears NFL team on Lakeshore Drive. We have not had the time to visit either the aquarium or planetarium.

'Sue'

We spent a couple of hours at the museum. It was so big and there was so much to see that it would possibly take many visits to see all there is and to take the time to read the information alongside each display. We entered an ancient Egyptian tomb, walked through African villages, saw many hundreds of different (stuffed) animals and birds together with assorted mammal skeletons and took an ‘epic journey’ through 13,000 years of The Ancient Americas, including ice-age mammoth hunters, Native Americans, the Incas and the Aztecs etc. It was brilliantly laid out with interconnecting rooms. The building itself was enormous.

We could have spent longer there but we wanted to get tickets for the 1pm tall ship trip and were afraid it might get booked out early, so we hopped on a (again free) ‘hop on hop off’ bus back down to The Navy Pier. We were in good time and got the tickets with no problem. This was another of our ‘included attractions’ within the ‘Go Chicago’ card. We spent time on the pier looking at the Stained Glass exhibition, then had some lunch before boarding the ship. It was ‘pirate themed’ with stories etc being told on the main deck but we ignored those and just sat at the stern of the ship enjoying the sea breeze (very welcome in this heat) and views of Chicago’s fantastic skyline.

The trip lasted about an hour and we both really enjoyed it.

We took a water taxi back to our hotel area and spent time relaxing after another enjoyable day here on the shores of Lake Michigan.

We have worked out that had we paid for each ‘attraction’ and 2-day bus pass individually we would have spent $128 - so we saved $38 by buying the ‘Go Card’. So that was worth the investment and we intend to buy a similar one when we get to New York.

One final thing for today. For those of you who followed my 'Losing It' diet blog before I left home in April, you will see that the diet is still going really well:

'Rocky Road Dazzler' - Yummy!

Thursday 25th June - Chicago

Another WOW! Chicago ‘is my kinda town’! Even though I was here about fifteen years ago, I am still hugely impressed by this wonderful vibrant city and the size and shapes of the buildings.

After writing yesterday’s blog we decided to go out for a stroll as we read in a brochure that there are firework displays on the lake at 9.30pm on Wednesday evenings. So we wandered across to Grand Park, which is just a very short distance from the hotel towards Lake Michigan, and spent some time there watching the huge Buckingham Fountain which continually changed shape and colour. It was beginning to get dark and all the skyscraper lights were lovely against the dark blue evening sky and the changing colours of the fountain really showed up. Every hour on the hour for 20 minutes the Fountain produces a major water display and the centre jet shoots 150 feet into the air.
The Fountain, one of the largest in the world, is obviously a popular local attaction as just before the hour many people gathered to see this spectacle.

www.cpdit01.com/resources/buckingham_fountain.cfm.

The firework display, although some distance away, was very impressive.

After studying various brochures we decided it would be a good deal to spend $90 on a ‘Go Chicago’ card. This card allows entry into most of the attractions and museums together with unlimited use of a ‘hop on hop off bus‘. But we had to get to Navy Pier

http://www.navypier.com/

to buy it. One day we will learn that what looks like quite a short(ish) walk on a map is, when in America, a very long walk - especially in the heat we have had (again) today. It was actually about one and a half miles but felt like it was much longer.

The first use we made of the card was to take an ‘Architectural River Cruise’ - an hour on the Chicago River going through downtown with a very good commentator pointing out, and giving details of, many of the buildings.

On completion of the river trip and after lunch we got on the (free) bus to go to Hancock’s Tower to take a ride to the Observation Deck on the 94th floor. The lift took only 40 seconds to get there, and the 360 degree views from the big windows were amazing. There was some heat haze around today so perhaps the views were not as clear as they might have been.


By this time we decided we had had enough. The heat and humidity really saps our energy. So we re-boarded the bus (they do continual tours of the city so are fairly frequent) and headed back for a ‘feet-up’ session before going out for another walk this evening.

23rd & 24th June

Nothing much to report for these two days.,

Yesterday (Tuesday) was again unbearably hot so we took the ‘Metro’ to an out of town shopping mall - The Galleria - and spent until around 3pm mooching around in the comfort of an air conditioned environment. We had lunch there then returned to the city on the metro and took a bus to The City Museum. Quote: “no visit to St Louis is complete without a visit to The City Museum” . Er - oh yes it is if you do not have children - it seemed to us like a huge exploratory indoor playground, fine for kids but not for two hot and tired 60+ ladies! We paid our $12 each and wished we hadn’t bothered. Aimee, Emma and the Kennaway twins would have loved it as all the children there seemed to be having a great time discovering lots of things and climbing on all sorts of different equipment.
http://www.citymuseum.org/about.html

By the end of our (short) visit there it was so hot and humid and we were so tired that we took a cab back to the hotel and spent the evening recovering and taking it easy in our room

Today (Wednesday) we caught the 7.55am train from St Louis to Chicago. We arrived around 1.30pm and after a snack lunch at the station food court we took a cab to our hotel - the Travelodge Downtown. And ‘downtown’ it really is, close to Lake Michigan and seems to be right in the hub of things. We have a huge room, well almost 2 rooms really with archway between, together with big bathroom and kitchenette. We both feel we deserve this space after our not too good hotel in St Louis.

We intend to just hang around here for the rest of the day to restore our energy levels before two days of sightseeing in this great city on Thursday and Friday.

Oh yes, the local paper reported temperatures in St Louis of ‘upper 90’s or over 105 with the humidity calculated in’ and are 10-15 degrees above average.

22nd June - St Louis

We had a very early start today as our train left at 7.30am from Kansas City for St Louis. So we were up before 6am and arranged a cab for 6.45am. The train journey lasted just over 6 hours and the scenery has become far less spectacular than on previous journeys - just ordinary stuff - fields, houses, trees etc. We arrived in St Louis to a temperature of nearly 100 degrees and high humidity. We nearly expired!

After settling into our (this time) not very nice hotel we thought we really ought to venture out into the sauna outside and see a bit of the city. We are situated near the Mississippi

View from hotel 3rd floor (zoomed in a bit)

so walked down to the riverfront and along to the ‘touristy area’. We had our first view of The Gateway Arch - it is awe-inspiring - 620 feet high and towers over everything else in the city.

We first of all boarded a replica Mississippi paddle boat for a river trip. Not a very inspiring trip and the commentator had a bit of a hard time finding points of interest to speak about - although he did find a few. The best part of the trip was getting out onto the water and feeling the breeze as it really was HOT, and it was a good feeling - sailing down the Mississippi!

After that we went to the visitor centre beneath the huge Gateway Arch to purchase tickets for a ride to the top. Our ticket included a 45 minute film about Clark and Lewis - the two men who led the first overland expedition to the Pacific Coast. They set out from St Louis in 1804 and they were away for around 2 years, there and back. It was an amazing story and the film was quite riveting. It was a huge screen - an Imax I suppose (although I am not really sure what an Imax is). Terry and I agree that this trip has not been all ‘pleasure’ - we have learned quite a lot of American history along the way - but will we remember it?!

When the film ended we went into a little 5-seater ‘pod’ - one of 8 sort of linked together and ascended to the top of the arch. It took over 4 minutes to get there and was a bit claustrophobic, but better than climbing 1076 steps! Apparently on a clear day you can see 7 states from the top, I don’t know how far we saw but I was certainly a long way.

We had dinner in one of the many restaurants in Laclede’s Landing - an historic area of town named after a French fur trapper named Pierre Laclede who set out from New Orleans to explore the Illinois Country to establish a trading post. In 1764, he chose the west bank of the Mississippi River. In 1784, the site was cleared and temporary cabins were built. Laclede named the settlement St. Louis in honour of the patron saint of the king of France. This site is now an area covering several blocks with many restaurants, gift shops and pubs all housed in lovely old red brick buildings with cobbled streets.


We were thankful to return to our hotel room as we saw that, even at around 8.30pm, the temperature was still in the high 80’s.

21st June - Kansas City

Another very hot day dawned so we lacked the energy to do much sightseeing. We took the bus to the City Market - ‘the market where locals shop’. It was a combined farmers market and other stalls together with a flea market. According to the website: “Since its inception in 1857, the City Market has been one of the largest and most enduring public farmers' markets in the Midwest, linking growers and small businesses to the Kansas City community. In addition, more than 30 full-time merchants are open year-round and offer specialty foods, fresh meats and seafood, restaurants and cafes, floral, home accessories and much more” We spent some time looking at the stalls but it really was too hot to take much interest.

There was a museum on the site dedicated to the Steamship Arabia which sank in 1856. This museum is home to a time capsule of frontier life in the 1800s. The Arabia was headed up the Missouri River when it struck a submerged tree and sank just north of Kansas City. Her cargo hold was full of 200 tons of supplies bound for general stores and pioneer settlements. As the years passed, the river changed course and left the Arabia buried beneath a Kansas cornfield. Finally, in 1988 a local family and friends uncovered the lost Arabia and her magnificent cargo. They were amazed to find fine dishware (including lots of undamaged English Wedgewood china), clothing, and even bottled food all preserved in remarkable condition.
The number of different artefacts there was staggering. It must have been so exciting finding all these things when the buried ship was discovered.

We had lunch at the market but it was far too hot and we were too exhausted to do anything else that day so we bussed it back to the hotel and took refuge in the coolness of our air-conditioned hotel room. We only ventured out again in the evening to the Chinese Restaurant next door for a meal, followed by a gentle stroll to a local park where we discovered a beautiful fountain dedicated to firemen who had lost their lives whilst on duty.

One last thing for today. We passed used car lot on the way back - would you buy a used car from this guy:
'Nuff said!

19th and 20th June - Dodge City & Kansas City

Yesterday (19th) was a difficult day to say the least. We had to check out of our hotel at midday and our train was not due to leave for Kansas City until 0034 - so we were orphans in a strange city for 12 hours - and in a city that has nothing going for it at all! But things turned out not so bad in the end and two things were in our favour - we were able to leave our luggage at the hotel for the day; and it started out quite cloudy so it was not as baking hot as it was on Thursday.

We decided to spend as long as possible at the Boot Hill Museum (as there was nothing else to do!) and in the end we spent the whole afternoon and evening there. The cemetery itself is now only ‘pretend’ as all bodies were dug up and removed to a ‘proper’ cemetery when the then Town Council decided they wanted to build a school on the site, but even so, it is very authentic.

The Front Street buildings are reconstructions, exhibiting hundreds of original artefacts. They represent Dodge City in 1876, and were carefully researched through historic photographs and newspapers, so we wandered in out of the shops and exhibitions, and because we had so much time to ‘waste’ there we probably got a lot more out of the museum than we would normally have done.

‘Entertainments’ were included in the entry price and although they were interesting they were a bit like watching an amateur drama production! We had a Chuckwagon Dinner in one of the saloons at 6pm - very nice tender braised beef (our thoughts went back to the poor cattle we saw in the feedlots the day before - but only beef was on the menu) with creamed sweet corn, potatoes and coleslaw followed by ‘Grandma Sally’s Apple Crisp’. During dinner we were entertained by one of Dodge City's top Country and Western Singers!

He sounded a bit like he looks!

After dinner we sat though another ‘gunfight’ - the same as the day before but with a different cast, then at 7.30 we went to the Long Branch Saloon to see a Western style variety show complete with can-can dancers. That was quite good too.

After all that finished it was almost 9pm when we retuned to the hotel and we were able to remain in the lobby watching TV or reading and using the restrooms there to freshen up before taking a cab to the station at 11.45. And lo and behold - the train was on time and we departed smelly Cow Poo City at 12.35. We were not sorry to leave.

To give some idea of what Dodge City is like here is a photo of Wyatt Earp Boulevard showing one of the many enormous grain silos and huge 'sweet smelling' cattle truck driving by!

We had to board the train and settle in our seats very quietly as most other passengers were sleeping. We both took a sleeping pill and settled down to try to sleep. I managed to fall asleep around 0315 - I just couldn’t get comfortable but Terry was well away before then. We were vaguely conscious of the train stopping a couple of times and new passengers getting settled in but before we knew it, it was 0630 and the train guard shouted out over the train loudspeaker system that we were about to arrive in Kansas City. The train must have been speeding along (no freight trains to hold us up I suppose) as we arrived almost one hour early. After a sleeping pill and only 3 hours sleep I had a very hard job waking up and getting my brain into gear!

Today (20th) we both feel a bit spaced out. We had breakfast at the wonderful Kansas City Union Station in a 50’s style diner then took a cab to our hotel arriving around 8.30am not knowing whether or not we could leave our luggage until check-in time or not. Luckily the reception clerk was very accommodating and for an extra $20 we were able to check in early. So by 9.15am we were both asleep and remained so until 11.15 when we decided that we really ought to get up and get out to see a bit of the city.

We took a bus into the city to ‘Crown Centre’. It was a very nice shopping mall but, as usual, many of the shops were eating places! Outside in an open space there was a wonderful water feature area where water fountains spurted randomly out of the ground and lots of children were playing in them. It was fun to watch. But, although it is very hot and humid here, we experienced our first rain for the whole trip so far (except for snow in the Rockies and a bit of drizzle on the cruise). It lasted a couple of hours then cleared up to blue sky and hot sun again.

A quiet evening and very early night is planned!

18th June - Dodge City

We are now in Dodge City, the town synonymous with lawlessness, cowboys, Indians, the Santa Fe Trail, wagon trains, cattle, and all other things Western, not forgetting Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday.

We left Santa Fe yesterday. An Amtrak shuttle took us to a little town called Lamy (pop. 137) where the train for Dodge eventually arrived one and a half hours late. I have never before been in such a remote, god-forsaken railway station in all my life (Terry has).

The train lost even more time on our leg of the journey and instead of arriving in Dodge at 0019 it arrived at 0215 - two hours late. We were not happy, but there was nothing we could do about it. The daylight part of the journey (about 5-6 hours) was lovely - so interesting with scenery ranging from mountains to flat prairie stretching to the horizon with remote farms (or ranches I guess).


We also saw various forms of wildlife - elk, horses, deer, antelope, eagles, vultures and wild turkeys as well as lots of cattle.

The train we are travelling on is called The South West Chief and only one per day runs along this route from LA to Chicago. So the slightly worrying thing for us now is what time will it arrive in Dodge to take us on our next leg to Kansas City tomorrow night?

This morning we walked a few blocks along Wyatt Earp Boulevard(!) to Boot Hill Museum where we boarded a trolley bus for a city tour. We should have saved our money. Although Dodge City is a famous place - it is a dump! The smell of cow manure is all-pervasive. We think the town suffered in the great depression of the 1930’s (never mind this current one) and never recovered. About 90% of the shops have closed down. The only thing it has to offer, as far as we are concerned, is the outdoor 'Boot Hill Museum'. ( http://www.boothill.org/intro.html )

On the tour we were shown several places of not much interest to us in the town, then taken out to see Fort Dodge - that bit was interesting. This fort was one of the most important forts on the western frontier in the late 1800‘s. On the way there (it is 5 miles out of town) we passed huge feed lots - and I mean HUGE - where cattle are fattened before being slaughtered. The pens stretch all the way up the hill and there were lots more that I couldn't get into one photo:


Thousands and thousands of cattle all penned in with only mud (and probably poo), and not a blade of grass to be seen. And they must really suffer in this intense heat. I decided there and then that I would become a vegetarian but on remembering how much I enjoy a juicy tender steak I relented a bit and decided that I would only eat the meat from happy, contented animals and not those ‘factory farmed’. There are several enormous meat processing plants here too, and every time a big cattle truck passed us it left a stench of cow poo behind it In this heat - not nice!

After our one hour tour we returned to Boot Hill Museum but decided to postpone our visit there until tomorrow. We were feeling the effects of lack of sleep last night and it was VERY hot. We were allowed inside to watch a re-enactment of a gunfight in an old Dodge City street. That was very good.


After lunch we paid a brief visit to the ‘Gunfighters Wax Museum’ (not very lifelike) then had quite a long and very hot walk back to our hotel along Wyatt Earp Boulevard - with a MacDonalds stop for me to have a M&Ms McFlurry to help me on my way. Good old Terry stuck to her cold water. I wish I was as strong willed!

Will someone please pay my bail?

I have been too scathing about this goddam town!

Tuesday 16th June - Santa Fe

Santa Fe - we love it too! The city has the honour of being the oldest State Capital in the USA and also has the oldest building and oldest church. It was founded by Spanish Missionaries in 1610 - before the Pilgrim Fathers reached the eastern shores.

We left Albuquerque yesterday (Monday) on the 10.37am ‘Rail Runner’ a new rail system between Albuquerque and Santa Fe opened only last year. The fare for the one and a half hour journey was the princely sum of $4! It was an interesting journey and the taking of photographs was prohibited whilst travelling through Indian Reservations. It seems strange that there are no raised platforms on stations here (not the ones we have seen so far anyway) so when the train slowly came into the station on the outside track we just wandered across to board it. The train was very crowded and we had to lug our suitcases up a couple of short flights of stairs to get to the upper deck. Never again! We arrived in Santa Fe not having a clue where to go and there were no taxis in sight, so we stood there for a while wondering what to do. Then luckily a taxi came into the parking lot - an appointment to pick someone else up, but the kind lady driver contacted ‘base’ and a cab came to collect us within 5 minutes. Our hotel is about 4 miles out of the centre of the town - most hotels are. The few in the town centre are very expensive. The hotel is situated on a very busy main road into town but luckily the hotel is very quiet. After checking in we wandered out to get some lunch locally and discovered a local bus runs every 15 minutes or so into the town centre. So after a snack we got the bus into town and were impressed to see a bike rack on the front and noticed several passengers making use of it. We headed straight for the Central Plaza, the centre of the town from which all streets seem to radiate. The buildings are lovely - all adobe and mainly Spanish Peublo style. After a law was passed in 1957, all new building has to be in this style and no higher than 37 feet. (All buildings in New Mexico are low - the highest ‘skyscraper’ is in Albuquerque and is only 22 storeys high). So Santa Fe is really keeping it’s original character. We returned to the hotel after wandering around the shops for a couple of hours. The shops are, needless to say, mainly tourist traps and most of them are Indian craft shops and the ethnic goods (jewellery, pottery, leather goods etc) on sale were lovely and very tempting.

Today, we did a 'city tour' of Santa Fe, to get our bearings. The tour guide, Gary, was an interesting character with a soft, mid-west accent and dry sense of humour. He gave us an overview of the history of Santa Fe and its most significant buildings. One, the Palace of the Governors, is the oldest building in America. Under a portico of this building Native Americans sit on the pavement selling their wares (only local tribes are allowed to do this). Again it was mostly jewellery and pottery on sale.The highlight of the tour, was a meander down Canyon Road. Nearly all the old homes have been converted into art and sculpture galleries. They are grouped around delightful courtyards, overhung by trees and bright with flowers. Within the courtyards are many beautiful sculptures, from the traditional to abstract, to whimsical and quirky. We could easily have spent a whole day in that street alone.

These colourful 'wind sculptures' all move and whizz around in the wind

I love the way this beautiful bronze girl has real flowers growing in her basket

This elegant Indian lady's 'cloak' is actually a beautiful bronze patchwork quilt

After lunch in yet another Mexican café, we visited the New Mexico Museum of Art and saw a video and exhibition of American impressionists.

The journey back to the hotel by bus was an interesting experience in itself. People-watching here is an endless delight. Most of the local people seem to be Mexican or Native American and all seem to be colourful and eccentric characters - at least that is how it seems to us. Nobody appears to be boring or ordinary, either in appearance or behaviour.

We were thrilled to see a colony of little native prairie dogs just along the road from our hotel.

Albuquerque and Santa Fe were just lovely places to visit and with less than two days in each we only scratched the surface of all there is to see here. I think maybe a couple of weeks in New Mexico could well be on the cards!

Sunday 14th June - Albuquerque

We have fallen in love with Albuquerque! Sadly we only had one full day here so were unable to visit any Reservations or recommended museums but we spent a lovely day roaming around Albuquerque Old Town which dates back to 1706. The architecture of Old Town Albuquerque is adobe in the Pueblo-Spanish style. These traditional buildings have flat roofs, stuccoed walls with rounded edges and are supported with heavy wooden beams. Most are painted in the colours of the surrounding desert, some with blue window and door frames to provide protection from evil spirits.

Many of the historic adobe homes have been renovated and there were many quiet hidden patios, winding brick paths, and gardens, although these days they are full of galleries, local pueblo craft shops and cafes. We could have spent many dollars in the art and photography galleries.


We had a delightful lunch at a Mexican café where we were waited on by 11 year old ‘Levi’ who said 'You guys are really cool ‘cause you’ve got accents'! He was a great little waiter and continually made sure we had all we wanted. We saw a couple of colourful little birds while we were eating and Terry was lucky enough to see a hummingbird darting amongst the flowers on the creeper twined around the veranda post.

There were several street entertainments including a fully dressed Indian dancing and a mock cowboy street fight including gunfire.
We boarded a replica trolleybus for a town tour which included not only the lovely Old Town area but downtown, the university campus, the Rio Grande river (John Wayne, where are you?) and other interesting residential areas. This tour lasted 66 minutes - I wonder why? 66 is the magic number here owing to the historic Route 66 running right through the middle of town, much frequented by aging bikers riding their Harleys.

We will be sorry to leave tomorrow as there are so many interesting and historic things to see here, but I am sure Santa Fe will have lots to offer ….

One thing I forgot to mention in yesterday’s blog was that we are staggered by the amount of freight being transported across the country. Every few minutes mile-long freight trains rumble along the railroad, sometimes each wagon carrying a double load of containers, and there were hundreds of huge container-laden trucks on the highway (another reason I was pleased not to be driving).