At Chicago Botanic Gardens last Friday, there were so many beautiful and amazing flowers! Here’s a lovely dahlia.
Month: July 2018
Getting Our Kicks in New Mexico – from Gallup to Santa Fe (Route 66 Day 5, Pt. 2)
June 11, 2018
Leaving Gallup, I-40 and old Route 66 run parallel to each other. On the eastern edge of Gallup, we were somewhat surprised to see this mosque.We stayed on Route 66 and stopped at the Continental Divide (I-40 exit 47). Rivers west of the Continental Divide flow into the Pacific Ocean, while rivers east of the Divide empty into the Gulf of Mexico or Atlantic Ocean. A much more spectacular Continental Divide view is in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, where we had been 10 days before.
The Continental Divide in New Mexico is marked along Route 66 near the town of Thoreau. It’s a rather run-down place. First you see this abandoned building with two USA red, white and blue missile prototypes rising up in front.
The sign marking the Continental Divide is somewhat battered.
In the middle of this desert nowhere, it was hard to believe we were as high as 7,245 ft.! But in fact, south of here is Lookout Mountain, elevation 9,111 ft.
There were morning glories blooming at the base of the sign.
The next placed we stopped was the small town of Milan, where there were signs of life, but many once-thriving businesses have been shuttered. This is common along Route 66 because major highways bypass these small towns, leaving them behind. Curious were these brightly painted bicycles in front of a deserted building.
Of course, there were also thriving businesses.
New Mexico has a lot of Indian Reservations, including several in this area called the “Checkerboard.” Milan is located between two of them, just northwest of the larger town of Grants.
We got back on I-40 at Grants, heading toward Albuquerque. Originally we had planned to stay the night there, but decided we would rather stop in Santa Fe. Bordering the western edge of Albuquerque is Petroglyphs National Monument. In this protected area, there are trails that take you through the lava rocks to some beautiful petroglyphs made by the ancestors of the Pueblo people. However, even a short walk from the parking lots reveal some interesting ones. We opted for this – the longer trails wound their way up high rocky hills and we didn’t want to stay too long.
All the petroglyphs made by these ancient people face southward. On the Macaw Trail, signs told us that the style found in this area is called “Rio Grande” by archaeologists. This style emerged rather suddenly around 1300 A.D., which coincided with a large increase in population.
To create these images, using handheld stone tools the Ancestral Puebloans carefully removed the desert varnish which exposed the basalt’s lighter interior.
After centuries of exposure, the images oxidize and turn darker, attesting to their old age and authenticity. On the Cliff Base Trail, we learned that petroglyphs are not just rock art, picture writing, or a depiction of the natural world. They are powerful symbols reflecting the society and religion of surrounding tribes.
The placement of each petroglyph was never a random decision. It had to do with the position of the image relative to the horizon and to other petroglyphs.
Some petroglyphs have meaning only to the individual who made them. Others represent tribal, kiva or community symbols.
Some of the petroglyphs have meaning to present day Pueblos, while the meaning of the others has been lost, but still respected by their descendants.
Archaeologists today believe that the 23,000 petroglyphs found within this monument date from 1000 B.C. to about 1700 A.D., using a variety of methods to determine their approximate age.
Authentic petroglyphs are valuable and irreplaceable. However, some modern people have taken it upon themselves to add their own markings. (Click on image to enlarge.)
This graffiti damages the images as there are no long-term ways to cover up these desecrations.
This image is so bright and on this smaller rock, it’s hard to tell whether it is authentic or not.
This is the Cliff Base Trail we were walking on. It is mostly level, with a few stairs and rocky areas that take you to petroglyphs a little higher up.
With my telephoto lens, standing next to our car in the parking lot, I was able to get this clear photo of petroglyphs visitors on the more rugged trail could see close up.
It was about 4:00 p.m. when we got back in our car and headed north to Santa Fe. We checked into our hotel about an hour later, then went to the historic area of downtown Santa Fe to look around. Most places of interest were closed, so we had dinner at Anasazi Restaurant at the Rosewood Inn of the Anasazi near Santa Fe Plaza. The food was excellent – we ordered off the appetizers menu and it was plenty.
A post about Santa Fe will be coming up shortly. Stay tuned!!
FOTD: Trumpet Creepers
I found out the name of these flowers is “trumpet creepers.” I’ve always liked them. They look like the kantu flower of Peru or maybe they’re the same flower. This is how they look in full bloom:
This is how the bud looks:
Posted for Cee’s Flower of the Day, 7/29/18.
FOTD: Lotus Blossoms
I don’t think I can top this one – I saw a lotus blossom for the first time and it took my breath away! It was during a visit to Chicago Botanic Gardens yesterday and I saw many beautiful flowers, which I will be posting in the coming week.
Posted for Cee’s Flower of the Day, 7/28/18
CB&WPC: Benches
For Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge, here are some benches at El Rancho Hotel in Gallup, New Mexico. (For more photos of this iconic hotel, see my post Getting Our Kicks at El Rancho Hotel (and Thursday Doors) (Route 66, Day 5, Part 1).
FOTD: Garden Cosmos
Posted for Cee’s Flower of the Day, 7/27/18.
SYW: On crossword puzzles, doctors, dates with parmesan cheese, and dogs
Cee’s Share Your World this week:
In regards to puzzle what’s your choice: jigsaw, crossword, word search, mazes, logic or numeric puzzles, something else, or nothing?
I do lots of different puzzles but mostly crosswords or jigsaw puzzles on my tablet or phone. I find myself obsessively doing one after another while I’m supposedly watching TV!
Crosswords are the best, however. My husband and I do them together and between the two of us, we can figure most of them out.
Dale sometimes gets stuck because he spells something wrong and then I come along and fix it, then fill in more of the clues! We take crossword puzzle magazines on trips and I work on them while he drives. He’s able to visualize what should fit without looking at the puzzle better than I am. I occasionally do Sudoku also, but mostly the easy ones I have on a phone app.
List at least five favorite treats and it doesn’t necessarily have to be food.
1. Anything chocolate
2. Dates with parmesan cheese inside (New! See below)
3. Ice cream
4. Traveling to new places
5. Sitting on a dock next to a cool lake in Wisconsin and watching nature.
6. Sitting on my porch when the rain is coming down all around me outside.
7. Being able to read as much as I want to (I love being retired!)
What is your favorite type of dog? (can be anything from a specific breed, a stuffed animal or character in a movie)
When I was a kid, my favorite was collie because I liked the show Lassie.
I also preferred beagles because we had a mutt that was mostly beagle. Now I like just friendly dogs. And puppies, they’re always cute! This is a hard question to answer because I haven’t had a dog as a pet since Corky (our mutt-beagle) died. I like dogs but much prefer cats.
What did you appreciate or what made you smile this past week? Feel free to use a quote, a photo, a story, or even a combination.
See #2 under “treats” above: at a gathering of girlfriends the other day, one woman brought dates stuffed with pieces of parmesan cheese. I found them so exquisite! Something about the texture and melting in my mouth reminded me of fudge, but it doesn’t taste like chocolate.
Several weeks ago, I fell on the sidewalk and really bashed up my face and my right knee. The knee is the only thing that is still recovering – still somewhat swollen from a hematoma. What I appreciate about this is that different doctors (emergency room, my GP) had suggested different things for why the swelling had continued and why my right foot had gotten swollen and sore a week after the fall: bursitis, cellulitis, septic arthritis – the scariest of all! Finally, I went to an orthopedic doctor referred by the ER doctors, who examined my knee and told me it is (just) a hematoma. As for my foot, it was a sprained ankle, but it’s now healed. I appreciated this last diagnosis by the specialist because I don’t have an infection or any other complications! I am grateful that my knee is getting better every day and I can walk normally again.
FOTD: White Lily
There’s a house in my neighborhood which I often walk by because I love the flowers the owner so deftly cultivates. The house is on a corner and surrounded by a white fence. All along the fence are plants that flower at different times. Today I was awed by the white lilies.
I think what caught my eye especially was the long curved stamen in the center.
Posted for Cee’s Flower of the Day, 7/25/18.
Tuesday Photo Challenge: Winding & Windy
Frank Jansen at Dutch Goes the Photo has a Tuesday Photo Challenge. This week the topic is wind. Depending on how it’s pronounced it’s either a noun or a verb. Here are a few of each.
Glacier winding down a mountain at Glacier Bay National Park, AlaskaAt Glacier Bay National Park, a steward came around with split pea soup on a tray and handed it out to grateful passengers. It was so windy on the deck that the steward’s tray almost got blown away and he had to hold it with two hands!
Here you can see that it’s windy by my blowing hair.
Fast forward to this year: On our recent road trip, we went to Rocky Mountain National Park near Denver, Colorado. We went up a very winding road, with a lot of switchbacks.
Note the road sign on the far left.
We saw winding mountain streams…
…and a rushing waterfall that winds its way through descending cliffs.

Adams Falls, Rocky Mountain National Park
At Hotel Donaldson in Fargo, North Dakota, they provide free wine and appetizers every evening in the lobby. We stayed two nights there last year, so you could say we were wined and dined at the hotel, to use a homophone! 🙂
FOTD: Black-eyed Susans
I’m joining Cee on her yellow kick today! I spotted these bright flowers at Ravinia Festival last week. Ravinia is a summer series of concerts of music of all types. There are concerts most every day of the week! You can pay $10 and sit on the lawn. People bring picnics and wine and it’s always crowded!
The black-eyed Susans were in this colorful flower garden.
The program that night was the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in an all-Beethoven program, including the 7th symphony. Here is a recording of the 2nd movement, my favorite, although I think this particular version is a little too fast.