Santa Fe, NM to Albuquerque, NM

From Santa Fe to Albuquerque, both time and abandonment have made large stretches of old Rte 66 impassable or inaccessible. Traces of the old road and the El Camino Real that preceded Rte 66 by centuries still survive in the ancient villages dotted between the two cities. Part of the road is named El Camino del Pueblos.

Today's drive was again through the high desert and the some of the views were super.

We reached Albuquerque around midday and headed to the historic Old Town. It offers a taste of New Mexico's Spanish colonial past. It has a lovely church, 300-year old San Felipe del Neri.

There is a small leafy green park in the plaza, surrounded by many pretty shops and restaurants.

We took a trolley bus tour of the city as we were only staying one night and even though the Old Town is small, the city which lies along the banks of the Rio Grande is the largest in New Mexico and spread over a huge area.

To the east of the city is the 10,378 foot Sandia Crest. In the evening we took the 2.7 mile Sandia Peak Aerial Tramway to the top. This is the longest tramway in America and it provided some amazing views on the ride up.

Here are some views from the summit.

On the way down the sun was setting and gave us some stunning views.

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Holbrook, AZ to Peach Springs, AZ

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Seattle, WA

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Amarillo, Texas to Tucumcari, New Mexico

We packed up after breakfast and continued our drive through Texas. Our first stop was at a ranch. Usually one expects to see horses at a ranch but this one was home to a row of half-buried Cadillacs! It was the idea of a controversial millionaire, Stanley Marsh from Amarillo. He said he created it as tribute to the golden age of car travel!! Visitors are encouraged to leave their mark by spray painting their names, comments etc. on the cars. We soon reached Vega, another small town with lots of Rte 66 treasures including a restored 1920s Magnolia gas station and the Milburn-Price Museum in what was previously the town bus station. Miss Karen, the owner told us lots of interesting stories about the museum pieces which were all donated by local families. Outside the museum there was a beautifully restored 1923 Model T Ford. We reached Adrian, TX which marks the mid point of the Route - 1139 miles east to Chicago and 1139 miles to Santa Monica, Los Angel...

On the Road with T and S

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