Tucumcari, New Mexico

Wednesday, April 28, 2021 for Thursday, April 22, 2021

I did not mention in yesterday's blog that after we left the midpoint of Route 66 near Adrian, Texas, we entered into New Mexico. The Motel Safari is in Tucumcari, NM.

We left the motel and headed on the road again. But first, we had to stop at Tee Pee Curios, an interesting gift and souvenir shop. Some of their neon was in yesterday's blog, and this mural was on one of the walls.

We met another interesting couple that was traveling a substantial part of the route, but they were driving back to Albuquerque that day to fly home. From discussing with them, we found the advantage of having our own vehicle, because they were in a rental vehicle and they thought it not as good as having their own vehicle.

Next up was the Route 66 Auto Museum in Santa Rosa, NM. Randy was not willing to spend her money and time on a car museum, so I was on my own. I took some pictures of the more interesting (to me) vehicles.

For Jim and Susan Andreini -- not exactly a Coronet, but the Plymouth version. I think the price was $27K or so.

Below is a kit car, a reproduction of a 1929 Mercedes Gazele.

Have you ever seen a wicker motorcycle?

The opening picture of this entry is some type of customized Ford Edsel, with a front-loader and a backhoe attached to it. Never saw anything like that before.

Our selfie for that day --

Next stop was the Blue Hole, and artisian well. Again, we remember hearing of this from childhood, and it was nothing like we expected -- it was fundamentally a swimming pool!

As you can see from the pictures, it didn't look all that blue, either! But it was on one of the older existing parts of Route 66.

The Las Vegas (NM) Museum and Rough Rider Memorial Collection, which we thought would be worth seeing, was "COVID closed," so we moved on. We drove on past the Pecos National Historical Park, and headed to Santa Fe, the state capital. On the way, we saw some interesting sights.

We were driving along one particularly desolate stretch, and Randy was commenting that it seemed like they had snow fence along the road, but it couldn't be snow fence. Soon after, a gust of wind blew a bunch of tumbleweeds across the road. We decided it was not a snow fence, but a tumbleweed fence! We were taken by surprise, and neither had a phone camera out, so we missed them. I was able to get a picture of one outside the driver's window when we were stopped somewhere.

While our route was mostly going from east to west, we did do some traveling north and south, too, so for a while we were on the Santa Fe Trail. Earlier in the trip, we were also along the Chisholm Trail, too, which again is mostly north/south.

If you've never traveled west, you may not have seen a cattle guard. They are metal grates across the road. Because of spacing, cattle and bison will not cross it, their hooves cannot negotiate the grate. Usually they are spaced round bars, but this particular one had square bars, but again the spacing prevented hooved animals from crossing.

In Santa Fe, we decided to stay at the El Rey Court Motel. This was the one that was supposed to be "the best" old-style motel on Route 66. While it was nice, it was not our favorite, and they had some shortcomings, partly due to COVID and other state restrictions.

Inside the room was nice, especially on first impression -- 

Even a separate little room we used for luggage

A clean, very bright bathroom

So what's not to like? Most services were missing -- you want ice? Sorry, the vending room is closed, come to the front desk to ask for it. Soft drinks? Sorry, the vending room is closed, come to the front desk to ask for it. Oh, sorry, we don't have that one. Yes, we have that one, but none are cold. Here's a bucket of ice!

On site dining?

Make a reservation with our wood oven pizza team. It was OK, but of the places we stayed, this has been the most expensive so far.

We called it an early night, I tried to work on the blog, and we prepared for tomorrow and the NM State Capitol.