Quick catch up

We left you in Durango where we had a fabulous time.  Managed to do the Spud Lake Trail which is one of our favorites.  We have never been in Durango this late in the year, and found the lack of leaves combined with the last dregs of color made for awesome views.  Also very few people around, so it was like our personal path.

The very rough road to the trailhead

Gorgeous view, you might be able to make out the ski area across the valley

Just awesome!

Spud Lake reflections

Spud Lake

We had some wonderful food at Rice Monkeys in Durango, in fact it was almost funny, we ended up eating there 3 times!!  Excellent fresh vibrant asian fusion.  And it's a kick to go, it is bustling, crowded, and tiny, in fact they can only seat maybe 20 people in a room that is only about 10 feet wide.

Then we headed south to Taos, a spot we hadn't been to for many years.  We had a nice visit with our nephew, Walker, who lives there, enjoyed the views and countryside, had a good mexican meal in town at La Cueva, a tiny hole in the wall, walked around downtown, enjoying the fact it was between seasons, felt like we were the only people in town.  There is an enclave of "Earthships" north of Taos, that kind of fascinated us.  These are passive solar heated homes made of recyclables for the most part, that aim to be autonomous off the grid homes.  Turned out the headquarters for the company that has done most of the research and built many of these homes is right there in Taos, and they have a visitor center that we were able to tour, unfortunately we got there right at their closing time so it was a quick tour:-)  We found it very interesting.

Now we are in Santa Fe, another one of our favorite spots, and again we are able to take advantage of the "tween" seasons, although Santa Fe isn't as affected, but the downtown was slightly less busy than normal.  We were able to walk around, visit several galleries we enjoy, have some great food, including our go to here,  Santa Fe Bite, for the absolutely BEST green chile cheeseburger on the planet!  

Now that's deliciousness!

Did some grocery shopping, had some excitement when we had to evacuate Whole Foods for a fire in the store, and just enjoyed the weather and the views, and the sunrises and sunsets.  So now later this morning we will head down to Albuquerque to see Nancy and CT, and of course Jan's mom, Viv, who just turned 92!