Great American Roadtrip 2024

We set out this morning to get to Mesa, Arizona, just outside of Phoenix. My sister and her family live there and we will be spending the night before our trek home tomorrow. Our first stop, was Painted Desert and Petrified Forest in Arizona.  This National Park is a first time for both of us. It’s always a good time for ice cream.  The park is mostly a drive through experience, with some short walks to see some things. Very cool geological history.  We had dinner and spent the night at my sisters. She and Delilah made homemade pasta and bolognese. 

We had one of our best days of the trip today. As we mentioned we were staying right in the heart of the town of Taos. We did a little shopping while walking around the plaza this morning; we bought a few things.  We then headed about one mile north to the Taos Pueblo, one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the U.S., home of the Taos Pueblo People — more properly, in the Tiwa language,  Place of the Red Willows. The village is a UNESCO world heritage site. The buildings are made of adobe — no plumbing and no electricity. While many inhabitants keep a traditional home, they also live in more modern homes outside of the community. About 25% of the homes are inhabited full time in a traditional way of life.  The building behind us is an “apartment” style structure, with about five separate homes. It’s also one of the oldest buildings in the community — at least 900 years old.  We participated in a guided tour. Our guide was Chenoa — a women who grew up ...

Today was another fairly long travel day, about 10 hours on the road. We made it all the way to the historic town of Taos, New Mexico. We usually only eat out one meal a day and usually eat out at night. We don’t snack all day, but we do usually have cheese, crackers, etc. Jim loves chicharones and found some that are cheese flavored… Yum!  Didn’t stop much today, but we did make one stop at the route 66 museum in Elk City, Ok.  Northern New Mexico was a surprise, not desert that Jim has seen in Albuquerque and center of the state. Before we hit mountains it was green prairie land. We saw prairie dogs and antelope … and a road runner — no coyotes. The last two hours was a very beautiful drive through the southern end of the Rockies. We didn’t hit any rain, but this storm in the distance was quite beautiful. Not only is it a historic town, Jim has some genealogical roots in the area, so we thought it would be good to visit.  Jim’s GGG-Grandmother (seated) was born near Tao...

We had a really long travel day today, almost 13 hours on the road. We left Carlos’ in Indianapolis this morning and made it all the way to El Reno, Oklahoma, which is about 30 miles west of Oklahoma City. We traveled through parts of four states today… Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, and Oklahoma. We also traveled right through St. Louis, Missouri again … our final route is going to be somewhat of a elongated figure eight. Or for my math folks, an infinity symbol. Other than refueling and pitstops and lunch we did we make one stop early in the day in Casey — pronounced Cazy if you’re a local — Illinois.  Casey is famous for having many Guinness world records for largest things, and a few other very large things. It’s marketing genius as it brings in people from the interstate that would probably never enter into their small town. The rocking chair was gigantic.  Almost all of our trip through Missouri, and much of Oklahoma was through the Ozarks, which aren’t exactly mountains. ...

The kind of traveling that we’ve done is fun, interesting, and … grueling. Today we decided to take it easy. And, since we are at Carlos’ we could easily do that. We slept in a little, ate breakfast, and didn’t get out of the house until close to noon.  Carlos lives about 12 minutes from the Indianapolis Speedway - home of the Indy 500. We decided to go over and take a tour, which didn’t disappoint. They have two tour options, one which takes the tour mini bus on the actual track. Unfortunately, they had Indy Car Experience (one can pay to ride in an Indy-type car) cars on the track today, so we had just one option, but it was very good. And it’s only 15 bucks! We took a short drive over to the start/finish line area of the track.  Our guide, Mike, then led our small group through some of the areas like the media room, owners suite, and more.  Looking down on the track from the owners suite.  Start/Finish line.  The flag person perch above the Start/Finish line ...