Day 6 - "Mission Accomplished, No Wrong Turns"

Today we were touring Ghost Ranch. Our tour was scheduled for 1:30, but we were instructed to arrive by 1:00. We decided to leave a little early so that we could eat lunch before the tour. Or so that we had extra time in case I was practicing my U turns again. Our plan had been to stop at the pine nut truck on our way out of town. Doh! the guy was not there today. One of those "you have to buy it when you see it" things. Kind of why I bought the necklace yesterday. It was a beautiful drive up there, the rocks started to turn reddish as we got closer to Abiqui. We followed the Rio Grande for a while, amazing how much greener things are close to the river. The amazing part was that we did not get lost on the way up there. There were a few last minute turns, but no U turns. On the way I see a mesa up ahead and see cars go up it. Oh no, not my favorite. I do it just fine if a tad slower than the speed limit but I am on the inside going up. Coming down could be interesting. We pull off for Ghost Ranch. Oh my this is a very bumpy road. There is a huge RV ahead of us and I stay well back because I do not want to breath in their dust. We get to the man at the gate. First he has to inspect the car of an employee leaving. OK, I am sure that there is a reason. Then it is our turn. He asks if we have reservations, yes, he checks us in, then does his spiel which he has obviously done repeatedly. We are told where to park, where to wait for our tour and that we must wear masks inside any building and on the tour bus. We drive carefully and find a parking place. There is a table on the patio in the shade where we can sit to eat lunch. We have a great view and can watch the hummingbirds feed. I did not know that those little things can be so noisy. There were different types of hummingbirds and they obviously do not get along. They are fun to watch.

There is a woman nearby with a dog. I would not mind the dog except that it barks at everyone who goes past. They talk baby talk to the dog and tell people that he is just being friendly. When the tour guide comes out the woman tries to talk her into letting the dog on the tour. Absolutly not. "Oh, how can you look into those big brown eyes and say 'no'?" Very easily it seems. They do not come on our tour. Yay. There are 10 of us on our tour bus. It is a mix of middle agers/senior citizens with 2 20 something females. This is a Georgia O'Keefe landscape tour. The guide will show us prints of some of her paintings in front of the scenery that she was painting. She would drive us around Ghost Ranch while telling us some of the background of how she ended up living here. She would stop the bus, we would get off and she would show us a print and the part of the scenery that was her inspiration. We were told to stay in the middle of the road and to NOT step off of the road. The 2 20 somethings were both off of the road and one guy had one food off of the road to take photos. Because you know that extra 6 inches makes all of the difference. The guide sees this and flips out. One of the girls steps back but the other one stays off of the road. Now the guide is mad. The two 20's run back to the side of the bus. You might recognize some of these scenes from her paintings:

These are photos of her home on the ranch. The home at Ghost Ranch is not open for tours and cannot be opened for tours until 100 years after her death.

This is Cerro Pedernal or Flint Top Mountain. This was used in different photos and where her ashes were scattered. She loved the land and wanted to remain there.

There were some cactus in bloom. I know that she painted yellow cactus flowers. I will have to research if she ever painted a purple one.

As you can see in some of the photos we had a storm rolling in. You can see so far out here that you could see it pouring off in the distance and it could not rain where you are. I even had my photo taken, this does not happen often.

Here was our attempt at a selfie with my camera and not the cell phone:

The drive back was going well, still no wrong turns, but we drove into rain around Espanola. I hope that they needed the rain because they sure got a lot. Still no pine nuts guy. We will try tomorrow. For dinner we went to the other side of town for Navajo tacos. We were clearly the only tourists there. I had planned to take a photo of the Navajo taco but I was really hungry. It was good, I promise you. The service was a tad slow but the food was good. I will admit that I did make a wrong turn on the way back. I thought I was turning for the grocery store, but I was turning too soon. I just went through the parking lot and back out on the main drag, no U turns involved.

The temps have dropped so we decided to go out to watch the sunset. We are not exactly out in the open, but we found a spot in front of a gas station to watch the sunset.