Sunrise, Sunset
Yo! So we were out in the middle of fucking nowhere. No cell phone reception, no Internet, no electricity...well, that last part is a lie. And the first part. But there was no WiFi at the inn. So no updates. Instead, we had sunrise at Grand Canyon.
Get up early on the North Rim and there's no one else but you.
Driving in the middle of the night through the wilderness with tons of deer glaring into your headlights--sound familiar, huh, Aki? Totally worth it again.
So frigging worth it you're going to get a third photo of the sunrise.
Told ya.
Stayed two nights at Jacob Lake Inn, some 45 miles from the North Rim (depending on where you want to go) and had far better time than on the South Rim. Fewer tourists, see? In any case. Getting up at 3:15 AM meant that we had a hell of a long day in front of us. We had time for wildlife.
Lizard Man.
Mules! 'They have more horse sense than horses do.' - Harry Truman.
And yeah, we did take like a million other photos of the canyon, but the scale doesn't really translate. So I post only this and then one more.
Person shows scale of canyon.
Hell of a long day? Yeah, because we wanted to see sunset at GC, too. And did, at Cape Royal. The wind picked up like crazy and it was Mistral strength by the time we got to the canyon. Beautiful, beautiful.
Sunset. Few tourists around, some having OJ and Smirnoff. Why not.
Transit
First the fucking solar eclipse, now the transit of Venus. All coinciding with the beginning of the zombie apocalypse in Miami, thank you very much. Anyway. New Mexico has its fair share of scenery, so we decided to get up to the Cross of the Martyrs in Santa Fe to check out the sunset. Didn't disappoint.
The Sun, and Venus, somewhere in there. In transit, apparently.
Oh, and that's the cross.
If I didn't sing the Silver Saddle Inn's praises enough, I will continue. The place is great, and its also next door to Jackalope. Tons of weird imported--and wonderful--furniture, local jewellery, weird and beautiful stuff. Easy to spend hours in there.
Día de los muertos stuff. Truckloads of it.
Oh, a love story. Aww. Wait!
After the sunset, we were driving around Santa Fe before heading back to the famed SSI, and we bumped into this. How could one pass this? Easily, it turns out.
The best name for a burger joint in quite a while.
Garden Of The Gods
Road trip, day one! Me and Ulla left Denver and Alex behind for a little while and hopped in the car. We set out to Santa Fe, NM, but stopped a couple time along the way. The Garden Of The Gods is in Colorado Springs (home to the U.S. Air Force Academy, the U.S. Olympic Committee, NORAD and other right-wing stuff. Beautiful spot (and hot) and when we were trekking around the park, we realized we hadn't really seen American tourists yet. Now we did.
What is this I don't even
Rocks and shit.
More r&s.
Kissing camels. Aww.
And if you're ever in Santa Fe, be sure to check out Silver Saddle Inn. Friendly staff, great recommendations for food, laid back--and there's a Calamity Jane room. Psych!
This was taken just before she passed out while leaning on a wall. With her head.