A Glorious Trip–Glitches and All

My husband and I went on a trip this past weekend to Albuquerque NM to see visit the Hot Air Balloon Fiesta. Here’s what went wrong in the first 18 hours or so:

1. We realized that we’d hit a stretch along I-25 in northern New Mexico where there weren’t any gas stations, and our little Honda FIT has only a 10-gallon gas tank. We’d been watching for a gas station but hadn’t seen any for some time. Suddenly we realized that the gas gauge was telling us we were in trouble. Where was the nearest gas station? Turned out it was 21 miles back the way we’d come. How had we missed it? Did we really need to go all that way back? Well yes—we probably did. The next gas station along the way forward was over 45 miles out. We turned back. Jim turned on the info screen and it gave us the range we had left. It was showing about 15 miles as compared to the 20 miles we had to go. So I sat and tensely watched the phone screen as it counted down the miles to go to Wagon Mound, NM, with its two gas stations, while also watching the car’s screen showing the range countdown. For awhile it looked as though we’d have to walk four miles to the gas station—and four miles back. Eight miles total. I hated the thought of leaving my darling little car sitting by the side of the highway. Jim said that we’d just call our insurance company’s free roadside assistance number, and we would probably have done that, but I wonder how long it would have taken for them to arrive in the middle of nowhere. In the end, even as the range dropped to 0 miles, we made it back to the exit and pulled into the gas station. (All of the billboards had been on the other side of the highway.) Guess how much gas we still had? Almost a gallon. We probably could have made it to the place on the way, but there was no way we could be sure. And now it was dinnertime, with no restaurant in sight. We ended up getting some little bags of nuts to tide us over.

2. We missed out on the hot air balloon event, the thing that got us going on this trip in the first place. We found out later that a million people, give or take a few, had attended the first day’s events, and I have to tell you that I think all of them were trying to get onto the balloon field at 5:30 AM Saturday. Yes, you read that correctly. The first event was at 6:00 AM. We got up, got ourselves packed up, and got on the road by 5:30, with only 12 minutes’ drive to get to the field. Ha. What with the accidents at both exits off the highway and what I have to think were totally inadequate logistics for getting people parked, we sat for over an hour. (We did see a few balloons silhouetted against the dark pre-dawn sky as they took off at 6:00.) Finally, at around 7:15, we said, “Well, let’s just go to Santa Fe,” and we pulled out of the line and did just that. I wonder when those poor people in line with us finally made it onto the parking lot. They may still be there, for all I know.

And you know what? We had a lovely day in Santa Fe. The Burro Alley Cafe with its fabulous croissants was gone, but there was a little bakery on the same street being run by an Asian couple who were hustling around manhandling dough. They even had a “sourdough bread schedule” posted. We sat in armchairs and watched them work as we ate. Then it was on to visiting art galleries and having lunch at our favorite place there, the Bumble Bee Baja Grill. We managed to stumble back upon our favorite gallery, Mountain Trails Fine Art, and had a delightful conversation with the woman manning the floor. The last time we were there we actually got to talk to one of the owners/artists, a member of the Payne family. Their sculpture is amazing, and there are tons of other artists represented there. I told Jim that that one visit was worth the whole trip. But we weren’t finished with great stuff to do—no sirree. We headed on over to Pagosa Springs where we planned to do some hiking the next day. It was great, with a delicious prelude at the Pagosa Baking Company where we had a fabulous breakfast. (But don’t bother going to Tequila’s; we’ve been there on a couple of other trips and really liked it, but the three-star rating it was currently displaying turned out to be more than justified; their prices had gone up and their quality had gone down. I think they’re coasting on their lovely location. We won’t go there again.)

It started raining right at the end of our hike, so we headed home, hoping to squeeze in one last venture to the new Staunton State Park, but by the time we got there it was getting dark, foggy, and cold. So we took a quick look around and made plans to return in the spring. It’s so new that the visitors’ center isn’t even finished, but it looked like a great place with lots of trails. We’ll be back, and we’ll visit Tinytown along the way. Always good when a trip sparks ideas about other trips!

And now we’re home. In the end, it doesn’t matter that the balloon fiesta fizzled or we had to eat snack food for dinner. It was a fabulous trip, fueled by flexibility and good humor. There was a time when I would have focused on the things we didn’t get to do, but no more. And there’s always next year. We’re already plotting how to get onto that balloon field in time for the pre-dawn launch in 2019.