Exploring Our Way to Pagosa Springs: Day Two

Monday, July 26, we left Amarillo and headed west on Interstate 40 until we got to U.S. Highway 66, about 30 miles west of Santa Rosa, New Mexico. Here we chose to travel north towards Interstate 25 on a fairly deserted road. We had been seeing a strange kind of plant growing along the interstate, but once we were on U.S. 60, we stopped to get a closer look at some of this unusual melon type plant. It grew much like a cantaloupe or watermelon and had small melons on it, but the leaves were different and it obviously didn't need much water to flourish. David pulled back a leaf to take a picture of it with his iPhone, and then we got back into the car and started on down the road. Immediately, we noticed a very strong onion type smell. We were trying to figure out what it might be when I happened to think of the fact that David had touched the leaf of this plant. Sure enough, the smell was coming from his hands. David said that it smelled like someone just got in the car with a big "Whataburger" or something.

By taking this "off the beaten path" road, we were able to visit Villanueva State Park. This park is nestled between large sandstone bluffs, along the Pecos River in northeastern New Mexico.

We didn't spend a lot of time here; it was pretty hot, and we still we still had some miles to travel. We did drive around, and we got out and walked around a bit.

It was a ranger at the state park visitor center who told us the name of the strange melon type plant that we had seen along the road. He said it is called a "stinking gourd" or "buffalo melon." We looked it up online later and found this information about the the melon, which is also know by many other names.

As we left Villanueva State Park it was getting very cloudy and stormy looking and before long it was raining hard on us. We watched the car thermometer drop from the upper 90's to the upper 60's. Before arriving in Santa Fe, we had one more stop to make. We wanted to visit the Baptist conference center at Glorieta. I went there with the UBC youth choir when I was about 17 years old. Much of it still looked the same, but there had been some changes.

Chapel at Glorieta

Prayer Garden

We arrived in Sante Fe late afternoon, and that evening we ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant that was recommended by someone at our hotel. The name of the restaurant was Los Potrillos, and it was very good. It was authentic Mexican food, so we did not have the typical Mexican entrées that we would usually eat. My dish was grilled chicken in a pineapple sauce, served with rice. After dinner we went downtown, walked around the Plaza, and sat and listened to music being played in the Plaza Bandstand. They have a summer concert series there in the Plaza. I didn't take my camera with me, but I did take a few pictures with my iphone. I posted some of them on Facebook.