Day 8

Today we went to visit the Puya cliff dwellings, in the Santa Clara Indian reservation, not far from Los Alamos.  Much to our surprise, after taking a detour that worked out to be around a half day to get there, it was closed to the public.  We were notified by a sign that was posted inside the reservation.  Thanks New Mexico, nothing like blasting this thing all over your tourist maps, then not telling anybody you can't actually go there until they've arrived.

But this seemed to be normal for New Mexico.  I thought Massachusetts was bad in terms of road markings, and then was shocked to discover that California was even worse, in that it is not uncommon for them to post exit information half way down an off-ramp.

Well, New Mexico has them all beat!  They don't post information at all!  More than once we'd be looking for a crossroad, only to drive right past it, then find it wasn't marked at all!  We'd turn around and then turn where we thought the crossroad should be, then find sure enough, we were on it!

One example, try to find where route 64 branches off from route 68.  There are no markings for route 64 on route 68 in either direction!  I happened to notice as we drove past what we hoped was route 64 that there was a sign a couple tenths of a mile down the road indicating you were on route 64 (assuming you were lucky enough to have made the turn).

If anybody from New Mexico is reading this, come on!  You can do better!  Really, you can!

If the roads weren't so darn fun to drive on, and the scenery wasn't so great, we would have been really, really mad.  But the fact is we ended up having one of the best drives you could imagine, the Alfa loving every bit of it.  Well, perhaps except for the SNOW!!

Yup!  As we passed the crest of route 4, just south of Los Alomos, we drove through roughly an inch of snow that had just fallen!  I'm pretty sure this is the first time this car has ever been subjected to snow, and hopefully it will be the last.  Hey, at least they didn't salt the roads!

We drove 568 miles (909 kilometers).  We spent the night in Boise City, Oklahoma.  Cara and Alicia were both impressed that the two competing hotels were trying to get a leg up on one another by advertising such advanced amenities as remote control for the televisions!  Whoo hoo!  We were going to stop in Clayton, New Mexico, but the wafting odor from whatever manure farm they built the town on was simply overwhelming.  Both girls held their breath until I was well out of town.

Total number of Alfas spotted: 0 (but we did see the rusted out hulk of a TR7 in a junkyard inside a reservation)

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