THE SCENIC ROUTE, THE HIGH ROAD AND THE BACK ROAD

Monday morning bright and early I dragged DH out to visit galleries on Canyon Road in Santa Fe.

This is one of many kinetic sculptures catching the morning sun and spinning in the canyon winds.  All that art gave me all kinds of new ideas.  

We visited some churches.  This is the famous and amazing spiral staircase in the Loretto Chapel.

Merchants and craftsmen were selling all kinds of stuff to a willing crowd of tourists.

We visited a few more museums and even saw some paintings by Georgia O'Keefe (who's work I don't like because she painted her hills to look like naked bodies with crotches and butt cracks and her flowers look like reproductive organs).  Then we fueled up and headed north for Taos.

We took the scenic byway (after we passed it and had to backtrack).

We stopped along the way to visit points of interest like a vineyard...

...and a cemetery.

The road wound on and on through the scrubby junipers.

There were long views of desert landscape.

The road narrowed to a single lane as it passed through an occasional village.

Signs warned us of hairpin turns, steep grades and watch out for cows.

They weren't kidding.

This heifer had apparently gone to sleep in the middle of the road.

So sorry to disturb your siesta, Senorita Vaca.

We were thinking we'd missed a turn on this High Road to Taos and when the pavement ended we decided we were lost and turned around.

Went past the sleepy cow and her friends,

Found the left turn we missed and continued on our way through The Carson National Forest to the highway to Taos, New Mexico.

Where even the building for Mickey Dee's looks like it was designed by Fred Flintstone.