K here again!
R and myself have returned safely from our Thanksgiving road trip to Santa Fe, and boy oh boy was it a good one! This was the first time we'd spent 4 straight days together since last Christmas season. I don't know how that is even possible... It was four days of outrageously fun, wonderful relaxing, taking in all the southwestern art we could, and lots and lots of food.
We set off on our journey not really having a plan... We had a B&B booked for Thursday night, and a hotel on the Santa Fe plaza booked for Friday night and planned to drive through Oklahoma City on Saturday night. That was our Thanksgiving plan.
"What are you guys doing for Thanksgiving?" they'd say....
and we'd just respond with "Going to Santa Fe!"
"Oh cool! Visiting family out there?"
"Nope... just going out on a road trip and spending time together."
Sorry for deserting you, families... Thanks for not getting upset with us for skipping out on the holiday!
Here's K's official photo-intense recap of our trip:
We left Wednesday night after I got off work at 10:30 pm. We knew we had a long drive ahead of us, and were stocked up with snacks, energy drinks and of course, Harry Potter audio books. R got to sleep in the passenger seat and I was on driving duty first. I lasted until 4 am, at which point we were just approaching the Oklahoma panhandle border.
R drove through the rest of the night until the sun came up, and we were in the panhandle of Texas.
(I lost the "take a picture of the state signs" game, with a score of 0... this is one of R's winners)
We stopped along the way only for gas and bathroom breaks. I really enjoyed R's company, and listening to HP and the prisoner of Azkaban while she was asleep.
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| (I was forced to delete the picture of her actually sleeping. However, since I had a t-shirt printed in high school with a picture of her asleep on it, I think this is fair) |
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| The cars in this yard had things like "Stay Away!" and "Get Out" spray painted on them... guess cars are classier than those plastic fence signs. | | | |
We were traveling along Route 66, seeing the sights of the great 'Merica
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| Wake up! Time for a pit stop on ol' route 66! |
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| Gigantic German Shepard we encountered wandering at a Gas Station. Knowing my love for animals R mouthed from inside the car "DON'T PET IT!" Didn't have to tell me twice this time. |
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| At a "roadside picnic stop" where semi-truck drivers had lined up their rigs for a rest, R says "They're not picnicking here at all!" |
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| Getting closer to Santa Fe! |
When we finally did get to Santa Fe, we spent a lot of time checking out the downtown plaza area. It was full of shops, restaurants and art galleries. Our first night we stayed in a beautiful B&B in the mountains called
Hacienda de Santa Fe in Cerrillos, about 30 minutes south of Santa Fe.
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| Front side of our B&B |
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| The whole place was amazing! |
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| View from the upstairs lobby windows |
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| Our room: complete with huge, warm fireplace |
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| Our bathroom had a mesmerizing hand-painted sink... I couldn't brush my teeth without just staring into it. |
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| We got lucky and never hit any snow on our trip, unless you count the dusting at the high altitudes. |
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After a long nap, it came time for our Thanksgiving dinner...
Which we had not planned for... The B&B offered a Thanksgiving dinner, but was a bit overpriced in our book.
We settled on pizza, but couldn't find anything that was open.
I tried calling a Santa Fe Pappa John's I found listed online to place an order.
But when I called them, a woman answered the phone with just "Hello?"
"Hi, uh... I'd like to order a pizza?"
"WHAT!?"
"um, I'm sorry.... is... is this Pappa John's?"
"YOU CAN'T EAT FREAKIN' PIZZA! IT'S THANKSGIVING FOR CRYIN' OUT LOUD!"
"oh, so this isn't Pappa John's then?"
"No, there are no Pappa John's in Santa Fe, hun. NOW GO GET A TURKEY!"
"ok, thank you ma'am. Sorry for the confusion, Happy Thanksgiving."
We drove into town searching the GPS for pizza huts, but found nothing... eventually deciding to save pizza for tomorrow and join the crowd of other non-turkey thanksgivingers at Ihop.
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| Chicken fried steak, pancakes, hash browns, eggs, bacon, sausage.... A delicious Thanksgiving dinner! |
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| Goodnight, Santa Fe |
Friday morning we left The Hacienda, and headed back to the Santa Fe plaza where we spent most of the day touring shops, galleries, and the plaza bakery.
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| Goodbye snow! |
We did end up eating turkey for breakfast, which we considered "leftover thanksgiving breakfast." It was in a tasty pastry with cheese and green chilli we ordered alongside a gigantic cup of hot chocolate.
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| R's favorite Santa Fe location, her "heaven"... The Plaza Bakery. Complete with pastries, cakes, pizzas, and other treats. |
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| My favorite Santa Fe location was the Chuck Jones Gallery. Chuck was a cartoon director at Warner Brothers Studios, bringing several of my favorite characters to life. |
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| Nothing says "Fine Gentlemen's Apparel" like the War of the Roses |
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| WHAAAAT!? |
The day continued on and we made our first '
Diners Drive-In's and Dives' stop, Backroad Pizza. It was one of the best pizzas I've ever eaten! Thin, crispy crust with pepperoni, onions and lots of green chilli.
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| We finally got our Thanksgiving pizza! And it was much better than we could have imagined. |
And since it's vacation time, we opted to follow up lunch with dessert at a chocolate and pastry joint right up the street.
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| Didn't pace myself very well with the pizza... But the brownie was so delicious I couldn't save it! |
We checked in at our night two residence, the Old Santa Fe Inn. It was right on the plaza, which was great, because we weren't even close to exploring it all yet! Plus it was all lit up with lights at nighttime!
To wrap up our Santa Fe stay, we had a Southwestern dinner on the plaza. R must have said the restaurant name to me a billion times, but I kept forgetting.... It now comes as no surprise I can't remember it now writing this. We had to walk around on the plaza searching for wi-fi on our phones, jumping from hotspot to hotspot to keep checking the googlemap, ensuring we were in fact going the right direction of the restaurant.
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| Twinkle lights, big trees, and a fountain! |
Saturday morning we awoke, and began the drive to Oklahoma City. We were stocked up on leftover pizza and fajitas for lunch, as well as some tasty snacks we picked up at the Trader Joe's (I am now on the bandwagon with R on being excited Trader Joe's is coming to our town.)
Thanks New Mexico, you defiantly were a "land of enchantment"... especially since we listened to Harry Potter the whole drive through you.
When we finally arrived in OKC, we found another Diner Drive-Ins and Dives location we wanted to try out... Ingrid's Kitchen.
They were a German diner where I ordered my very first Wiener Schnitzel. I am now a huge fan. However, I'm still not sure I am too fond of the sourkraut and German potato salad... R on the other hand was digging it. I loved their pie though, and R said it was only so-so. I'm hardly a pie critic though... If it's a pie, I'm sure I'll enjoy it... I mean come on, IT'S PIE!
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| Good thing we only had leftovers and snacks to eat before this. |
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| Because we destroyed this meal. Delicious. |
We booked a Holiday Inn Express on a whim online, and it (like every other online reservation we just happened to make for this trip) worked out perfectly...
Then we had the journey home on Sunday. We made an attempt to stop at one last DDD joint in Wichita, KS, but alas, it was not open on Sundays...
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| Looks so delicious and classic. Too bad it was closed. |
| We did get to fulfill our desperate need to eat diner burgers and a shake though, at Jimmy's Diner. |  |
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| Oh Yeah, delicious way to wrap up our food adventure. |
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| Dealing with my antics is one of her specialties. I don't know how she does it so well all the time. |
All in all, the trip was an adventurous, relaxing, delicious getaway across the country with the person I love the most. I saw a lot of the country that I had never been to, and laughed a lot more than I thought possible. Thanks R for a fun-filled Thanksgiving trip, and I will always be thankful to have you with me!
K
Stop the presses!
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| K's antics yield adorable pictures of R. |
