ROAD TRIP
Day 2, Part 2
mishaps, black holes and sweet friends.
After a blissful, easy and fun morning exploring Tucson we hit the road for New Mexico. Our plan was brilliant…or so we thought. Leave Tucson at 1pm and drive to White Sands, New Mexico….mapquest said it would take us roughly 4 hours to get there which was perfect because they closed at 6pm and we wanted to get there as close to sunset as possible for photos. After visiting White Sands we planned on driving to my friend, Chantal’s house in Albuquerque for a night… that was another 4 hours away. It was a tight schedule but totally do-able!
We spent the first 2 hours of the drive taking different versions of the above picture (kids don’t do this at home) and looking for the New Mexico state sign to take a picture next to. Side note- before I left town, Brian put in a request- he wants a picture of me flashing him in front of each state. It was certainly an interesting challenge and one that I found funny enough to accept. Rachel and I also thought it would be nice for us to have a normal photo of us in front of each state sign as a memento (you know, for the grandkids or something). Sadly, we had missed our opportunity to take a picture with the Arizona sign because we were half asleep on that drive and never even noticed it, so the pressure was on to get the shot with the New Mexico state sign!
We succeeded! I’m only posting the non-flashing one of course. It was bad enough having a thousand truck drivers see me do it.
After the rush of the state sign we hopped back in the car to continue our drive to White Sands. About 20 minutes later I noticed that the clock on my phone read an hour later than the car’s clock- that’s odd, I thought. Don’t you love it? My first thought was…that’s odd…rather than that makes total sense considering we are driving across the country and the time changes when you do such things.
I broke the news gently to Rachel (she was pretty attached to White Sands) that the time had changed somewhere along the drive and that we would not be making it to White Sands before they closed. She seemed pretty heartbroken- we both were actually. I mean we had like 20 inspiration photos that we wanted to take there!
Rats!
To fight off our tears, we tried to find the silver lining in the situation. We were able to find two- the first was that we would now be arriving in Albuquerque earlier and would be able to enjoy more of a visit with my friend Chantal, her husband Michael and their baby Sebastian. That’s a plus! The second was we now also had time to stop off at a dusty roadside trading post for a little retail therapy! Another plus!
We walked away from the hour spent at the trading post (we were sucked in) with a dream catcher to hang in our car. It seemed like the perfect addition to the journey considering this whole trip is a dream come true.
What happened next we still can’t really explain- somehow the drive to Albuquerque took 2 more hours than we had thought it would. The only reasonable explanation for this is that we fell into a black hole somewhere between the trading post and Chantal’s house.
By 7pm we were starved, exhausted and loopy from being in the car. All we wanted to do was get to Chantal’s and fall into bed. In an attempt to make better time, I decided to pick up the pace and put the pedal to the metal as they day. Shortly after this brilliant decision I saw lights flashing in my rearview window- oh no. I pulled over, turned off the car and put my head on the steering wheel, not knowing whether I was going to laugh or cry.
Officer Mike wasn’t too impressed with us, our mission to drive across the country or our humorous ways. The only good thing to come out of the situation was this picture.
At around 10:30 pm, we finally pulled into Chantal’s driveway. We were starved, exhausted and I’m pretty sure we looked and smelled as if we were in need of a shower.
Thank God for kind souls like Chantal and Michael because they had Thai food and a bottle of white wine waiting for us. They also had a beautiful guest room set up for us with clean towels folded on the bed and a sweet smelling candle burning. It was the warmest welcome I have ever received and made me thankful to have friends like them in my life.
We sat on the patio, ate Thai food, sipped wine and talked with Michael and Chantal about life under the stars. It was the perfect way to end the day.
{Photos by One Part Gypsy}
See Rachel’s take here!
365til30.com 
My Brian would have made the same request… I’m sure of it 😉 silly boys!!
HA:)
Ditto to the request 😉 haha! Sorry about the ticket and Officer Mike’s lack of humor. Loving reading your posts & tweets along the way.
Hahahah! I’m so delighted to have you along for the ride!! 🙂
Sorry you slipped into the twilight zone for a little while, Kate. But it made for a fun read, and, all the more fodder for a great book. To hell with officer Mike!
Ha! Thank you Gregory!! Yeah, to hell with officer Mike!
Other than officer Mike sounds like a beautiful trip. Really enjoyed reading about your journey.. Stay safe.
Thai food is a great way to end the day! Glad to see that you’re having a ton of fun!
Thank you so much! I am! glad to have you along for the journey!
It’s New Mexico! Nearby Area 51 and Roswell are the only explanations for your Twilight Zone experience on Day 2 of your trip. HaHa.