Day 8

16th May 2006
Santa Fe – Gallup NM

28366 – 28577 (211 miles)

Left the hotel in Santa Fe at 8am, wind our way through the narrow streets of the centre of the city, and get out onto the Highway 25 once again. Ahead is old route 66, it is dual carriageway for most of the way to Albuquerque where we plan to have breakfast, the last 10-15 miles is the single carriageway road we have come to love so much. The dereliction is still prevalent at the side of the road, the landscape is still changing it is getting more and more like desert now. The soil is light coloured sand, brown grass and a few shrubs pass a dead coyote at the side of the road and pull into Albuquerque. Here you can really imagine the stagecoach coming into town, besides paved roads the centre cannot have changed much since it was first built. Breakfast is in a small cantina just off the town square, the food is good and reasonably priced, though I must admit some of the breakfast menu had some strange offerings.

A quick stroll around the town along the board walks outside the shops complete with hitching posts, the quality of leather goods are excellent and the prices low. Still not a lot of room on the bike for such extras, would have to get a second suitcase to go home with things. We make a stop for gas and then a few short miles we stop off at the Rio Grande for a photo opportunity, the ground is pure white sand and is held in place by tall long grass.

Back on the bikes again and the temperatures are getting up into the high 20’s, we are riding across the plains now and have mountains all around us. Red buffs rise out of the ground, some fun is had with the road as we have come across some decent bends cut through some small bluffs and it is a chance to practice, as these are the first real bends we have had in a long time. We cross over dry riverbed after dry riverbed the scenery is changing again rocks rising from the ground signs of volcanic activity long ago. We have a train running parallel with us for a while until we stop off in Grant for a break, and I get a chance to text home for an update on my daughter, during the ride, my mind has not really been on the scenery or the road. The train passes us by and continues on its journey towards or next destination.

Leaving Grant we travel across a flat landscape, we have bluffs to our right, rising up you can imagine the canyons and the Indians riding out across the plains, it is like scenes from the movies only in improved colour, this is real cowboy country.

It is quite amazing how the re-routing of Route 66 destroyed so many livelihoods and devastated so many towns.

Arriving at Gallup at an early hour 4pm, we get our rooms and I ring home for an update and told to carry on with the trip as things are going all right at home. So with this bit of news I go for a dip in the hotels pool, the first time on this trip that we have had time to get in a pool, our last stop did not have one. Feeling a bit more refreshed and happier with the situation at home, I feel that I can relax a bit tonight.

Our tour guide has arranged for us to have a meal out at El Rancho, which is famous for the number of film stars that it had staying there during the heyday of Hollywood, whilst making films nearby. We are being picked up in a limo again tonight and transported to El Rancho, never been in a limo before this trip and now twice within a week, not only that we had motorcycle outriders provided by Chapter 144 of Dons motorcycle club, Fire and Wind, (made up of fire-fighters, ex-fire-fighters and police). El Rancho is an amazing place built in 1930 and has all the grandeur of that era, sweeping staircase and loads of highly polished wood. The evening was great and the people so friendly after the meal we had another ride back in the limo with outriders; we said our thanks and goodnights and waved them off.