Taos Continued

I am two days behind in chronicling our journey.

Wednesday we spent the morning walking Taos Plaza. I found a hat I liked that is "crushable" making it easy to pack and still keep its shape.

We checked on our bike rental at Gearing Up which is just off the Plaza. We reserved two mountain bikes for Thursday. We got great service from the staff.

Lunch was at a burger place about a mile south of the Plaza. Then nap time and afterwards dinner at Graham's Grille. We both had salads which were very good. We plan to go back again, just to try the corn chowder a guy at the next table was raving about.

After dinner we went to the Spirit Runner Gallery to hear storytelling by Roberta Courtney Meyers. She is an artist/dramatist/historian that is originally from Taos, although she spent some time away working in opera and theater.

The Gallery is a small venue. There were six of us in attendance. Roberta took on the roles of Kit Carson's Cheyenne wife, Mabel Dodge Lujan, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Sakajawea (sp?). It was a special evening...a great way to learn history.

Thursday morning we picked up the mountain bikes and headed for Forest Service Road 438 which is a few miles south of Taos on Hwy. 518. It was a good road for beginner mountain bikers. It's a steady scenic climb. About a 1500 ft. elevation change. The challenge for us was the thin air. Coming from 600 ft. in Fort Worth to 6-8000 in Taos is a big change.

Vicki did very well for not biking much. She made it up some pretty steep hills. Yea! She took a break while I went on to the end of the road.

Coming down is fun! Especially when the shadows cast from the roadside trees obscure holes and rocks in the road when we were "flying" down. I guess we could remove our sunglasses to see better...but hey, it was an adventure.

On the way down a large bug flew just under the edge of my sunglasses on my right eye. It got stuck there and was flapping away. Needless to say, I slam on the brakes and just lift my sunglasses to let it go. Weird.

It was a good ride. We probably did about 10 miles.

Lunch was Subway, then nap time. A short walking tour of Arroyo Seco and Francesca's Boutique. Dinner at Orlando's Mexican Restaurant.

After dinner we went to the Plaza. An outdoor concert was underway. It was one of a series they have in the Plaza during the summer. Afterwards we called it a day.

Today, we are finally going to make it to the Taos Pueblo, on this our fifth trip.