Traveling to Colorado

You want me to ride where now?

This is a joke right?

Our first day of travel started early in the morning. We drove to Albuquerque, New Mexico which is about a 10 hour drive of suck. Lucie didn't mind being in the crate, but she would not potty at any of the many breaks that we took.

This is how flat Texas is.  Oh look, more flat.

After too many hours, we crossed into New Mexico. I couldn't tell you how many more hours that it took to get to our destination. It has been many years since we have driven a far distance like this and we were all ready to get out of the vehicle! We stayed at a crappy Days Inn. We have learned that there are not many hotels that accept pets and the one that we chose allowed pets but was not pet friendly at all. When we asked for an area to walk Lucie at they stated, "around the building". So out we went where we found only pavement and rock gardens. Our princess was not having anything to do with these things so we got back in the FJ and the search for grass began.

The New Mexico landscape is mostly sand. We did find one place to walk Lucie at which was a local bank. We were thankful to have found some grass, but Lucie simply would not go. At this point it had been about 12 hours since she last had gone to the bathroom. Being that it was a very long day, we headed back to the room. The room was acceptable enough for one night. It would have been better if the power had not kept shutting off during the night causing various alarms to go off which kept waking us up. When morning came we were back out at the local bank where Lucie finally found some relief.  Finally found a use for Wells Fargo. (Quit calling us for other people not paying their mortgage...we don't care!)

Ron took this picture, he's bad-ass for so many reasons.

We had about 6 hours of driving remaining. Around lunch time, we had stopped in a cute little town called Aztec in New Mexico. We grabbed some food and stop at a park to relax and eat. Here I am walking Lucie encouraging her to potty. Traveling must have made her a little nervous because she had no luck.

Our weather was overcast and rainy.

But it was beautiful even with the rain! We had pulled over on the "Million Dollar Highway" to get our first real look at the mountains. This is one of the craziest roads we have ever driven on! Being the passenger, I had a prime seat for beautiful views of the mountains and the jaw dropping view looking down over the edge which was about two inches away from the edge of the road. During the many twists and turns we saw for a split second a sign in front of a house that said "Addie's Place". That made me smile and miss our pups.  There were a few roadside crosses here and there for people who had died going over the edge but a lot fewer than I would expect.  No Guardrails!

We rented a house in Ridgway which is about 15 minutes outside of Ouray. At 8,000 feet our secluded rental house was on top of a mesa and had amazing views. The purpose for our trip was to attend the FJ Summit. This event attracts FJ Cruiser owners from all over to come together for some 4-wheeling fun.

The house was amazing but was sooo isolated and alone I couldn't stop thinking about the movie "The Strangers"  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0482606/

After unloading and getting settled into our amazing house, it was time for some much needed rest.

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Coming Soon - Deer and Mountain Lions and a Bear... OH MY