Saturday, May 8, 2010

Carlsbad to Santa Fe





I've had a very interesting past couple of days. Yesterday morning, I got up and went to Carlsbad Caverns. My pictures did not turn out very good, but it was totally fascinating. First of all, the tour begins 75 STORIES below ground! I went on a guided tour of the King's Palace Room, and that was amazing. I learned a lot from the guide. The "Queen's Chamber" and the formation known as "Eternal Kiss" were my favorites from that tour. The tour ended up in the Big Room, which I then did as a self-guided tour. It was absolutely incredible....the formations were unbelieveable, truly. I've attached one here, name unknown, just to show the sheer size of it (by the way, the top of the formation was cut off -- it went several feet higher than the picture shows!). The names for the formations, or speleothems, are interesting: "Fairyland", "Mirror Lake", "Temple of the Sun", "Chinese Theater", "Twin Giants", "Veiled Statue", and "Bashful Elephant" were only a few of them.

After I left Carlsbad Caverns, I drove westward to Cloudcroft, where I stayed overnight at The Lodge at Cloudcroft. The lodge's elevation is 9000 feet, and up there, aspens and evergreens grow, not the desert plants I saw everywhere else. It was really beautiful there.

This morning, I left Cloudcroft and drove to Santa Fe, but I decided to stop at White Sands National Monument first, especially since it's so close to Cloudcroft. It is unbelieveable, really -- white sand dunes as far as the eye can see. I've entitled this picture "Lovers at White Sands".

So finally, I'm in Santa Fe, and I'm here for a couple of days, which is really nice. Since I'm not driving tomorrow, I've decided to take a yoga class, at Yoga Source, from 10am to noon. For those in the know, Tias Little founded the studio and usually teaches that class, but he won't be teaching it tomorrow. (I've never met him, just heard about him from afar....) Could be fun, could be scary! But I'll never know unless I try, right?

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