Let's go to New Mexico (part 2)...

On Wednesday (Aug 21st) I hopped in the shuttle van and headed from Santa Fe to Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu.  The ride was so beautiful and the driver of the van was so nice.  We talked so much!  Honestly, I was so overwhelmed by the landscape that it was hard to focus on the conversation.

Throughout the 10 day trip, I took over 600 photos with my camera and probably around 100 on my cell phone.  

I was the first of our group to arrive that day in our building.  After settling into my room, I wandered a little bit around the outside of the building, just taking it all in.  There was a monsoon off in the distance that I kept watching as it came closer and closer.  The lightening was amazing and when the storm finally made it to us, only a few drops hit the ground.  It sure was fun to watch move over the land.

One of the things I learned was that the land had once been the bottom of the ocean, which I guess I should have known from school, but it just didn't register.  They had a couple of museums on the ranch, that I never made it to.  One of them was about the dinosaur bones that had been found on the land.  It turns out they matched bones that had been found in Africa.  So fascinating!

Anyway, I walked A LOT on the ranch.  I only hitched a ride with my classmates a few times.  It was really important to experience the land as much as I could.  I walked over 12,000 steps daily and a few days went as high as 15,000.  

My time on the ranch was from Wednesday until Monday.  It was the most wonderful five days I think I've ever spent.  

One thing that surprised me was the lack of wildlife.  I saw one rabbit, one deer (just barely), a couple of little lizards and a few birds.  I could hear ravens but never got to see them.  Not a single rattlesnake or scorpion.  No coyotes or wolves.  I was very disappointed in that.

On Monday, I took the shuttle back to Santa Fe and met up with my friends from class.  One had a flight out later that day and the others had to drive back to Albuquerque for their flights, so we hung out in my room for a few hours until she had to leave.  I had to get up at 4 on Tuesday to make my flight home.  

I'd been watching the weather before I left for Ghost Ranch and was worried about a tropical system that was supposed to hit the Miami area when I had my return flight through there.  Once back in Santa Fe, I turned on the weather channel and found that the storm was still incoming, but my bigger problem was a system moving across the country into Dallas - which was my first stop on the way home.  

I made it home Tuesday after lots of flight delays and re-routing of flights.

Being out there, experiencing the open spaces and the clear air, seeing all those stars, it just reiterated how much I would love to live away from a city.

Next up is a post about the art we made in class and the art I made after returning home that was inspired by my time there.

What have you been up to lately?

Thanks for stopping by for a read...

love & blessings
~*~