The Trip Day two

Tom (tburris) and his son Tyler join us in Flagstaff. Now there are five of us in 3 beautiful cars, Crossfires (have any of you seen one? ) Steve and his son Tyler (grey SRT6), Tom and his son Tyler (Blaze Red Limited) and me Karl (black SRT6). Obviously these are the fastest colors as not one single blue Crossfire passes us!

As we leave Flagstaff (gas $3.19 a gallon) the terrain quickly returns to a high plains appearance as the temperature starts climbing toward triple digits again. A good part of this "prime" real estate has been snatched up by Native Americans as mile after mile we are treated to multiple bill boards promoting genuine Native American artifacts "at the next offramp".

All along this stretch the scenery changes from high plains, to desert, to high chapparal to amazing rock formations and mesas. The bare walls exposing the Earth's ancient geological history is breathtaking. I am in awe as I gaze at the horizontal levels of strata weathered by rain, wind and water. I thought I caught a glimpse of a Tyranasaurus Rex sneaking around one hill and quickly out of sight. Suddenly the horizontal strata levels tilt at a 45 degree angle indicating the tremendous pressure of two techtonic plates slamming against each other. Talk about horsepower! Mother nature must have used a tune, dual CAI and a pulley on that one.

At the border between Arizona and New Mexico, we are stopped by armed guards wanting to see our papers.....NAW, not really! Like all of the other state's borders they just kind of happen and suddenly we are in New Mexico. As you may have guessed, the scenery has changed completely....well now it is NM sand instead of AZ sand.

Originally we planned to first stop in Albuquerque, but realized it would have been over 323 miles (bladder control rejected this) and we wound up stopping in Gallup, NM first.

The large Texaco star loomed high by the side of I40 promising to quench our powerful steeds thirst. This large facility also features an outstanding full Mexican buffet. I pull in and insert my Texaco credit card into the pumps receptacle. A message pops up asking if my transaction is credit or debit? Odd as there is a sign on the pump stating they don't accept debit cards. As requested, I promptly press the NO button and the screen goes blank "busy processing" I think. "Your card cannot be processed" the screen alerts me. As I try once again, I am again confronted with rejection.

I go inside and present my card to the clerk behind the counter. "We are no longer affiliated with Texaco" he tells me. I ask "what about the big red Texaco star?" "Oh, that. We are now known as Red Star gasoline, an independent." OK, I hand him one of my standard bank cards and he immediately processes the transaction....

The stop was quite a relief for us all as we kept the "immaculate" toilet facilities busy. What a wonderful experience to walk upright after driving some distance. We pile back in to our cars and now head to Albuquerque where my daughter has called and found yet another gem from Diners, Drive Ins and Dives. The Standard Cafe.

The drive to Albuquerque is uneventful and we soon find the group at the mercy of the lady that lives in my GPS to guide us through the streets of Albuquerque to get us to our culinary destination. She comes through with flying colors and gets us there without incident (much better than in Flagstaff). The Standard cafe is a stand-alone single story building of many architectural styles. Inside the appearance is very pub-like with lots of brick and wood. The menu is very interesting and features bacon wrapped meat loaf. No meat loaf lovers here as none of us wish to try it. Their Monte Christo sandwiches and home-made mac n cheese are of interest. My daughter told me about the Tempura Seared Ahi with Wasabi Guacamole, but I don't see it on the menu. A simple request to the waiter and smiling he replies, "we can do that!" I have to say it was delicious as were everyone elses choices. My daughter is now two for two.

We head back to I40 in the middle of Albuquerque's rush hour and are delayed slightly. Once again back on the road to our day's final destination, Santa Rosa.

All during the drive we experience the same type of "outstanding" drivers as we did before. However, this time there are more big rigs that pull out to pass slower vehicles. Unfortunately the majority of these drivers display the "mine is bigger than yours" attributes. "Oh, were you in that lane when I pulled over?" has to be their theme song. I have great respect for truckers and work with them, but some of these drivers seem to have gotten their commercial licenses from mail order. It is one thing to pull out directly into oncoming traffic that exceeds your current speed by as much as 30 MPH, but it something else altogether when you do this going up hill. Better yet these "high speed" passes are conducted at the blinding speed approximately 1 MPH faster than the vehicle they are passing. These maneuvers seem to take an hour (probably closer to 5-10 minutes). Unfortunately the farther we seem to be from civilization, the more frequent this occurs.

It is only 107 miles to Santa Rosa from Albuqureque, but after a long day, these are LONG miles. The destination is finally reached and we all decide no evening joint meal tonight, just a nice comfy bed to prepare for Day 3.