Catch Up - Santa Fe and Family Time

Since we last posted we spent three days in Santa Fe where we saw some great art galleries and did some people watching on the main Square.  For anyone interested in seeing what's happening in the art market, a trip to Santa Fe is a must.

Over the past week, we have been in Northeast Oklahoma and Northwest Arkansas and finally the past three days at the Buffalo National River in the company of Barbara's fun sisters and brothers-in-law, doing a float on the beautiful Buffalo River, eating good food, and playing the incomparable card game, "31".   It's a game of low-stakes gambling (max. loss per game is 75 cents per person) that somehow generates the most high-spirited trash talk and laughing I may ever have heard during a card game. If you're interested in the particulars of the game, we're willing to share...

Barbara's sister Jean and husband Jim

 Sister Alice and husband Ray ("31" champions)

 Sisters Alice, Jean with Barbara and Gabby

Buffalo Point was one of the prettiest RV parks we've been in.  This was our RV site, shady all day, surrounded by tall trees, about 30 yards from the banks of the river.

Taos, New Mexico - "The Place of the Red Willows"

We came to Taos after Monument Valley (Arizona/Utah) and have spent two sunny days visiting Taos Pueblo (above), sitting in the shady 17th century downtown plaza of more modern Taos, and enjoying a nice bike ride.  Taos and Santa Fe are major art centers so there are galleries and studios everywhere: painting, ceramics, weaving, and jewelry.  Barbara visited Taos Pueblo which is the oldest continuously inhabited community in the U.S.!  Families still live in adobe structures like this one as they have for thousands of years.

While these structures are over 1,000 years old, they were modified later by adding doors.  Originally the only entryway into the homes was by ladder through an opening in the rooftop, also serving as a source of light and safeguard against intruders. 

The drying rack is still used to dry meat for jerky as well as for corn, squash, and bean crops.  The native language Tiwa and is unwritten and unrecorded, and the living natives intend to leave it that way.  The exteriors are plastered yearly with adobe bricks (earth, straw, and  water) with walls several feet thick.  These are multifamily structures that share walls.

Well, we are on to Santa Fe later today for three days before going to Oklahoma and Arksansas to visit Barbara's sisters and their families.

Monument Valley

We spent a day here and took a tour with a Navajo guide.  We learned a lot about the Navajo customs and history.  Lots of movies, especially John Wayne movies and Thelma and Louise, were made here.  The vistas were breathtaking.  Monument Valley is within the Navajo Nation Reservation and is run and controlled by the Navajo.



Final Grand Canyon post - The raven

Ravens are amazing birds! 

Last night Barbara listened to a Park Ranger talk about ravens and learned some surprising facts. 

First, ravens look like blackbirds, but are a lot bigger.

Second, they are VERY smart, AND mischievous.  Here are some fun stories about ravens:

1.  Ravens love to eat and have been known actually to unzip backbacks to get at a snack!

2.  Ravens are sneaky.  The ranger reported that a hiker in the canyon was being harrassed by a raven when he was trying to prepare his dinner.  The raven kept approaching him, seemingly unafraid.  The hiker shooed him away, time and again.  Finally, he got so exasperated, he got up and chased him away.  When he left his food preparations, two ravens hovering in the branches nearby swooped down and picked up his food!  When he turned around, he found all three ravens enjoying his dinner on a ledge above him.

3.  Ravens are able to recognize human faces!  Scientists discovered this with an experiment.  They had two or three people deliberately harrass a raven in captivity by shooing it away, waving their arms at it, swiping at it with their hands, etc. 

Later, they brought back the harrassing human beings along with several other, innocent, people and put them all in the same space with the raven.  The raven took his revenge, but ONLY on those who had harrassed him, by pooping on them!  He left the others alone.

4.  Ravens can imitate sounds, including those of coyotes.  Ravens in the Grand Canyon have been observed to call out with a coyote sound whenever they see carrion (the body of a dead animal) on the ground.  The coyote cry by the raven alerts coyotes in the area and attracts them to the dead animal.  Ravens do this because they themselves actually want to eat the dead animal, but their beaks are not adequate for breaking open the carcass and exposing the flesh underneath to be eaten.  The coyotes, however, have their sharp teeth and they do the job.  After the coyotes have had their fill, the ravens swoop in to eat what's left over!  In this way, both the coyotes and the ravens benefit.

So, ravens are an amazingly intelligent bird.  Who would have thought?

Finally, here is a picture of sunset at the Grand Canyon last night.  The picture was taken only about 30 yards from our RV site which was close to the edge of the canyon.  What a campsite.

Today, we travelled to Monument Valley in southern Utah.  We're going to take a tour tomorrow.  Our campsite here is hemmed in by the great red rock formations of the canyon, another beautiful place to be staying.  And, it's warm!  At last.

Sunrise at the Grand Canyon

Barbara got up at 5 a.m. to go see the sunrise from Bright Angel Point, near the main lodge.  Below are pictures for your enjoyment.  FYI, in the first photo, the South Rim visitor center is virtually in the middle on the rim in the far distance.  Underneath it is a pretty wide shadow in a "V" shape, where the morning sun hasn't hit it yet.

    For those who have an interest, the first and last photos were taken without any special effect.  The middle two were taken with a rose-colored filter over the lens.  Notice how the latter brings out the reds and makes the sky almost purple.



Grand Canyon goes on!

After a great hike down the Kaibab trail, the only one that goes down to the bottom of the canyon and then up the South rim, then known as the Bright Angel trail, we enjoyed a great fire and evening.

This was the view from our campsite, which is only 30 yards from the rim of the canyon.  To see any picture on our blog with better detail and in larger format, just double click on the picture.

The next few photos are from the walk into the canyon, just too much to see, why we have been to Grand Canyon five times now and Barbara swears we will return soon again.  The last picture for today, of the six deer, was taken through our front windshield of the motor coach at 5:15 a.m.

Ever the enthusiastic learner, Barbara attends many of the ranger talks in the evening as well as doing all the nature trips.  Wednesday, we are taking a bicycle trip to see some of the above-rim forests and vistas.