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After our fun experience with letterboxing at home, we had talked about doing this on our road trip across the country and Aidan had eagerly packed his letterboxing gear (stamp, ink pad, and journal book tucked nicely inside his green turtle backpack). So today we decided to head out and search for clues, all in the hopes of finding a hidden box with a stamp inside.

We selected a box called “Rise and Shine,” and despite it being 2:30 in the afternoon, we ventured out to see what we could find. We drove north to the Santa Fe National Forest where we drove on twisting turning roads climbing up the beautiful mountains and eventually came upon an easy-to-miss dirt road where we then began our descent. Now when I say a “dirt road,” this really was a narrow gravel (and at times small-boulder) path, that is closed in the winter with potholes that at times jarred our Jeep. There was a sea of birch and evergreen trees that rose to one side and a drop-off to the other. It was a wonderfully, beautiful place.

After about three miles down, we passed an intersection that we thought might be the special place. We parked the car and hiked around and tried our best to follow the clues, but to our disappointment (and anyone who knows Aidan knows that he does not do well with disappointment), we did not find the box. We decided that perhaps we had the wrong spot, so we got back in the car–all the while trying to be encouraging and positive for Aidan and secretly hoping and praying to Mother Earth that we would in fact find it.

A little way down, we came across another intersection and again got out and followed the clues to try to find the large stump with a rock hiding a secret letterbox. But after searching several stumps in the area, we still we could not find this letterbox. This one was a tough one!

By this time, Aidan was becoming more and more discouraged and upset, and we were feeling the stress. Then by the luck of something (perhaps it was the power of the fetish that we bought for Aidan yesterday), we spotted another large stump hidden in the grass with a rock resting a bit unnaturally on one side of the stump. Aidan was excited! He quickly went over and, with dad’s help, was able to get the box from its secret spot. He stamped his book with the chicken stamp that was carefully wrapped within the box. He then placed his own dog print stamp on a page of the letterbox journal, and we wrote a short note to the box owner.

[View with PicLens]

 

After tucking the box back in the secret spot, we continued our drive to the other side of the mountain taking in more scenic views and just enjoying the natural landscapes of Santa Fe. It was a good way to spend our last full day in Santa Fe. Tomorrow we’re off to see the Petrified Forest as we head over to Sedona, AZ.

Tags:   family fun · letterboxing · nature · photos · vacation1 Comment

I’ve been reading McCarthy’s novel The Road for the past few days while on vacation. I’m about halfway through at this point and am not quite sure yet what I think. A friend of mine recommended it. I’ve never read any of McCarthy’s work before, but after getting the recommendation from my friend and really enjoying the film No Country for Old Men, based on another book by McCarthy by that same title, I figured why not. The book is far from uplifting and I’m not sure what I think of McCarthy’s writing style. While he is an acclaimed and accomplished writer, I’m not sure if it appeals to my sensibilities. Just the same, I am enjoying it enough to suspend judgment until I reach the end. It’s an intriguing, albeit depressing (and maybe somewhat overdone), story of a post-apocalyptic dystopia where father and son find themselves journeying across an ash-laden, dead or dying landscape, rife with hidden dangers of roaming, cannibalistic outlaws. (It’s got that Mad Max kind of feel but without the muscle cars.) The real hope I hold for the story is with the relationship between father and son as they push their shopping cart (a far cry from a muscle car) down the road bound for the coast. The dystopian backdrop seems cliché in my mind, but I hope the character development sets this novel apart from the genre. I’ll let you know when I’m done.

Tags:   books · fiction · reading1 Comment

We’ve been quite busy the past couple days hanging out in the greater Santa Fe area. Today is the first day we’ve really just hung around the house, venturing out only for dinner and a walk through the downtown area.

The past three days, though, have been filled with adventure. On Wednesday we visited El Rancho De Las Golondrinas (The Ranch of the Swallows). This place is rich in history. It dates back to 1710 and  Mountain Gravescomprises buildings and artifacts that range over a 250 year span. The historic records indicate that this site was the last encampment before reaching Santa Fe after the long trip on horseback from far away Mexico City. It is here where Mexican and Native American culture mixed, contributing much to the culture of New Mexico today.

Thursday we took a drive to the Randall Davey Audubon Center to do some hiking and get in a little birding. This wildlife refuge covering 135 acres at the mouth of Santa Fe Canyon is the home of over a hundred species of birds, 120 plants, and a wide variety of mammals. We hiked along the mile-long loop trail and thought we had scared all the birds away, as we saw very few. (I’m sure it had little to do with our louder-than-most five-year-old.) We did observe some beautiful views, though, an amazing dragonfly up close, an interesting array  A Patient Dragonof cacti, and more beautiful rocks than you can imagine. (We were walking all over them.) Just as we were about to leave, we noticed a small garden through an archway and beyond the restrooms of the visitors’ center. Apparently, this was where all the birds were hanging out. We saw a bunch of hummingbirds (which was cool for me, because I had only seen one once before in my life.) I snapped a bunch of pictures, but they are fast little buggers, that’s for sure. The Audubon Center proved to be a nice little escape–and just a short drive from downtown Santa Fe.

Friday we ventured out a little further and made the hour-long drive to Bandelier National Monument to  Hummingbirdhike and visit the ruins of the ancient cliff-dwelling ancestral Puebloan culture. This was amazing. We climbed amongst and even into wonderfully preserved cave homes dating back between 1100 and 1550 AD. On the way to Bandalier, we stopped at a White Rock Overlook, just off state highway 4. Nestled within an otherwise typical suburban neighborhood, we found a small park with stunning views of the Rio Grande River Valley and faraway red mesas dotted black with distant Junipers and Ponderosa pines.. On the way back, we pulled off highway 285/84 to snap a couple photos of “Camel Rock.” It really looks like a camel.

We took so many photos over the past three days, it’s difficult to share them all here. To give a little better taste, I’ve assembled some of the highlights below in this quick slide show.

Tags:   natural history · nature · photos · road-schooling · travel2 Comments