Wandering around Albuquerque

Mike and Cheryl, our couchsurfing hosts here in Albuquerque, live on the eastern part of the city that borders the Sandia mountain range. We were looking forward to a hike yesterday morning, and Cheryl took us out for an hour and a half in the foothills behind their home.

The Albuquerque Aquarium and Botanic Garden

These popular Albuquerque attractions are part of the "ABQ BioPark" which also runs the local Zoo and Tingley Beach. There's a $12.50 ticket that allows you admission to both the Aquarium and the Botanic Garden and it's especially worth a day out if you've got children.

Albuquerque Rattlesnake Museum

Okay, this was different. And a lot of fun!

In "old town" Albuquerque there is a museum officially called the American International Rattlesnake Museum!

Cancelled!

Well, we're supposed to be in the basket of a hot air balloon right now. Unfortunately, the weather didn't co-operate and it's too windy this morning so our balloon adventure has been postponed until Tuesday morning. So, slight change of plans, but we've got lots to see and do here in Albuquerque and we'll update you on our activities tomorrow morning!

Bright white sand. Everywhere!

Yesterday, we did a day trip out to White Sands National Monument. I think I had heard about this place before, and it was suggested by one of our readers, Poraka, in our comments section that we should visit. So we took him up on his suggestion!

It's always interesting crossing a border...

Let the bells ring out and the banners fly! We're in the United States of America! But they sure do make it interesting to get across a border. I always say that it's a bit of a circus, and the American border is a three ring circus. Barnum and Bailey would be proud!

Glad we came to visit Chihuahua!

Once again, we are overwhelmed by the hospitality of the people we meet. When all you hear from the media are warnings about danger and being told "don't go there", you start to question things. But then when you set out to explore, you find a city where the vast majority of people are just going about their daily business and everyone is friendly and helpful.

Four hours from the U.S. border

A bit of a long driving day yesterday. But in just three days we have placed ourselves only a four hour drive from our border crossing point! We did 550 kms (341 miles) yesterday, for a three day total of 1,263 kms (783 miles).

Aguascalientes to Cuencame

We did 390 kms yesterday to the little town of Cuencame about 100 kms south of Torreon. We were up early with our couchsurfing hosts Paola and Armando so we were actually on the road by 6:30am!

Aguascalientes

We have been to Aguascalientes before, but we wanted to see some more. Plus, we wanted to try and visit the huge Nissan factory on the outskirts of town. So, we set the alarm for 6:00am yesterday morning to try and get an early start for leaving from Hacienda Contreras.

Heading North!

We're heading north this morning!

Here's our approximate driving schedule for the next three weeks...

March Expenses

We spent a total of $1,343 in the month of March. Not bad, but a little higher than we planned partly because we pre-paid for Sherman's storage fees for the summer months. Also spent a little more for gasoline and toll roads. In fact, we were a little higher than we wanted to be in just about every category!

Whiskey's Tree

Our regular readers will remember the sad day at the end of September when our faithful traveling companion Whiskey passed away. We buried Whiskey here at Hacienda Contreras RV Park and to mark her grave with a memorial at the time, we planted a tree.

Sherman goes for a drive!

And, we've made some blog changes. Most of you won't notice, but we've removed the ability for someone to comment as "anonymous". We were getting a lot of advertising comments, and while the spam filter blocked most of them, they were still a pain in the butt! So, anybody who really wants to comment will have to take the five minutes to register for a google account.

Great visit to the dentist (part two)!

You'll remember last week when I went for a cleaning and inspection at our local dentist here in Valle de Juarez. She had mentioned that I had a tiny cavity beside an old filling and so we had made an appointment to have that repaired. On Wednesday, I went and had the repair completed!