Holy cow. What I remember about this part of the drive is the wind. If we thought it was windy when we got close to Amarillo, it was nothing compared to how windy is was from Amarillo to Gallup. I actually had a little cramp in my hand from hanging on to the steering wheel so tight. I did the first shift driving; when we switched after about 3 hours, I think Kelly thought I was exaggerating a bit... he learned quickly that I wasn't! It was so windy, that while I was a passenger, when I would normally knit, I couldn't. The car was swaying and rocking so badly that I wasn't able to knit comfortably. I was simply bracing myself against the side of the car.
The first part of the drive out of Amarillo was pretty much like the bulk of the drive from Fort Worth to Amarillo. Ranches, fields, silos, cows, trains, wind. Besides the wind, though, one of the high points of the Amarillo-Gallup leg was Route 66. There are still parts of the old Route 66 that are labeled Business-40 and perfectly driveable. One stretch takes you through Aiden, NM, and the Midpoint Cafe - the half-way point on Route 66 between Chicago and San Bernadino.
The other high point was the part of the Continental Divide that crosses I-40 and Route 66 in New Mexico. It was here, too, that we realized the landscape had changed again, and started looking like the "painted desert" pictures I had seen. Very dramatic, very pretty. Still too windy to be fun, though.
Gallup is pretty much a way-station for travelers. Not much going on except chain hotels and chain restaurants. Our chain hotel (Quality Inn) was sandwiched between one chain (Applebee's, where we had dinner) and another (Crackerbarrel, breakfast the next morning). (Yeah, but I like Crackerbarrel's blueberry pancakes...)
Before we started on our journey, Chris and Kelly Ann and June had told us about the deal that the Crackerbarrel has with audio books. Apparently you can buy audio books in one Crackerbarrel for a tiny price (about $3.50), listen to them, then return them to any other Crackerbarrel and get most of your money back. We deliberately didn't get any before we left California, figuring instead that we'd get a few books in Florida before we left. Turns out that there aren't a lot of books on TAPE any more. Welcome to the digital age; all the audio books we found were CDs, and Belinda doesn't have a CD player. Even the Crackerbarrel in New Port Richey only had one cassette book left. We picked it up and had been listening to it intermittently, but it was almost over.
Our Gallup hotel was right next to a Crackerbarrel, so when we ducked in for breakfast, we found their audio book collection - alas, all CDs again. Until the check-out lady pointed us to the sale bin at our feet - filled with tape books! We picked up 3 more so we'd have a supply.
Tomorrow - Gallup, NM, to Flagstaff, AZ!
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