Heading out of Taos, we passed back through Santa Fe and into Albuquerque where we stopped at the REI to get Glenn some warm pants. (This pic was taken on the drive down from Taos to Santa Fe). We went to the REI in Santa Fe the day before, but they didn't have the pants in the size we wanted. Fortunately the Albuquerque store did. I have no idea what would happen if you took a left turn at Albuquerque like Bugs Bunny always said, but if you take a bunch of rights you'll wind up at REI! Seriously, it took like 7 consecutive right turns or something ridiculous to wind in off the highway.
At the REI I went to go exchange my Big Agnes inflatable sleeping pad for a Therm-a-rest self-inflating pad. It takes forever to inflate the Big Agnes pad like a balloon and is a pain to deflate every time and fold into the stuff sack. It has also started deflating throughout the night and I like sleeping on my side. When my body touches the ground, it's uncomfortable and cold, so the thing's not very effective. I had to blow it back up about 4 or 5 times in the middle of the night, so I got another one instead. Hopefully this one'll perform better. It is much easier to inflate and deflate and although it's physically much larger when rolled up, I really want a comfy sleep pad so I sleep well and wake up feeling awesome for the next day.
While we were at the REI, Glenn was checking out snowboards and this approached him while he was checking out bindings (the special shoes that attach to the snowboard.) The guy snowboards 7 days a week and works at a ski/snowboard mountain as a lift operator. Anyways, he knows all the best places to ski and snowboard in the area and told us with the snow that had just fallen here, Santa Fe will actually be one of the best places in the area right now for skiing, including Utah and Colorado. Alrighty then!
I was looking at doing some skiing or snowboarding towards the end of the trip after we go from New Mexico to Arizona to Utah to Colorado and figured that I'd find something along the way and everything would work itself out. It continues to do so! So we stopped our long drive out to the Grand Canyon and back tracked from Albuquerque to Santa Fe where we are now (I'm at a coffee shop in Borders updating this photoblog at the moment) where we're taking the day to relax and chill before some good times and play on the mountains tomorrow. I'm really excited about skiing in Santa Fe and then being able to compare that to skiing in Utah, Colorado, California, and elsewhere. Skiing in the eastern US would be cool for comparison as well as skiing abroad. I have no idea if I'll even like skiing yet, but I've found that one of the best ways to find stuff that I actually LOVE is to jump in and try it. This past summer I found out I liked water hiking. I also discovered I like hiking maybe 6-8 miles with a backpack on, not 10-14 as we'd do with a daypack. In college I'd try a bunch of burritos at Moe's until I found exactly the recipe I liked best: Homewreckers with rice, black beans, and steak, everything on it plus cilantro. mmmmmmm so good!
Anyways, so yeah, I'm super thrilled at the opportunity to continue trying new things and watching as synchronicity just keeps making everything happen for me in ways that are more amazing than I could have dreamed up!
Alright, time to go grab some dinner and then grab a hotel before hitting the slopes in the morning. Peace out folks!
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