Day 11 - Not a Hostel environment!

So I'm typing this the morning after rather than the night of as I've be accustomed to doing, didn't have internet access yesterday night but wouldn't have changed it for the world - our real journey started last night when for the first time in my life I stayed in a hostel - and what fun it was!

Okay so lets start at the beginning, we woke up in Albuquerque in our fab mural-painted wall room, sadly the hotel was fully booked (all 21 rooms) for the next night due to a wedding so we had no choice but to move on.  As we arrived here in the dark the night before we decided to go back to the old town to look around in the daylight. 

The old town revolved around a plaza square, the fiesta from the night before was still going (we presume they took a break and slept)!!!  We had a mooch about in the shops buying a few trinkets and then it was back in the beast.  We decided to still go to Santa Fe even thought this was off our route but had been strongly recommended. 

It was only about an hours drive and when we got there I was pleased to see it resembled a bigger version of the old town plaza in Albuquerque.  By now it was 1pm and a perfect time for a spot of lunch, our nifty guide book (now our Bible after the fab tip on the last hotel) recommend a place called The Shed,.  They call themselves the home of creative cooking and if our warm chicken, walnut and blue cheese salad was anything to go by it was fab.  The outside is a tiny courtyard, people wait for around 45 mins to get a seat there.  They are known for their desserts (so the trusted guidebook says) unfortunately we didn't stay to sample one and there was still a lot to see in Santa Fe. 

We strolled around the plaza taking pics of their historical buildings and visited a chapel called Loretto, it's famous for having a freestanding spiral staircase that has no central support or nails - it was built in 1872 and only had a safety rail put on 10 years later.  True craftmanship at it's best.  We then sat on benches in the central part of the outside plaza soaking up the atmosphere, our ice creams were melting in the hot sun faster than we could lick them!  It was nice to watch the world go by for 10 minutes:-) 

We left pretty Santa Fe at around 4pm has we had a long drive of around 4-5 hours if we were to make it to Roswell.  About an hour into the drive we remembered a brochure I picked up in Albuquerque about a museum called Tinkertown, it has a collection of small hand-carved figurines and villages.  Understatement of the year!  We thought we'd have a quick stop off there, the place was simply amazing, I wrote in the log there afterwards that it was real art.  I absolutely loved it, this small quirky tunneled series of shacks housed an array of brilliantly made American towns complete with general store, toy shop, salons and much much more.

I have always been interested in miniature dollhouses (a fact I may not broadcast as I'm trying to appear cool) but this place has brought out my passion again.  The work this must have taken to create and the attention to detail was amazing....and it was just so fun to look at (even had push buttons to make things move). 

Just when we thought we saw it all we turned a corner and there was a whole room/shack with a full circus, including tent, animals, freak show - this whole place summed up my interests, miniature freaks!!!!!  No seriously the combination of the miniature scenes, circus, freak shows and various toys and dolls was a true trip - picked that word up from some fellow American travellers - more on that in a mo! 

The lady who ran the museum was called Carla, it was her late husband who built everything, sadly he died 9 years ago and had severe Alzheimer's.  His passion lives on in her and it's not just the exhibits that are amazing but the grounds and building they lie in.  There was also a sailing boat displayed with various news clippings, photos and info about the boat, it was made in Essex England and a man called Fritz Damler has given up his day job to fulfill his passion so bought the boat and sailed around the world for ten years, he has written a book which we bought in the gift shop.  Carla told us this man was her her brother - they really all are an inspiration to follow your dreams and be creative and live life doing what makes you happy.  I can't gush enough about this place, it should be visited by all passing as it's a real must-see...  I think I've got my life motto from this place - a poster in amongst the toys read "You don't stop playing because you grow old, you grow old because you stop playing"!

By this time it was nearly 6.30pm and we still had nearly 4 hours to Roswell.  Carla suggested we stayed around here and recommended a hostel up the road.  Me being me I had an inward shudder at the word "hostel" - my only knowledge of hostels is from the horror film "Hostel".  Carla assured us that Jim, the owner, was a real character and very welcoming and the hostel was a comfortable, homely place.  She rang him immediately to check availability and then we were on our way.



There were loads of rooms over two floors, hundreds of bunk beds.  he kindly told us if we wanted to stay downstairs it would be cheaper and we'd have the whole floor to ourselves.  We decided to book one of the private rooms upstairs with an ensuite - okay so not exactly the bunk bed hostel experience one typically thinks of but one step at a time for Bermondsey Barbie me!

Jim told us of local restaurants we could visit but offered to cook us dinner.  We didn't want to impose but after some persuasion we agreed and made our way to the grocery store.  The couple staying at the hostel were Marie and Goiyo.  They said they had barbecue skewers so we bought lots of veg, turkey burgers, nachos, dips etc.

When we got back Jim had fired up the barbecue.  We told Marie and Goiyo that the shopping was our treat.  They kindly prepared the dinner, Jim cooked the dinner so it was a team effort all round!  Getting to know one another, we all sat around the barbecue as it grew dark while Jim put the food on to cook.  Everything was delicious apart from the disastrous turkey burgers which stuck themselves to the grill - with Jim's attempt to save them with a spatula resulting in one giant turkey mass!  Ringo Starr the dog enjoyed them though...

There's so much I could tell you about last night as we had such fun getting to know each other, but I would go on for ages and this blog is already long enough!  It was like something out of a film at one point - two English travellers way out of their depth, two open-minded independent young Americans, and bearded Jim who produced his 4-foot samurai sword while telling us a dead elk's head (which he proudly shot two years ago and kept) was over at the donkey pen!

Jim didn't stay as his own home was just up the road.  When he left I joked that this was a scene in a horror film and usually only one survives the horrific ordeal.  I quickly declared that it would be me!  Us four stayed up chatting until the early hours.   We discovered that we both started travelling on 25 May, and although going now in different directions through America, they would be going to the places we had just left and vice versa.  Too much to go into but it was definitely fate that we all met last night, and they offered to show us around their hometown of San Francisco when we turn up there in a couple of months - we can reminisce about Jim and his giant sword!  On a serious note, Jim was a real character just like Carla had said, a humble man with a true heart of gold and a warmth that meant I couldn't help but love him immediately.

I don't know what the rest of our trip has in store for us but I'm so glad that we stumbled across Carla who put us on to Jim and hence meeting Marie and Goiyo.  Another case of serendipity!

It's now fast approaching lunchtime and we are in a cafe (with internet access!) just up the road from Jim's.  With our pancakes eaten it's now time to head to Roswell to see what those crazy aliens have in store for us!

Ankle bracelets 2, turkey burgers 0, elk's head 1!

J&O