SANTA FE, CAJUN RIVIERA & SQUARE DANCING

     It has taken 6 months, but we finally settled into a period of relaxation.  We now are slowing down by staying longer at one place and getting off-season or weekly rates.                
     Our visit to Santa Fe was a mixed bag of RV repairs with a large dose of visiting this beautiful area.  Santa Fe was a real "highlight" town filled with adobe structures, excellent restaurants, good music, and lots of places to visit.  If you like Native American crafts, this is the place to buy them.  My favorite Santa Fe adventure was the night we "tore-up-the town."  We started the night around 5:00 at a brew pub on a second floor patio overlooking the central square in Santa Fe.  From there it was on to the "The Shed" for a superb New Mexican dinner.  Our evening was rounded out at a fun local bar, "Cowgirls," where we were treated to a Tex-Mex/Western style band.  The place was packed and we had the opportunity to mix it up with the locals.  After proving we still had it we finally bailed, went home, and were sound asleep by 10:30.  We really showed those locals in Santa Fe that we knew how to par-tay!

"Joca," a fun band at 2nd Street Brewery in Santa Fe.

Palace of the Governors on Santa Fe's central square
with Native American vendors.

Santa Fe, NM

Bandelier National Monument
near Santa Fe.

Nancy climbs into a cliff dwelling at
Bandelier National Monument

     After Santa Fe we ended up in Austin, Texas.  The purpose of our journey to Austin was to visit Linda, a close neighborhood friend of Nancy's from birth through high school.  Linda now lives in a town outside of Austin in "Texas hill country."
     I need to digress for a moment.  I have now developed a new rule--if you want to stay healthy, don't let us visit you!  Since the start of this RV adventure we have attempted to visit 3 families at various locations and all ended up in the Emergency Room.  First, we visited Rick and Laura in Chicago.  The morning of the day of our visit, Laura ended up in the emergency room and they had to cancel.  Second, when we went to visit the O-Family in Portland, on the day of our arrival, Heather spent the morning in the emergency room.  Third, in Austin, Linda and her husband, Taylor, just became grandparents again.  It turned out the the newborn had to be wisked back to the hospital on the day of our arrival and Linda needed to help with grandparent duties.  Although everybody turned out fine, I'm starting to believe that our visits may be akin to the plague.  Watch out!
     Sorry for the digression, so back to Austin.  Austin advertises itself as a music mecca and they are correct.  It does not matter the day or the season, you can find music of a variety of genre's all over town.  It was a blast spending an evening visiting the music venues on 6th street.
     It wasn't until our last day in Austin that we were finally able to get together with Linda and Taylor.  They visited our place for lunch, gave us an insiders tour of Austin and surrounding area, and cooked us a gourmet meal back at their house.  It was wonderful watching Nancy and Linda reminisce over their youthful adventures.  They got along famously and it did not seem that they had not seen each other for 40 years.  This visit was very special for Nancy and we can't wait until the next time we see them.

Linda & Taylor

Nancy & Linda

     We next travelled to Livingston, Texas; the home of the Escapees RV Club.  The Escapees is a club for full-time RVers and they have a campground at very favorable rates for club members.  We ended up staying 9 days and learned what life is like in a retirement community.  The Escapees have a daily activity schedule with bingo, line dancing, crafts, square dancing, movies, ice cream socials, etc.  It was a great place to relax and not go anywhere.  I hesitate to admit this to Todd and Johnny M, but I actually squared danced and had a good time.  However, after busting a few moves, I was very politely replaced by somebody who knew what they were doing.  At least I didn't hurt anybody!  Oh, just so you know, we are not yet ready for the retirement community scene.
     We are now in Holly Beach, Louisiana.  Holly Beach is on the Gulf of Mexico on the "Cajun Riviera" and is surrounded by hundreds of miles of bayou.  It was one of the towns scoured clean from the face of the earth by Hurricane Katrina.  The town is still trying to rebuild.  Everybody here now lives in an RV or in a house on 15'-20' stilts.  Upon entering town, the houses on stilts grabbed my attention as they reminded me of a pod of those alien creatures attacking earth in "The War of the Worlds" movie.  Temperatures are in the mid-60's here, so it is onto the beach tonight for the sunset!

Interesting find on Holly Beach, LA.

Sunset at Holly Beach.

     QUOTE OF THE DAY:  "No matter which end of the horse you're working with…there's nothing like an ice cold Kansas City Sarsaparilla to quench your thirst!"--Taken from a bottle of Kansas City Authentic Sarsaparilla purchased in Sulphur, Lousiana.