Framedlight

  We were going to fly back to the UK from Denver airport so we planned a slow route from Santa Fé to Denver, through Colorado and the Rockies. But when we got up to leave the Parador on the Friday morning, we found that snow had fallen quite heavily overnight as was evidenced in the car park. We were pleased that we were now in possession of a Ford 4x4 which we felt would do the trick. The route took us back over our well worn path of Highway 84, running north west past Ghost Ranch and the Pedernal  towards a town called Chama. In fact by the time we got up to Abiquiu the snow was disappearing although we could still see it falling on the Pedernal. I stopped to take a picture of the entrance to Gost Ranch as we realised we had not got one Snow was falling on the Padernal - Georgia O'Keeffe's mountain There was lots of colour in the hills as we drove west Chama is only 7 miles from the Colorado border and, according to Wikipedia has a very harsh subarctic continental climate. N

  We had noticed a rough path up into the hills a little bit east of Ghost Ranch. Most of the land was fenced off so this seemed the best place to explore from. It was not so much a footpath but a track following an arroyo or dry stream. It was pretty rough going but we persisted and really enjoyed the scenery and the solitude. The sun was out and the sky was perfectly blue although in the shade there was still some persistent snow on the ground. We climbed up the stream going through narrow gullies until we reached the top of the hill and the watershed. Here we could gaze across at the view of blue mountains beyond. View from the top to the distant mountains Reflection in the parked van

  It was yet another trip on Highway 84 up towards Ghost Ranch, but I now perfectly understand why Georgia O'Keeffe found the area so inspiring.  We had planned a walk and an excursion but stopped first to look at a tiny group of graves we had seen just next to the road. There was no marked graveyard and nothing to explain why they should be there. We thought they may be memorials to traffic victims but they looked far more like proper grave markers. Strangely there were some animal bones in the same vicinity which I photographed in homage to Georgia!

 It was mid afternoon by the time we had finished our tour so we decided to do one of the trails at Ghost Ranch. Chimney Rock trail is 2.6 miles long and ascends to the two dramatic chimneys that dominate the skyline over the Ranch. The sun was out, the light was mellowing and we only saw one other couple when we were there, so it was a serene ending to our day at Ghost Ranch. As a bottle of wine seemed in order for the evening we went home via Bode's Store in Abiquiu. This shop was founded in 1890 as Grant's Mercantile and was bought by an employee, Martin Bode, in 1919. It really sells everything under the sun and also has a petrol station, so is a very useful port of call for the community.