Channeling John Denver

We left Albuquerque about 11:30 Friday and decided to take the scenic route to Ft. Collins. We had a goal to not stop at a restaurant on the way up and almost didn't succeed. Our first stop (pics below) was about 5 miles north of Tres Piedras, NM. The kids didn't want a bell pepper and Swiss sandwich w/ some some kind of tomato/eggplant ooze from Sunflower market, so Joy and I had seconds.

(Pardon the unfocused pics; we need a new P&S camera...)
We picked a random dirt track off the side of the highway and wound up finding a cool rope swing under a tree where we stopped. There was a huge puddle along the way that made a good splash and got the kids wet through their windows. That was a hit.

Our second stop was about 10 minutes south (and above) Breckenridge, CO. We stopped again off the side of the road and Allie was starving, begging to go to a drive through. I promised her she would love dinner. We made an instant hot water meal (freeze dried backpacker food)- Pad Thai noodles with real peanuts and peanut butter. Yummy - I was OK in her eyes again.
We were next to a stream and with sun setting were being eaten alive by mosquitoes. So we packed up and drove up near a pass, 11,600 or so... The sunset and the snow fields on the mountains made for a great view. Thai food doesn't quite match, but oh well...
Wesley's hair is crazy from a little run in with a tub of Vaseline. We have tried washing it with shampoo, bar soap, Dawn and have probably tried each a million times to no avail. Finally our neighbor E. Hedrick put some corn starch in his hair which seems to have worked reasonably well after we washed it.

Joy and Lindsay have taken the chance to get some girl time in so James and I have been playing with the kids and eating peas all day in their nice back yard.