Funny stories from the top of a mountain

Spending a quick weekend in Albuquerque for my cousin's wedding, there was not much time for site seeing. Trying to get 3 girls 'to the church on time' to throw the petals, letting them play in the hotel pool (why do I travel 800 miles to let them swim in a pool?), and spend precious time with not oft seen family and friends, there was not much time for enjoying the unique beauty of the southwest.

On my last day there, we took the two littluns to see the high desert. Trying to find a scenic byway, we stumbled across a tram that takes people up Sandia Peak. I did a U-turn at the gate when I found out it would cost $15 a head.

We continued down the road to find a gas station to ask for directions to the scenic byway. I looked at a map to discover that we were only a few miles from the scenic byway if I were a crow (I'm not). If I wanted to keep the minivan on roads to get there (I did) it would take about an hour to get there, an hour each way on the byway, and another hour back. I took into account my families uncanny ability to be late to ANYTHING and did some quick math. My 'cypherin (as Uncle Jed would say) indicated we would be cutting it very close to the scheduled flight departure time to head back to KC. Of course if I would have taken into account Southwest Airline's uncanny ability to be late on EVERY flight, I would have realized we could have made the trip twice. However, I missed that key point and decided we couldn't go on the trip.

You should realize that I am tighter than a frog's ass. My vacation souvenir budget typically consists of fifty-one cents to smash a penny at a tourist trap. If its not free, I usually don't do it. But, I figured we needed to see the high dessert and were probably not going to have the chance to do something like this again anytime soon. So I did another U turn and headed back to the tram.

I overcame two of my biggest fears: spending more than fifty-one cents at a tourist trap, and the fear of looking like a flat-lander on top of a hill (but let's call a spade a spade). I decided to spring the $60 for the four of us to go to the top of Sandia Peak. Imagine my delight when I found out the youngest was free and the other one was 1/2 price!

I hope my kids were as impressed with the ride as I was. I thought it would be like a gondola type ski lift where there were many cars going up and down. It reminded me of the Mt. Manitou Incline because there were only two cars, as one came down, the other went up. The one coming down was a counterweight to the one going up.


During the fifteen minute ride to the top, we rose 4000 feet in elevation, traveled 2.7 miles, dropped over 20 degrees in temperature, soared 900 feet above the canyon floor, and eased Crystals fear of riding in a tram.

This is how the middle-un rode for the first half of the trip.





This is how the little-un rode.

When we got to the top of the mountain, there were two things that struck me 1) I grew up in Colorado and was still impressed with the view from atop a mountain. 2) I live in Missouri and was still impressed with the number of bugs on top of this particular mountain.


This second point continued to strike me every 5 seconds for the entire two hours we were on top of the mountain. I don't know if I have ever been anywhere that there have been as many bugs, this takes into account a summer evening in Missouri next to a pond. There were lots of different types of bugs, the only ones I knew were lady bugs and flies, but there were lots of different kinds. I swear, it was unbelievable. Some made us itch. Some flew in our hair. Some just pissed us off.

A short walk from the upper tram station there were a number of nature trails. Mind you, I realize this was a "touristy" mountain hike, but you know what - it felt so good to be there I didn't really give a hoot.

We all have such different perceptions of 'being in nature'. Crystal and I were trying to encourage the girls to be aware of the beauty around us. Crystal's idea is to be quite, close your eyes, and use all of your senses to 'be at one' with your surroundings.

She tried to encourage the girls to stop and just 'be' in nature. That doesn't work so well for a 3 and 6 year old. She gave up and headed down the trail. Giving it one last effort, she turned around to us, heaved her chest as she took a huge deep breath, and said "Just smell it!" The kids and I were still standing where, just seconds before, Crystal had broken wind when she stood up. We were not to excited to 'just smell it!'

My idea of being in nature is to smell everything. Some people are tree huggers. I'm a tree sniffer. I'm not talking about standing next to a tree and breathing in the aroma. I'm talking about sticking your nose in a crack ot the bark. All the way up there. I'm talking about getting sap on your chin and your nose. My favorite are pine trees. Many pine trees smell of caramel, but there are some that smell of chocolate, and some of vanilla. Oak, walnut, and of course cedar, all have very distinctive smells.
My kids think I'm pretty weird (rightfully so). As the breeze blew, you could hear the distinctive tinkle of aspen leaves. I haven't seen an aspen in years so I excitedly stuck my nose in one. Again, a tree with a very distinctive scent. Wanting to show my kids another way to 'be one with nature' I called out to my kids "Hey, come smell this aspen."
The middle one looked back and hollered "You're gross!"
"No," I said, "Come smell it."
"No way!" She proclaimed. "I am NOT smelling an ass tree!"

We saw a number of trees that looked like this. I'll tell you what - I can deal with litter (maybe it was an accident), I can deal with pollution (although I'm not happy about it, but there is not much that pisses me off as bad as this!

We came to a spot where there were a bunch of flat rocks. Crystal told the girls to find a rock that was calling them, and sit down and look around. Another couple came up the trail with their dog, who went up to Crystal and nudged her hand.

"Are you trying to steal a pet?" the man asked his dog.
Very defensively, the middle one said (in a not so polite tone) "We already have a pet! We don't need yours!"



My woman may have some of the photos from the trip on her blog.

Here's a link to a site about the tram. Really a neat ride.
http://www.sandiapeak.com/history.html