SANTA FE, N.M. — The longest leg of this extraordinary journey is complete. I am pooped. So is Toby the Puppy.
The next two legs will be pieces of cake compared to what we just endured. What was that?
We left this morning at 5. Our trip from Richfield, Utah to a campsite just north of Santa Fe was all of 570 miles. My Ford Ranger guidance system said it would take about eight hours of drive time. It took us 11 hours.
We had to get some shut-eye along the way, Toby the Puppy and I had to relieve ourselves, we needed gas and I stopped for lunch in Cortez, Colo.
My bride, Kathy Anne, and I lived in West Texas for 23 years before moving to Princeton in 2019. During our time out yonder, we learned one irrefutable truth about that part of the world: In order to get anywhere, you have to drive some distance. Amarillo is a long way from most destinations, so we accustomed ourselves to driving a while to get to where we needed to go.
Those trips, though, rarely required us to drive 570 miles.
I’m going to see friends near Lubbock and then family in greater Austin before I point my buggy toward the house.
This journey has been worth the effort. I’ll have more to say about it later. Just know that I believe it was the correct course of action to take.