3/9/18
The intention this morning was just to make it back home to Boulder at a reasonable time. Since we were in Amarillo near the Texas border, we didn’t have much left to see of Texas. We looked at the map and it seemed that heading straight North would take us through the panhandle of Oklahoma which could be interesting and then into eastern Colorado to Lamar and then up to Limon before heading west on I-70.
Although I have lived in Colorado since 1979 and have thoroughly explored all areas west of I-25, I have not seen too much of the eastern side and Lamar and the area north of there would be new to me, so that is where we headed.
We pretty quickly left Texas.
The state of this sign is illustrative of the area.
We did run across this interesting historical marker showing the old Santa Fe Trail. It ran alongside us throughout Oklahoma well into Colorado. You could see why the pioneers were using this as a passage since it was virtually flat as far as you could see. The wind was whipping when we got out of the car to read the markers and one got the sense that it never stops there.
This photo is a good example of what it looked like for over 200 miles through the northern edge of Texas into Oklahoma and southern Colorado. The only things you would occasionally see were huge grain silos, a ranch or two, some lonely cattle and some small towns of 2-3000 people. Beautiful big skies but a desolate feel.
When we turned west finally at Limon, we knew we had made the right decision in the route we had chosen. It was a relaxing ride with little traffic and when we checked what I-25 looked like on Friday afternoon, we realized we had likely cut close to 90 minutes off of our drive.
All in all, a very successful trip. 5200 miles, 18 days and 13 states (not including Colorado).
We are thinking the next big one will be the Northeast states this coming Fall……
Stay tuned!
Adventures after Retirement 