Day 13 - 5/05/2003

Lucille:

May 5 - Monday - Gallup is a smaller city than I expected. This morning I explored the 12 block area that is considered the heart of downtown. There are many Indian shops selling jewelry and other crafts. This is a town with many pawn shops. In some of the shops, the prices are not shown until the shopkeeper removes the article from the glass case. The price shown on the underside of the article is much higher than the price he quotes as the price he will sell it for. No bargaining mentioned, but I noticed this in more than one shop--price for a $35 pair of earrings was shown as $95; a pretty vase priced $540 would have been sold to me for $200. After going through the shops, my next stop was the Gallup Cultural Center located in the Amtrak station. There was an interesting little museum there. 2 items of interest there were the beautiful basket carried to represent Native Americans in the Olympics in Salt Lake City and a large bronze statue honoring the windtalkers, the native Americans who helped with codes during World War II. On the way to Grants on I-40 I passed the continental divide. Tonight we're at another Days Inn.

TOM:

Day 13 – The trip from Gallup, NM to Grants, NM covered 68.84 miles, taking us over the continental divide at an elevation of 7245 feet about midway along the way. The starting elevation was 6550 feet and the ending elevation was 6500 feet, making the profile look like a fried egg with the highest point about 700 feet with both a gradual ascent and descent. There was no wind factor today. It was another very fun day of biking. We completed the trip in 4 hours and 16 minutes riding time and 6 hours and 8 minutes including stops. The average speed was 16.1 mph. Today was our coolest day starting at 50 degrees and ending at 65 degrees. Most of the ride was along old Route 66 which in now maintained by the State of New Mexico. We were on Highway 40 for about 15 miles during the first half of the day when Route 66 disapeared. We liked the Highway 40 ride in Arizona much better than in New Mexico. The scenery today consisted of many red bluffs to the north and brownish green grass and trees to the south. This is a very beautiful country. We stopped at an old abandoned gas station to have a great lunch. Lucille made us peanut butter sandwiches with bagels, some cheese, mushrooms, carrots, broccoli, and strawberries. We saw many trains and trucks today, reminding us that a lot of stuff is moved across our country every day. We traveled through both of the towns of Gallup and Grants. They looked very nice with many shops along the old Route 66. Today's ride competes with yesterday's as one of the better rides.

More New Mexico scenery