I thought today might be a bit boring - leaving Route 66 and finding our way north west to the mountains in Colorado and beyond. But it was an extremely interesting day.

We got away from Amarillo at 9, and headed north through the Texas Panhandle . The first thing of note - we saw a coyote race across the freeway! No time for a photo. We saw another one later on in the day too.   Second thing - the nodding donkeys (to pump the oil). Thirdly, the enormous flat fields of grain - I couldn't take a photo as it was too flat to see anything!

I liked seeing all the crops and the cattle; the sky was clear blue (a tinge of cloud on the northern horizon); we even sang "oh what a beautiful morning, oh what a ......." - you get the drift! We were rather keen to see the wagon ruts on the Santa Fe wagon train trail. We knew they were very faint, but had heard they could be seen near Clayton - in the Kiowa and Rita Blanca Grasslands (these grasslands are all over the place, not just one block area). The Tourist Information at Clayton were helpful, but she thought some other government agency place [US Forest Services Ranger Station - thank you Bryan and google] might be able to help me more with my specific query (someone's blog I'd read) . And they were/he was! He agreed, that with our car, McNee's Crossing was probably be best to see the Santa Fe trail; but he suggested carrying on north and looping back to the Capulin Volcano.

What a great suggestion! The ranger was a bit worried about the road after all the rain - he thought it was dirt. But the map said it was "blacktop" (bitumen to us Aussies, "tar seal" to the English). The wagon ruts at McNee's Crossing was a bit of a fizzer - just a plaque at the side of the road, and not even much room to pull off. But then we were driving along the top of a plateau (like being on the moors in England) with great views. A very narrow road. This is where we saw the deer. Must be the Spring migration as we saw a few more

When we got to the T junction, we turned east to go into Oklahoma. The scenery was very much the same. After a while we did a U-turn (that would have kept Dora happy, if we'd had the satnav on) . And then we drove the best road - great scenery, hardly any other cars. Awesome. Okay, there was 17 miles of dirt road - we could see why the Ranger was a bit worried! Right near the end of the dirt, a car came towards us - he waited for us to negotiate our way through. We wondered why he was so polite - then realised why. The last km was a real mess - the old red clay road near Yarwun mixed in with deep ruts!

This was fabulous scenery on this route. It followed the Dry Cimarron River - so we were in a valley. In a way it reminded me of the Boyne Valley (central Qld).

Better move on (as in it's getting late). The Capulin Volcano. Brilliant! It cost a whole $5 to drive up there - one beer, half a hamburger! Amazing views.

We arrived at the motel at 4pm. I thought - a relaxing afternoon, have a look around the town (it has history, just not as well known as other places - on the Santa Fe trail, but the Mountain Route) ....... but, soon after we arrived the power went out. Yep - all over town. And it was raining too. We went for a walk over to the shopping centre next door - and they were all closed! What wimps. We bought a pizza that was in the oven when the power went off, and went back to the motel....... the power is obviously now back on.

So - we started in Texas, then into New Mexico again, a quick side trip to Oklahoma, back into New Mexico, and then north into Colorado. What will tomorrow bring?