Day 12 (4/12)
South, East, Northeast, South and now, West . . .
Peter had told us to have breakfast at the famous El Rancho Hotel in Gallup, but we didn’t want to take the time. However, we did backtrack two entrances on the highway to go by and take a look. What a kick! It is an old hotel indeed and is where all the movie stars stayed in the hay day of westerns. It has a great southwest rough-framed lobby with a grand staircase to a balcony lined with signed photos of the old stars and posters of old movies. We spent time looking around and taking pictures and, on our way out, asked about the room prices. Next time we’re in Gallup, we’re staying at the El Rancho.
Flagstaff, the gateway to Sedona, is about 3½ hours down I-40 from Gallup. The traffic was easy and we were already into our new audio book, The Fallen Man by Tony Hillerman. We bypassed Flagstaff and it wasn’t long before we were into Oak Creek Canyon, the first half of which is like being dropped straight down between shear cliffs on hairpin turns. Connie was white knuckled and she wasn’t even holding on to anything. But soon the rate of descent slowed and the curves widened out and we were following the creek (more like a small river) through sun-flecked woods. As soon as we exited the woods we were in the middle of the tourist part of Sedona. Which is dangerous because the surrounding scenery so jaw-droppingly spectacular that you could run over six pedestrians and smash up three or four parked cars before you took your eyes of the skyline.
I didn’t kill anyone and somehow managed to get us to our hotel about a mile down the road. After we got situated, we walked back up the road in search of a beer (a marguerite for Connie) and a little something to eat. For part of the walk the land drops off precipitously from the edge of the sidewalk. Along that part about every 50 feet or so there were plaques describing the landscape, the history the town, that it’s an arts and crafts center, how many westerns were shot there and so on. We learned that Sedona is named for Sedona Arabella Miller Schnebly. She and her husband set up there homestead at the mouth of Oak Creek Canyon. Her mom made up the name Sedona.
We took our time over the drinks and a massive dish of nachos, relaxing in an open-air second floor room. We sat overlooking the street, but our attention was on the magnificent backdrop to the town – a massive wind and water carved rock sculpture stretched across from us not more than a couple of miles away and towering up to a brilliant blue sky dappled with fluffy white clouds lazily floating by. Closer at hand were the little bits of Cottonwood fluff drifting past like snowflakes that had lost their way.
On our way back to the hotel we stopped into an Irish bar and made the bartender look for every possible way to watch the Warriors game that night. No matter how she tried, there was just no way. We’d have to see if we could stream it in our room. It was a while after we got back that we learned the game was to be played the next night. Oh, well. Before going back to our room, we stopped by Elote, the hotel restaurant. While reading the menu at the bottom of the ramp that leads up to it, we were accosted by a couple who told us that we absolutely had to eat there and that if we wanted to, we’d have to be in line at 4:30 the next day. They practically made us swear that we would. After that, we decided that we too tired to go out to dinner and that the nachos would last us until breakfast. In our room we got into bed and read for a while before turning off the lights and going to sleep.