New Mexico Sky and Chile

By 66 Underachiever August 29, 2012

Route 66 / Santa Fe Trail sort of.

We skipped breakfast to take the 1937 Santa Fe Trail alignment, a beautiful ride but sort of a scam if you were trying to get to your new job in the California Cotton Fields.

The road cuts up north 66 miles (really) to
Las Vegas, west 60 miles to Santa Fe then south 60 miles to Albuquerque depending on the road you take down. There's a lot to see in Las Vegas and Santa Fe so we walked around a little, forgot to take pictures and decided to base camp another time at the Plaza Hotel in las Vegas and explore a couple days.

Our primary destination on the Pecos/Santa Fe trails was a restaurant in Santa Fe where Lori had witnessed the best Chile Rellenos in the world. (She was a kid and was too grossed out to eat a chile fried in an egg so she ate a bean burro). The place looked familiar...a little more developed with grass in the middle and slicker stores. She spotted the rare white building and it was a restaurant. Sadly a burger place now not a hundred year old Mexican restaurant. We googled chile rellenos and found the highly rated Tune Up. Strange name but apparently well loved. Maybe it was an old bar. We turned into an old neighborhood, things were looking good but when we pulled up it looked like a hipstoid coffee house. It was but they served chile Rellenos and they were really good. Not best in the world but very good. While eating, Lori described the place she'd been to as a kid. It sounded a lot like Mesilla to me. I asked if she was sure it wasn't Las Cruces, she said, "that's it." She'd been to La Posta which arguably does make the best chile Rellenos in the world.

With happy stomachs we headed down the mountain and soon passed a sign "Las Cruces 274 Miles."

We backtracked the old road and explored a couple dead ends. We want to come back in a truck and follow some of these. On the leg between Albuquerque and Continental Divide we got 66 mpg, true story!

We checked into El Rancho after taking a cruise through town, ate enchiladas, and had a swim.

I learned a couple things last night. First: While eating I realized there is not a "best" New Mexico Chile place. I love Joe and Aggie's, El Rancho, Joseph's, and La Posta equally for their differences and similarities. Second: While looking at the pictures I shot last night. New Mexico has really pretty skies.

Visit Lori at www.bondorella.wordpress.com