We launched the Research road trip, setting out from Albuquerque at 9:30, only half an hour later than the planned time, heading east.
Along the way, we recorded the number of different state license plates we see, then locating the states on the map. Today we saw plates from Arizona, Arkansas, California, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon. Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming. America seems to be on the move again.
Our featured stop of the day was the Mesalands Dinosaur Museum in Tucumcari an impressive museum for such a small town. We had never visited there before, and any new experience is exciting. The museum included a large collection of minerals, a few dioramas with bronze cast skeletons of dinosaurs and saber-tooth cats, and numerous fossils. A children’s area featured a saddled dinosaur, ready for a ride, and a pit of walnut shells in which children could dig for bones. We highly recommend it.
We took a small detour to drop Granny off at Uncle Chuck’s, then drove on to one of our favorite hotels in the world, the Embassy Suites in downtown Amarillo. It features a wall of water, a living wall of succulents, and in non-COVID times a lovely evening reception. Because they have not resumed the reception and there is a baseball game at the stadium across the street, dinner became a bit problematic. We got frozen meals from the snack bar downstairs, along with beer and wine from the happy hour, which the hotel has not eliminated.
