Long Weekend in Santa Fe/Taos | ~1600 miles | MKVI Golf

DerekG

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Sep 8, 2013
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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
I decided to intro this trip report the day before leaving since I won't have time tomorrow until I update while on the road.

I've had quite a few people over the years tell me how cool/weird/artsy/yummy Santa Fe is and I figured a long weekend would be a good way to get a taste of the food/culture etc. I'll leave tomorrow after work and drive ~half of the 609 miles one-way....probably stopping in Amarillo just to sleep leaving just 4 hours to drive on Thursday.

It will be myself, wife, and our 22mo old boy packing up in the Golf. I decided to try and go without the roof box since it's just ~4.5 days, but there are still lots of accessories to take with a toddler lol

I would take the 545i since it's a lot bigger inside and obviously more of a highway cruiser, but I just did a bunch of work to it and I wouldn't want to be 1000 miles from home and risk a break down...just in case. Plus fuel cost would double lol

You guys know how much of a visual thread author I am so expect lots of pics and it appears Santa Fe will lend itself well to visual appreciation.

Here are a few things we plan on doing...some for us and some for my son.

-High and Low road to Taos
-Meow Wolf
-Harrell House of Natural Oddities/ Bug Museum
-Museum of International Folk Art
-Blue Corn Brewery
-Harry's Roadhouse
-Outdoor market
-A few churches?
-Santa Fe Brewery

Any other restaurant suggestions are welcome as well as cool places to stop along the High/Low road.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading....see you guys on the road!
 

DerekG

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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
Went home at lunch and packed the Golf.

This is about 90% of what we're taking and I haven't put anything in the back seat yet other than the car seat.





Gotta love the usability of a hatch :)
 

DerekG

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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
Finally underway now. We left around 5:30pm and after a stop for food, a bathroom/coffee stop, and ~340mi we came into Amarillo around 11:30pm.

I was not expecting to have to call 10+ hotels to find a room, so after 30 minutes of calling and cursing under my breath we found a room lol

This little man was ready to get out of the car....he skipped his nap today and was grumpy for an hour or so of the drive.



Here's where the Golf sleeps tonight....hopefully free of door dings when I wake up in the morning.



Computer is showing ~47mpg right now. Stayed above 50 until we reached a headwind in TX.

The plan for tomorrow is to finish the ~4 hour drive to Santa Fe and have lunch/beer at the Blue Corn Cafe. Afterwards check out the Bug Museum, do some sightseeing, and then chill until dinner as I'm sure my son will want a nap by then lol

Thanks for reading!
 

DerekG

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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
Day 2

Amarillo->Santa Fe

Finished the 260 miles to our KOA cabin.


Obligatory


Also, pro tip....traveling in these Minnetonkas is awesome. I drive without shoes on long trips and these make it super convenient....plus they look COOL. Just kidding lol



Also this because...



Due to the head wind the latter part of yesterday and all of today the opportunity for a decent tank was denied so I didn't push it.

Fuel Fill #1

Miles- 581.7
Gallons- 13.337
MPG- 43.6



Plus a dose of PS grey bottle



Rest stop playtime

DSC09367 by DerekG710, on Flickr

#sootlife lol

DSC09372 by DerekG710, on Flickr

And finally the cabin....these things are so fun. Especially for kids....bunks, playground, games...etc

DSC09379 by DerekG710, on Flickr

We are about to head into Santa Fe proper and check out the Bug Museum and grab a late lunch.

Thanks for reading!
 
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DerekG

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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
A few pics from this afternoon.

DSC09407 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09444 by DerekG710, on Flickr

He has 2500+ mounted specimens at the museum and another 4500 at home almost ready for display.

DSC09456 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09396 by DerekG710, on Flickr

Blue corn tacos and a 40k Honey Wheat Ale at Blue Corn Cafe/Brewery



A quick Autoscan just because....all systems go! Lol



Had a chance to test out my rusty parallel parking skills.....still got it.



Until tomorrow!
 
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DerekG

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Day 3

I forgot to mention that I stopped by Iconik Coffee Roasters last night. I was looking over their most recently roasted whole bean coffees and found one that I obviously had to buy lol




Breakfast at Harry's today....it was excellent!



Blue cornmeal waffle with bananas, honey butter, and smoked bacon cooked into the waffle.......I can't even



Up next Meow Wolf. It's hard to describe this place with words or pictures. We all loved it and would definitely go back.

DSC09528 by DerekG710, on Flickr











 
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DerekG

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A few more

DSC09484 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09590 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09594 by DerekG710, on Flickr

Next we did the Low/High road loop to Taos and back.

DSC09615 by DerekG710, on Flickr

You can see the gorge in the distance.

DSC09610 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09602 by DerekG710, on Flickr

We ate at Michael's in Taos and had stuffed sopa's which were incredible.




A few notes on the High/Low loop and Taos.

I went up there mainly just to see what the town was like in case we ever wanted to come ski here. If you aren't going into the mountains It's probably not "worth" the ~180 mile round trip from Santa Fe as there is so much to do here that you could stay busy for a week or more and Taos has the same types of stores/restaurants/museums.

From a driver's POV the High Road is much more fun to drive and imo has better scenery throughout. Granted, we didn't stop at any Pueblos or recreation areas along the way....this was just an excuse to hit some curvy mountain roads, so definitely take this opinion with a healthy pinch of salt.

Overall today was great. Tomorrow will be a little more laid back with much less driving and more walking around downtown and checking out the market as we're doing the entire 600+ miles back home on Sunday.

Thanks for reading!
 
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DerekG

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Oklahoma
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Day 4

Went down to the Rail Yard/Farmers market before breakfast. Couldn't buy anything with a short lifespan like leafy greens, but we did grab some killer tasting bread...I'll have to grab a pic tomorrow.



Then had breakfast at Cafe Pasqual's on Water St and proceeded to eat the best omelet that I've ever had.



Durango Omelet



Walked around for a bit and checked out some shops and churches after parking next to a black JSW



DSC09654 by DerekG710, on Flickr

DSC09649 by DerekG710, on Flickr

Finished off the day with some playground time and a low key dinner from Upper Crust Pizza

DSC09632 by DerekG710, on Flickr



Tomorrow will be a long day of driving. 9hrs without stopping, but with a toddler it usually requires a 20-30 min stop every few hours :) Good times!
 
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DerekG

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Day 5- Final update

We ate at Harry's Roadhouse one more time before leaving and it was amazing again. Made it home yesterday around ~9pm after losing an hour moving from mountain time to central time. We left Santa Fe at 9am...so about 13 hrs including stops to eat/breaks for my son to run around.

I topped off before leaving since I used ~half a tank of fuel driving around Santa Fe and up to Taos....I also wanted to make it back on one tank. (I did btw, with lots to spare :) see below)

#2 Fuel stop

Miles- 373
Gal.- 8.354
MPG- 44.6

I was pretty surprised by that number since I drove pretty spiritedly to Taos and back. Also 80+mph back and forth from our KOA cabin 5-6 times which was ~15mi outside of the city.


Overall the trip was fantastic. I would definitely recommend Santa Fe as a destination if you are into the arts, food, culture...etc. We didn't have a single bad meal and everything tasted awesome. We skipped out on 1 or 2 of the museums we initially planned on visiting just due to the fact that having a toddler running around an art gallery would have been in bad taste lol I will be stopping by to at least eat a meal the next time we go west to CO/UT/WY/CA/where ever.


#3 Fuel stop

Miles- 626mi
Gal.- 11.544
MPG- 54.2!

That's a new personal best for me. The last 90 miles were really hilly and windy so it could have been better....oh well. I considered waiting to break my distance record of 707, but I don't have any highway driving planned for a few weeks so I wanted to try and break my previous record of 52.2mpg instead. Super happy about that lol



Seeing the "scissortail" coming into OKC was a relief after so many hours on the road...it meant we were only 1.5 hours from home.

DSC09672 by DerekG710, on Flickr

Final Stats

Total Distance- 1580.7 miles

Total Gallons of Diesel- 33.235

Total Fuel Cost- $86.22

Avg. MPG- 47.5


As always thanks for reading! See you next time!
 
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meerschm

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Very cool weekend.

I like the slippers.

I wear sandals with socks on long drives. (otherwise the feet get too hot and sweaty, even in the dead of winter.) My wife has learned not to look at my feet.
 

DerekG

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Sep 8, 2013
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Oklahoma
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'13 4dr Golf TDI 6-speed manual
Very cool weekend.

I like the slippers.

I wear sandals with socks on long drives. (otherwise the feet get too hot and sweaty, even in the dead of winter.) My wife has learned not to look at my feet.
LOL! Mine didn't want to walk with me into the gas station
 

ezshift5

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Appreciate the pix/narrative. A USNR amigo is now in Santa Fe. I can see why. I may need something like that to deal with the MPG loss when I turn in my JSW TDI 6M.

Thanks again.


ez
 

kooyajerms

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What a Nice trip, and done with a toddler! You two are troopers! We have yet to take our 1 and 2 year old on a long trip yet, you've inspired me!
 

DerekG

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Oklahoma
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What a Nice trip, and done with a toddler! You two are troopers! We have yet to take our 1 and 2 year old on a long trip yet, you've inspired me!

Thanks! Go for it!

We started him early with road trips hoping that in the future he would be comfortable in the car since we like to take trips like this. His first was a 3 hour drive at 6 weeks old and we made 3 stops to feed him lol He probably has close to 8k miles of road trips under his belt now and other than cutting teeth for some of those miles he does pretty well.

My advice is to take frequent breaks to let them run around. It gives them a chance to burn off some energy and you a chance to rest...makes long trips less tiring imo since you won't be doing any 300+ mile stints without stopping. Another thing I've learned is leave for a trip at times when they normally would be sleeping....either very early in the morning or midday nap time. It allows you to cover some ground right off the bat and hopefully avoid 2 hours of screaming right at the beginning of a trip lol

Also, if you get 2/3rd's of what you initially planned to do on a trip then you are doing well! The enjoyment you get watching/showing them new things more than makes up for a few missed points of interest. Once we turned his car seat forward facing he did 10x better than before. You can interact with them and keep them occupied and they don't feel like they are alone. He now says, "dad, dad, dad....big truck" pointing out almost every semi or motorcycle saying," brrrmmmm brmmmm". It's great watching him enjoy such simple things. :)
 

john.jackson9213

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What a Nice trip, and done with a toddler! You two are troopers! We have yet to take our 1 and 2 year old on a long trip yet, you've inspired me!
Kooyajerms, Take the kids and the trailer to Anza Borrega Desert State Park for a 3 day weekend. Enjoy the desert flowers and the campground.

DerekG, USNR = U.S. Navy Reserve.
Great trip report and looks like everybody had fun and ate well! P.S. Nothing wrong with 54 mpg.
 
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