New Mexico Enchantment

So, it seems we are having a bit of a "bump in the road" on our trip, with traveling with our sweet toddler. Our night last night was better, but then CJ woke up this morning at 5:30am crying, and as soon as I picked him up he felt very hot!! His temperature was 101.4, so we gave him his next dose of medicine and tried to get him to settle down. But it was clear that our independent boy was up for the day, and despite not feeling well, he was in good spirits and full of energy. We went to the hotel breakfast and fed CJ some fruit and pancake and cinnamon roll. He also drank a little milk. By the time we came back from breakfast and got packed, we checked CJ's temp again and it had come down to around 100. Because we were already up, we decided to get an early start to our day!! Before we left, JT and I decided that we would try to take it easy on CJ today since it was obvious that he wasn't feeling 100% and we wanted to limit the amount of time we had him outdoors in the Southwestern heat!

Our first stop was Petroglyph National Monument since we were already in Albuquerque, and it was on our way out of town! We drove through some beautiful scenery on our way to and at the park, but decided not to do the hike.

Then we drove to El Malpais National Monument. It was neat to see the landscaping change before our eyes as we left the flat barren plains and entered El Malpais, where there were more trees.

Again, we just elected to do the scenic drive rather than try to do any of the hikes the park had to offer, but what we got to see was very pretty!!

Funny story: These were my "Route 66 sunglasses".

I thought they were super cool and bought them for $6 back at the Route 66 Museum the other day (all the days are starting to run together, thank goodness I am blogging otherwise I wouldn't be able to remember!). They also had some gold "Elvis Shades" that I tried to talk JT into getting, but he wasn't feeling them at their $10 price, ha ha!! I thought we could have made quite the pair. Anyhow, between El Malpais & our next stop, they got broken! :( I won't say by who, but I will give y'all one guess:

(But it is my own fault for letting him play with them!) Ha ha! At least I have these pictures to remember them by. RIP Route 66 Sunglasses.

As we drove over to El Morro National Monument we passed the Continental Divide.

El Morro was probably my favorite thing we had the chance to do here in New Mexico! I thought it was just SOO gorgeous and really neat to see all that history!!

We decided that we could try to do the Inscription Loop Trail hike here because it was paved (perfect for stroller!) and was only a half a mile. I am so glad we did!

The black "stripes" on the rock are from where the water falls after a heavy rain, or when the snow melts.

And it flows into this pool of water, which in the olden days was the only water available for travelers for miles around!

The coolest part of El Morro (aka Inscription Rock) were all the petroglyphs and inscriptions you could see on the rock.

The inscriptions date back to the 1600's when the Spanish traveled through this area.

This one was my favorite!! Amazing to see such a pretty "font" carved in stone from so long ago!!

Mr. CJ Teether and Me at the base of El Morro with the gorgeous New Mexico landscape behind us.

Another shot from the base.
As we left El Morro, we headed toward Gallup, where we are spending the night this evening. CJ was getting increasingly irritable. JT went to get us some food while I stayed back at the hotel with CJ trying my best to console him. Here he is trying to bite JT's sock off. Gross but I guess it felt good on his teeth?!As the evening wore on, he didn't really want to eat, and then he started refusing to drink too which worried us!! I called our pediatrician in Ann Arbor, and touched base with them about if all this fever & cranktasticness is teething or something else. Tough to say since he's been exposed to who knows what germs all over half the country, but we know what to keep an eye out for and are watching him to make sure we don't need to go to any ER/clinics. Please pray it is just teeth, and that he'll be feeling better soon!!

He struggled to go down again tonight, but the fact that we are in a single room (vs. a suite) could also be a contributing factor. Overall, it was a good day, and we really enjoyed New Mexico's "Enchantment" (since they claim to be the "Land of Enchantment") at their National Monuments!! More National Parks are penciled in on the schedule for tomorrow in Arizona, but top priority is making sure that CJ is okay!!