The Trip West 2010 Beginning

Hello from Santa Fe! . . . we are about four days into our trip out West! Yahoo!!! And, I am sorry I have not posted anything, but I have not painted yet. It has been three days of driving, looking for accomodations, eating dinner and then resting for the next day of driving.

Wanda Crane is my partner in this first part of the adventure (and for the most of the rest of it)! After the four days of travel, we will hook up for the first week with Denise Champion from Bellingham, Washington. When we do arrive at our final destination of Sedona, AZ, Candy Day and Ginny Dauth will fly in to join us for a month of painting in Sedona! The Sedona Plein Air Festival will happen while we are there, so we will enjoy watching some of the best artists in the country paint the local scenery in and around Sedona. 

Our first stop along the way was for a night in Little Rock, Arkansas. We had decided to make what we thought would be the longest drive that first day. Each of the other days, the plan was to have about a 5 ½ hour drive so we could stop anywhere we pleased along the way.



Little Rock, Arkansas -- River Market Area



We did stop along I-40 at Checotah, OK on the second day of driving because we saw billboards on the side of the highway advertising it as the home of Carrie Underwood and then one about an antique mall. So, being lunch time-ish, we decided to take a break. It was a cute little western country town and we enjoyed shopping at a couple of little antique stores, eating a hamburger and fries at a diner and talking to the locals about Carrie! Wanda and I both love her music and songs, so it was a treat. I did take a picture of the downtown, though it is not really a good shot, but will post it here.



Oklahoma City, Oklahoma - River Walk



We drove on to Oklahoma City and spent the night. We walked along their river walk and had a snack at one of the local eateries before calling it a night for the drive the next morning to Tucumcari, NM. Well . . . as we were approaching the town, we decided it was only another 2 ½ hours to Santa Fe, which was our next stop. My plan had been the 5 ½ hour drive to Tucumcari and spend the night with a short drive the next morning to Santa Fe. That would give us most of the day to visit Santa Fe – Wanda has never been there! We stopped, had lunch in Tucumcari and then drove on and arrived Friday night in Santa Fe and hooked up with one of my best friends and our fellow artist, Denise.

We walked around Santa Fe, looking in gallery windows, cute little shops, and then had a very nice dinner and called it a night. On Saturday morning the plan is to go to the Palace of the Governors to see if there is any Indian jewelry or trinket we wish to purchase from one of our Native Americans! I have done this twice before on trips and am always very pleased with my purchase. They have to be a “native” to be able to sell here under the awning of the Palace. They have a lottery for the spots under the awning and you won’t always find the same people there.



Palace of the Governors

After that we will go into several galleries to fill up our minds with some fabulous paintings and then on to an Indian swap meet. Denise will travel on to Ghost Ranch this afternoon, while Wanda and I will have one more night and morning here in Santa Fe before we continue our trip up to Ghost Ranch. So, Wanda and I decided to visit the Georgia O'Keefe Museum! Here I am in front of the banner at the Museum.



Georgia O'Keefe Banner and Me



We will be there for the next week taking a workshop from Ann Templeton – a plein air workshop – and we will not have internet access. Ghost Ranch is where Georgia O’Keefe painted quite often – a very stark landscape – so we shall see what Marsha Savage can come away with in this very different landscape. I will have to post those paintings the following week because of no internet access while there.



When we leave Ghost Ranch, we will travel to Canyon de Chelly for two nights and the opportunity to take a guided trip into the Canyon to paint. This is an Indian reservation and an must see for any artist! Hopefully the morning we leave the weather will permit us to paint from the rim of the Canyon also. Then on to Sedona for the next month!

So, with no internet at Ghost Ranch, the posts will not come again until about Monday or Tuesday of the following week.