Eating in New Mexico Day 5

Rough night. Z. coughed all night (she and A. flew with colds, hers was on the way out but came back with a vengeance last night). My back and hip hurt all night (I'd been having back pain all summer, but it was getting worse and adjusting to hotel beds was rough). We got up early, around 7ish, showered and dressed and walked down to the Plaza to eat breakfast at the Plaza Cafe.



A. had a chile rellenos omelet and coffee. Z. had two very large buttermilk pancakes (upper right corner- sorry, this is the only photo of the food) and I had 1 blue corn pinon pancake (very good, I preferred it to the also very good blue corn pancakes we had at the SF Baking Company- the pine nut flavor really added something to it), 1 fried egg (over easy which I haven't had in years, it was really good) and a side of bacon (which I shared with Z. and A.) and some decaf. It was all very good and very filling.

We waddled out of there and walked back to the hotel and got ourselves ready for the day. We drove out to Museum Hill and went to the International Folk Art Museum (we bought the 1 day 2 museum pass for this museum and the Indian Arts and Culture Museum across the courtyard). Before going inside we walked the labyrinth they had in the courtyard between the two museums. A. and I had been to the International Folk Art museum many years ago but the last time we were there with Z. it had been closed for renovations. We thought Z. would enjoy the giant room filled with toys from around the world. She did but what she enjoyed even more was the hands on section in a special weaving exhibit. They had a group weaving loom, needlepoint and loop potholder weaving. She especially got into the needlepoint, mostly she was needle pointing letters (Pokemon names). We spent a long time there, but since we could sit down I didn't mind. She really wanted me to buy her some kind of needlepoint kit, she was sure they would have one in the gift shop, but they didn't. I told her that I had all the stuff at home and when we got back I'd set her up with it, but by the time we got home she had lost interest.



After seeing the whole museum we decided to leave Museum Hill and go to the Cloud Cliff Bakery for lunch (this is in that industrial section not far from Chocolate Maven). Z. had a cheese quesadilla from the kid's menu and a giant glass of chocolate milk. A. had a green chile cheeseburger and a side salad. I had a bite of his burger and it had a nice grilled flavor.





I had a turkey green chile croissant with a small cup of Garden Delight (vegetable) soup and a side salad. Very, very good! The soup was really tasty (I think I tasted some tarragon in it), the salad had a dressing that had mint in it, unexpected but very good also. Z's quesadilla had some sliced avocado on the side as a garnish which she was not interested in, so I took it and put it in my turkey green chile croissant. It was already good but the avocado made it even better (they might consider that as an option). I really enjoyed that meal a lot.

We managed to get out of there without stopping at the bakery (that was not easy!) and drove back to Museum Hill and spent a long time at the Indian Arts and Culture museum. There was a lot to see and we all really enjoyed it. We saw an exhibit of paintings by Pablita Verlarde, who was hired at age 19 to do paintings for Bandelier National Monument. There was a show of incredible Navajo textiles called Spider Woman's Gift. Their permanent exhibit was about Native American culture; Here, Now and Always. It was very thought provoking with a lot to read, much more than one could read and absorb in one visit (at least when it's the 2nd museum of the day and we were getting tired). Definitely worth another visit someday.



We went outside and checked out all the sculptures in the courtyard and Z. and I walked the labyrinth again while A. videotaped us. This labyrinth was much larger than the one at the St. Francis Church, but it was also less intricate.

We left there exhausted and drove closer to the Plaza area to try and find a coffee shop that either didn't exist or we were too tired to follow the map well enough. After driving around and around and finally parking, going into an expensive chocolate shop that didn't have coffee drinks (only chocolate elixirs which didn't seem very refreshing) and walking around and around we gave up and drove to the Santa Fe Baking Company (we knew we'd get good coffee there). Z. got a chocolate chip croissant and A. had some kind of twist pastry and iced coffee. I really splurged and had a piece of chocolate cake that reminded me of a gourmet ring ding, 2 layers of chocolate cake with a layer of cream filling in the middle and a thin chocolate ganache frosting on the top with a decaf double latte. It was heaven, YUM!

After stopping at a drugstore for water and saline nose spray for Z. (I suspected that at night she was drying out and this was exacerbating the coughing- she was also under the fan for the swamp cooler so I think she was also having some allergies) we drove back to the hotel and laid around for a long time exhausted. We didn't want to go out for dinner, plus we weren't very hungry, but eventually A. wanted dinner. So he called the Bumble Bee's Baja Grill which was around the corner and ordered take out, which he walked over and picked up. Z. had the kid cheese quesadilla (again), I had some of an order nachos, and A. had a 1/2 of a rotisserie chicken with beans and rice. A. thought the chicken was very good. The nachos were pretty tasty although some of it got kind of wilted and greasy since it had been in a foam take out container.