Los Alamos, NM – The Secret City

This week we have been parked in front of Jesse’s cousin Steph’s house in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The backyard in their house is literally a million foot canyon. Literally. I’m not afraid of heights, but watching the boys (and dog) out there makes me very very afraid!

Los Alamos is such an interesting place. The Los Alamos National Laboratory is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory initially organized during WWII for the design of nuclear weapons as part of the Manhattan Project, the birthplace of the atomic bomb. Steph’s husband Shawn works for “the Lab”, but no one can ever know what he does! (hehe!) The locals call it “Los” and the city is built on top of mesas that make it super hard to get to!

Only 15 miles away is the Bandelier National Monument. There is evidence of human activity from over 11,000 years ago. Because of volcano activity nearby, the sides of the cliffs were easy to carve out homes. We were able to climb up ladders to see inside, many of the ruins are still intact! The boys loved being up high, the sights were beautiful! https://youtu.be/qblA_2xE6ZY!

We also took a day trip into close by Santa Fe. We were not dressed fancy enough for this artist city but it was neat to see the Plaza, the adobe architecture and the “Roundhouse”, the only round State Capital in the USA. (And the capital with the highest elevation!)

Steph and Shawn’s kids have been fun to be around too. Their son Seth is at college in Albuquerque, Alix is a Junior and Ella is a Freshman in high school. We’ve been lucky to watch 2 of Alix’s basketball games this week, she’s a great player! Ella had a tennis tournament in El Paso, we wish it was a home tourney so we could watch it! https://youtu.be/d1abYfxUr90 Go Hilltoppers!

Just down the street from us was an amazing hike we just did with Alix called “Deer Trap” due to the small “traps” the Native Americans made and lured deer into. This hike also led us down the tippy top of a mesa, really feeling on top of the world!

We were also convinced to wake up at the crack of dawn to go watch the sunrise. IT WAS AMAZING! The colors changed every 5 minutes or so and it was just so cool. Afterwards, we picked up breakfast burritos from Chili Works. The girls were pretty impressed that my boys would order the “super brick” with 4 kinds of meat and green chilies! Andy finished his is 2 minutes flat but Woody finally found his match with the spicy green chilies – they were too hot!

LA is a pretty memorable place – for more reasons then one! (Inside joke for Tischers and Haileys!) (MT)