Our ninth wedding anniversary was Nov. 20, on which date Susie was in Nashville and I was in Gainesville, FL. Bummer. Some time during Thanksgiving week I decided that it would be fun to make a delayed anniversary trip to Winslow, AZ and stay at the La Posada hotel. Faithful readers know that the La Posada is a handsomely restored and enhanced Harvey House hotel. I wrote an article about it that appeared in the Albuquerque Journal in 1999 (my debut as a travel writer, since blossomed, or morphed, into travelblogging). Since that time we had stopped by for brief visits on trips to or from Las Vegas, but we hadn't stayed there since Halloween, 2000, when we and a group of friends rode the train over for a weekend stay.
The rooms in the La Posada are named for various famous persons who stayed there back in its heyday of the 1930s -- John Wayne, Clark Gable, Dorothy Lamour, Carole Lombard, etcetera, etcetera. Susie came up with the idea for a Halloween party in which each couple would do a skit or presentation depicting the person for whom their room was named. As luck would have it, we were in the Shirley Temple room. In our skit I played Shirley and Susie was my evil sister, Susie Temple, and we, appropriately costumed, lip-synced and danced to the Good Ship Lollipop. Mortifying! The horror, the horror.
I told you that to tell you this: I asked for the Shirley Temple room and it was available. I made the reservation for Dec. 2. That morning when Susie awakened, I told her, "Pack a bag. We're going on an overnight trip." Oh, was she surprised.
(This was not a Tuzigoot trip, but there is a Tuziconnection, as you'll see below.)
We can report that the La Posada continues to improve and appears to be doing quite well. A few years ago they added a top-notch restaurant -- it's still going, owned and managed separately by the chef and his wife. The hotel has also added a really spectacular gift shop, called the Mary Colter Room in honor of the remarkable woman who was the architect of the La Posada and other Harvey establishments in the southwest. It's full of southwestern and international arts and crafts. I don't know whether the Colter room is a restoration of what was in the original hotel, or an enhancement, but it's a great addition, worth a stop on its own. Also, the grounds and gardens have been further developed/restored. I saw a newspaper article posted saying that the La Posada had been designated something like the outstanding Northern Arizona site for a weekend getaway. It was fully booked for Thanksgiving weekend, which is why I booked it for the following Tuesday.
Also new to us, there are two videos playing in the lobby. In one, owner/restorer Allan Affeldt talks about Mary Colter's design and his restoration work. It's a long video, but worth sitting through. Colter controlled the minutest of details and saw to every painstaking touch. Her mental model was that of a Spanish family estate, assembled over several generations. She lived in the La Posada even after it opened and Allan says they had to kick her out because she kept making improvements.
Incidentally, Affeldt is now working on restoring the El Garces Hotel in Needles, CA, scheduled to open this month.
In the other video, Allan's wife, Tina Mion, talks about her art. Many of her large and dramatic paintings are on the walls, so in this sense, the La Posada continues a vibrant existence and is not a static period piece. Her series on President's wives is highly acclaimed and her dramatic depiction of Jackie Kennedy, which always moves me even when I just think about it, is now in the Smithsonian. Spend some time exploring her website to see pictures and her explanations.
There's a strong sense of morbidity running through Mion's art. A large fairly recent piece on display in the ballroom is this one: A New Years Party in Purgatory for Suicides (where would the idea for that one come from?!)
It's hard to see on this scale (I copied from the website; the picture is floor to ceiling high), but if you go to this picture on the Mion website, you can move your mouse over each face to identify the famous and not-so-famous suicides. In the front row, the gray man with the flower in his lapel is Ernest Hemingway. Note the head wound. Just behind him is Marilyn Monroe. At the right end of the second row is Judy Garland with a necklace made of pills. In front of her is Tina Mion herself! Creepy, huh? On the other hand, front and center is Liberace, not a suicide, but she just thought he would like to crash this party!
On a warmer note, here is Mion's tribute to the Harvey girls, two women she became friends with during the hotel restoration process.
Two other artists featured in La Posada are Daniel Lutzick, a sculptor, and Verne Lucero, described in the souvenir guide as "the greatest master of New Mexican tinwork."Anyhow, on the way over we had had a sizable lunch at Earl's cafe in Gallup ("famous since 1947"), so were not inclined to partake of a La Posada gourmet dinner. (Note. The link to Earl's raves about its breakfasts, but reviews on other websites are not so flattering. The present Earl's is a modern reincarnation of the original, famous Route 66 Earl's in Gallup.) After sightseeing in downtown Winslow we opted for Sonicstuff and took it back to our room. Gourmet dining would wait for breakfast (and it was "worth waiting for," as they say about Clines Corners in NM).
The other thing Winslow is famous for is the Eagles' song, Take it Easy, with a line about standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona. Well, we stood on the corner and visited the two adjoining Route 66-themed gift shops, and that was about it for sightseeing. At the corner, though, is a brick plaza that includes a brick that Susie bought to honor our one-year anniversary. We made sure it was still there.
Here are a few pix of the La Posada and your intrepid travelers.
Wednesday morning I was up very early, reading by the fireplace in the ballroom (one La Posada amenity is books and magazines everywhere), and then checking out sunrise over the railroad tracks. Just after 7:00 am Amtrak rolled in, took on about a dozen passengers, and left for Albuquerque and points east, on-time at 7:09. I talked to one couple who had spent the night in the La Posada. Wife said, "With airline travel being such a nightmare now, this is the only way to go."
Now, here's the Tuzigoot connection. On our Tuzitrip with the Allegro Club to Tombstone, we agreed to organize a rally some time in 2009. I've driven through the Mogollon Rim country of Arizona, near Show Low, a few times and thought that would be a nice place to spend some time. So, on the return trip from Winslow to Cedar Crest, I decided to check out a couple of RV parks in this area (south of Winslow). We have in mind a fall rally, say early October, timed for fall foliage finery. We did find a couple of possibilities and will check them out further before we finalize our rally plans. Might include a trip to the La Posada for lunch and corner-standing one day.
It was mid-afternoon by the time we left Show Low. There is some awesome ranch country heading east on US 60 from there, then angling up to I-40 near Grants, NM. Some of it we could barely see, though, because it was dark for our last hour on that stretch. Got home about 7:30. A fine time was had by all. Plan to stop at the La Posada in Winslow next time you're trekking across AZ on I-40.
Leaving soon for Florida. Until then,
Cheers,
Rob and Susie
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