Yesterday’s drive wasn’t such a long one, but I chose to take a more remote freeway instead of the main one—I drove up 54, a single-lane highway, instead of 25, the larger and obviously faster route. What a great choice; the scenery was simply stunning. As I said in a tweet yesterday, I honestly had no idea that New Mexico was so gorgeous. And as a chap I met over margaritas last night explained, it’s even better farther north!

I’ve been updating the map with my actual route, as you can see here. The blue car is me, of course :) (not updated in realtime… still hoping someone will tell me how I can do that!)

View Travel Junkie’s Cross Country Drive in a larger map

Here’s a few shots from the “back road”. If you’re looking for the abandoned store in Duram, I’ll post those separately.

This first one is the moment I realized how green things had gotten. It was one of those sudden “whoah!” moments, when everything around me changed color, seemingly all at once.

Admittedly on this next shot, I took some liberties with the color. I treated it more like the desert photos from earlier in the trip, emphasizing the dryness of this area. I realize that’s in complete contrast to what I just said on the photo above—but hey, the landscape kept changing!

These next two are my favorites from the day. I stopped the car to photograph the clouds, and as soon as I got out these bright yellow flowers (mini sunflowers? I dunno, but that’s what they look like) popped out at me. Very pretty, and I just love the contrast.

Finally, the ubiquitous “standing in the middle of the road” photo. Don’t try this in Los Angeles, kids!