US memories

There is news today of serious flooding in Colorado. We have a niece and family living in Fort Collins Colorado which isn't too far from the affected area. I have emailed this morning but no reply yet. I'll have to wait until their morning.

We visited them in Colorado a few years ago and had an interesting holiday, driving ourselves north to visit Yellowstone and to meet some Canadian friends. We met in a place called Deer Lodge which sounded so romantic but in fact was just a truck stop!

But this little Navajo blanket comes from a much earlier visit to the United States. In 1966 we had finished an eighteen month posting in Venezuela with Shell, and chose to come home via the western States. Our daughter was nearly two and I was pregnant with our son so it was quite a challenge. We flew to San Francisco and after a few days we drove east. In nearly two weeks we visited Yosemite, The Hoover Dam, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas and many smaller National Parks. We bought the Navajo blanket in Arizona from a small roadside trading post, together with a hand made silver spoon. Las Vegas was still a very small town with just one street of casinos. The Grand Canyon had just one hotel. Everywhere has developed so much since then! We ended our trip in Phoenix, flew to New York and arrived home in England on Christmas Eve. Lots of long ago memories.