Santa Rosa,NM

Picked up our load in Manteca,CA and headed out on Tuesday with it. We made it into Albuquerque around 1830 where we dropped it off with another team. Since we had a little time, we went ahead and spent the night there and got up this morning and dropped our trailer over at Shaw. On the way over there we saw a roach coach. Couldn't resist good authentic mexican food so we pulled over and grabbed something to eat. We each got the carne asada taco plates. It was delicious but the sauce and onions/jalapenos were freaking hot! My lips were on fire for about 20 minutes. But it was worth it!

From there we headed on over to Santa Rosa. When I called and made hotel reservations, I specifically asked if they had truck parking, with a trailer. They said yes. Thank goodness that we dropped the trailer because there is NOT truck parking here. There is a lot next door that we could have parked at, but they didn't specify that it was next door when I called. We got here around 1100 but they let us go ahead and check in. We got checked in and took a nap and then got up and got to studying our academics for our scuba certification.

Last night Ironpony sent me a PM asking if we were still going to be in Albuquerque. I told him no, that we would be here, but if he was coming on I-40 past here to call us. Sure enough, he came right through Santa Rosa and right in time for dinner. I had him park in the lot next door and we went across the street and had some pretty darn good mexican food for dinner. It was great meeting him. I just love meeting people in person that we have been talking to online. It is always great to put a face with a name. We had a great time and I hope we get to meet on the road again and get to visit for longer. Unfortunately, we had to check on Smokey, he had to get back on the road to make his destination for the night, and our dive instructor showed up while we were eating and we needed to get studying.

After getting the room situation figured out, we started studying. We studied for about 3 hours until around 2300 and then decided to call it a night. The goal is to get our confined water dive finished in the morning, have one dive tomorrow afternoon and then get in three dives on Saturday. And in between get the rest of our academics done. Since he is a PADI instructor we have to take several tests before we can get our actual certification. He has been diving since 1991 I think he said and he has well over 2000 dives, so he knows his stuff and takes it very seriously. He doesn't skimp on the teaching, and I like that. I want to know what the hell I am doing down there underwater!

OH! During dinner J had to step outside becase we finally got a call from Justin. He is doing his pre-BUDS training right now. He passed his first PST test with flying colors so he got liberty to go off base and finally was able to get a cell phone so he called. We are so proud of him! They said the first PST is the hardest and if he passes that, he should be fine for the rest. Once he finishes this, he will be off to Carmel,CA for SEAL training!