January 1, 2020 Lunch – Chicken Salad in bed. Dinner -Hotel Holland, Alpine.

January 1, 2020 Lunch – Chicken Salad in bed. Dinner -Hotel Holland, Alpine.

We got a slow start, going to get coffee for Suzette.and a chai for me and splitting a thick piece of toast spread with almond butter and a generous squeeze of honey at 10:00.

                                         The house across the street from the coffee place

We went back to the room and rested until noon, when we ate several forkfuls of chicken salad.

We then drove south to Alpine and then to Marathon and an additional 5 miles to Pena Colorado Post Park.  This is the location of a natural spring that was a favored watering place for the Apaches on their way to Mexico to raid ranches there.  The US Calvert took possession on the spring in 1882 by buffalo soldiers to stop the Indians’ predation.  It was abandoned in 1893 after completion of the railway and the end of the Indian wars.

We walked around the small pond created by a WPA project damming the spring in 1937.


After our short walk we drove back to Marathon to the Gage Hotel’s White Buffalo Bar and sipped an Old Fashion under the white buffalo.

We called the Holland Hotel in Alpine to make a reservation for dinner at 5:30.

We left the Gage at 5:00 and drove to the Holland Hotel in Alpine.  I has been recently remodeled, it was a beautiful hotel designed by Trost and Trost, as was the Gage Hotel in Marathon and the Paisano Hotel in Marfa.

We selected a booth beside the kitchen where I could watch the chefs prepare the dinners.  It was ½ wine night so we ordered a bottle of Argyle Pinot Noir for $26.00 instead of $52.00 and two ribeye on focaccia sandwiches.  I loved the sandwich, a sauté of steak strips, portobello mushrooms and onions on a slice of focaccia bread covered with melted cheese.  Each of us ordered a side salad.  Suzette ordered s Cesar and I ordered s wedge with blue sheesh dressing ,fried bacon strips and a fig glaze.  I loved the sandwich and the side salad.  Suzette thought dinner was good.

After dinner we took the remaining 1/3 of the bottle of Argyle and drove to the Marfa lights viewing area where we ate a brownie with glasses of Argyle and watched for fifteen minutes to see the mystery lights to no avail.   After we finished our wine and brownie, we drove back to the motel, arriving with 4:00 minutes left in the Rose Bowl.  We were able to see Oregon beat Wisconsin by 1 point, 28 to 27.

Then we watched Baylor play Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. Although Suzette went to sleep.

We had a lovely relaxing day, while we covered lots of new territory.

Bon Appetit