Ahhhhhh Vermejo. This place is a DREAM. Townsend and I planned this trip on a whim and it came together much quicker than I anticipated. We were in Maine with our kids and decided we needed to plan a trip without them because they were driving us nuts. So I called my friend who had been posting all these gorgeous pictures at a ranch in New Mexico. She hooked us up with the people who run the property and within a day we had booked a 6 day trip to one of Ted Turners ranches in New Mexico. Little did we know that it would be on this trip that we would get some very special, very unexpected news that would change our life forever!
We flew in to Denver and spent the night so that we could get an early start to Vermejo the next morning. Its about a 4 hour drive so we took a pit stop in Colorado Springs to see the Garden of Gods State Park. I have to trick Townsend into these little stops because even if its only 10 minutes out of the way he freaks out!
As we drove onto the almost 600,000 acres of land that make up Vermejo, we couldn’t help but feel like we were in our own private national park. We went in late September so the leaves were changing and the temperature was perfect; we really started to feel how special this place was as we got closer to the lodge. Casa Grande is the main lodge on the ranch. It dates back over 100 years way before Ted Turner owned it. It has been restored and it is truly remarkable.
Right next to Casa Grande is the check in area and the bar and restaurant where we had cocktail hour and dinner every evening. We got lucky and our first dinner was all cooked entirely on a custom made grill which included steaks, grilled vegetables and even a cast iron skillet blueberry cobbler. OMG to die for! The food, amenities, and accommodations were all first class!
The next day we explored the property and let me tell you, Townsend was in heaven. There was wildlife everywhere… elk, mule deer, bison. And every time we saw something, Townsend would say “ Look! look at the mule deer, God bless it, why didn’t I bring my binoculars, I must be some kind of idiot.” Literally every time.
What I love about this ranch is that with every turn, you see something new. We found abandoned buildings and homes, remnants of old ghost towns. And the vast landscape was so picturesque, I was snapping pics in every direction. Townsend and I have been to many National Parks over the years but this was so much more special, because we felt like we were the only people there. We were free to explore all the hidden gems of the property without hundreds of other tourists and lines, it was bliss!
Shortly after we booked our trip, guest services contacted me to book our activities. They had so many fun things to choose from including horseback riding, a shooting range, archery, spa services, fishing trips, biking, and private guided tours. We wanted time to roam freely but also wanted to have some activities mixed in so we booked horseback riding and a full day guided tour.
Townsend knew going into this trip that this was a no hunting week so he wouldn’t have a chance to hunt at all. He was obviously disappointed but also so happy just to see the wildlife. Buuut even the No Hunting Season didn’t stop him from immediately asking every person at the ranch if they could sneak him in on a hunt while we were there. One kind soul mentioned that he might be able to shoot prarie dogs and he jumped at the opportunity. So, the day we had a guide taking us around the property, he let Townsend have some fun shooting the very overpopulated prarie dogs that they needed help managing. It may have been one of the highlights of the trip for him, if you can imagine.
It was around this time on the trip that I had started noticing some changes to my body including heartburn during cocktail hour, a very bloated stomach even considering how much delish food I was eating, and congestion. I did the math in my head and realized I was also late. I mentioned to Townsend a very off the wall comment… “what if I’m pregnant?” Which we both knew was just impossible given the issues we had when conceiving Galilee. But I of course started to over analyze it more and more and decided I needed to get a pregnancy test. Our guide took us to this great old western hotel to have lunch, there were bullet holes in the ceilings and all kinds of stories historic cowboys who had been guests of the hotel. After lunch, Townsend asked him to take us by the dollar store where I ran in and bought two tests, a first response with the double lines and a digital test. I put both in my purse to take the next morning.
That afternoon, our guide took us to see the aspens which were changing colors up at higher elevations. On the way, Townsend asked him to stop so that he could go to the bathroom in the woods. And at the same time, I grabbed one of the First Response tests, jumped out and popped a squat behind the truck. Once back in the truck, I watched two lines appear on the test which confirmed my suspicions, I was pregnant!
The next morning I took the digital test which said not pregnant. So I was officially confused. I had two tests, one that was positive, one that was negative, so what did that mean? Was I pregnant or not?!
It was our last day so we decided to wake up at sunrise and drive to the other side of the ranch which is much higher elevation, to try and see more aspens changing colors. It was a beautiful drive and we spent most of the time debating over whether or not I was pregnant and how our lives would change if I was. When we first got married, we wanted 4 kids, but after all the fertility issues we had, we accepted the reality of only having two children. And we were okay with that. We felt very grateful for the two kids we had been blessed with, they were healthy and happy. I had given up on the idea of having any more children. And of course, now it had happened, naturally, which just seemed so unlikely. But the one thing we kept coming back to was something my fertility doctor had said after my endometriosis surgery with Leon. He told us that sometimes, after a vaginal delivery, endometriosis just goes away and its never a problem again. I had a c-section with Leon since he was breech and then of course had issues with my endometriosis again. I was determined to have a vaginal delivery with Galilee so that I could maybe possibly have a chance of conceiving again. And it was always in the back of my mind that it might happen, but I was still so shocked when it actually did happen.
The rest of the day I made Townsend stop at every cluster of aspens we saw so we could get out and walk around. We also found a large herd of elk so we stopped and watched them for a while. We ended the day with a trip to Castle Rock, a large rock formation in the middle of a field where old lone bull bison like to hang out. We climbed to the top and took waaaay too many pictures, but it was just gorgeous!
We will never forget the magic of Vermejo and the wonderful news we received on this trip.
