That Elusive Trading Post

For the third time, we tried to visit Toadlena Trading Post and failed. We attempted two times back in the mid-to-late 1990s when we were doing our roving trading post visits. We found Two Grey Hills on the dirt road, but no luck when it came time to sight Toadlena. On our recent visit last month, we were traveling on Route 491 (former Rte. 666) from Gallup to Shiprock and back. We knew the turnoff was around Newcomb, we had our maps out, and there were some signs not far out of both Gallup and Shiprock. Yet we failed again.

The culprit, we realized, was the fact that New Mexico DOT is working on Route 491 in that area, doing bypass construction and road widening. Subsequently, the turnoff from 491 wasn’t indicated. We’ve been pretty excited about the work that Mark Winter and staff have been doing to make this 1890s trading post come alive again with weaving talent and the chance for the visitor to have an artful museum experience. Nevertheless, a well-placed sign at the turnoff would help everyone. Maybe the construction workers moved it. We’ll try to find this elusive trading post yet again on a later trip. In the meantime, if you plan to visit — get your GPS going!

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