Coronado Center Mall, Albuquerque, New Mexico

I went to the mall yesterday, it was a deja vu experience.

It's been a LONG time since I have shopped at the mall. I have spent decades honing my skills as a bargain shopper at boutique shops, antique stores, TJMaxx, REI, gun shows and online, and I haven't needed to wander the mall.

And I am not a mall walker either. High stepping laps in tennis shoes around the two levels of Coronado Mall in Albuquerque, NM is not my idea of a fun way to exercise. I think it's great for others, don't misunderstand, but it's not me.

Anyway, I went to the mall and it wasn't all that bad. There were a lot of people since it was a Saturday, and there were too many kiosks lined from one end to the other with rather aggressive sales folks calling me "hon", but other than that it wasn't bad. (I have always had an issue with 18+ year olds calling me "hon").

I really hadn't walked the entire mall before, my typical errand is a direct line in to The Body Shop and then out again, but yesterday I took my time.

Coronado is anchored by three major department stores - Macy's, Penny's and Sears - putting it right in the middle of mall greatness, in other words it's not a high end mall. No Nordstroms. No Dillards. But between the 3 anchors going every which way (this is not a long straight mall, it curves and heads in different directions) are most of the "to be expected" mall stores, including Banana Republic, Aeropostale, American Eagle Outfitters, etc. And because we ARE in New Mexico, there is a large Boot Barn as well - a favorite of mine.

I will go back to the mall someday, probably to The Body Shop and to Boot Barn, but I have to admit that Banana Republic caught my attention and managed to lure me in long enough to take some of my $ too (probably because the sales staff was trained well enough to NOT call me "hon").

Coronado Mall in Albuquerque is located off of I-40 between Indian School and Menaul just west of Louisiana. It's a fun excursion into the past. Can tennis shoes and mall laps be far behind?

Nah, if we wore tennies we couldn't hit the gun show later that day.

After all, this is the Land of Enchantment!