Santa Fe is one of the few places we’ve ever had to write two posts to cover it all. It is a great city with lots to see and do and we wish we had more time here. In the last blog I told you about The Turquoise Trail, Tinseltown Museum, Madrid, “the Old Town”, the oldest house and the oldest Chapel. Then there was the magnificent ancient living town of Taos Pueblo and the breathtaking Rio Gorge Bridge. Well that is not the end of it.
In one respect the two days of rain we had here gave us some respite from the hectic pace we’d set ourselves. Once the rain cleared we had another perfect Santa Fe day so we set off on another adventure. On this day we drove up into the mountains to Los Alamos where, if you know your history the fate of the world was changed forever when Robert Oppenheimer and his crew of scientists developed the atomic bomb that was dropped on Japan to end World War II. The trip up to Los Alamos was spectacular in itself. The highway winds it’s way along the sides of gorges and over the ranges. We stopped at one overlook (American for ‘lookout’) and take photos of where we’d come from when I noticed caves in the top of the scree slopes that were Indian cave dwellings.
After some 45 minutes of driving we reached Los Alamos and to our surprise it isn’t as portrayed in Hollywood film in the desert it is actually a very mountainous region on the Pajarito Plateau. The original labs from the 1940’s are no longer there but the facility as a whole is but it is now vastly expanded and still highly secretive. We were actually directed through ‘toll gates’ where our I.D. was checked before we were allowed to proceed. Also there are the houses that Oppenheimer, General Groves lived in (they’re the houses behind the fences in ‘Bathtub Row’ which was the nickname for their street as they were the only houses with bathtubs!) as are several other low security buildings. There is also the remains of a native Indian Pueblo in the middle of town as Los Alamos was in the centre of an ancient trail.
After a look about Los Alamos we then turned the car to Bandelier National Monument which holds Frijoles Canyon, the home of ancient Native Cave Dwellings. On the way we sighted several Mule Deer before stopping at the canyon overlook. The two circular photos and the one following are my clever attempts at taking a picture with my phone through the lens of a telescope. If you look closely at the pics you’ll see adobe brick dwellings, paths and tourists several miles away at the bottom of the canyon. We drove to the bottom and immediately noticed caves right at the Ranger HQ. The trail loop was about 2 miles and though some dwellings were off limits there are several that were open to climb up the ladders to enter. There is a Kiva (village) on the canyon floor as well as whole cave dwellings and ‘houses’ built against the wall that incorporated caves.
This walk was one of the best we’ve been lucky enough to do. It is fascinating to walk in the footsteps of ancient civilisations and see how they lived. The Pueblo people who lived here did so from about 1150 CE to 1550 CE farming the ‘holy trinity’ of native foods (corn, beans, squash), hunting animals such as deer, rabbit and squirrel and by domesticating wild turkeys. After 400 years they had exhausted the fertility of the canyon and had to move on. That means these caves were last lived in almost 500 years ago. Some of the more interesting photos in the gallery are those after the photos of the wild mule deer. In some you’ll see the actual colouring of the paints used to decorate the homes. There are also numerous petroglyphs seen above the entrances. Look at the rows of horizontal holes in the wall. These held the vigas. I mentioned these in the Santa Fe blog – they’re designed to hold the roof covering of small branches and mud and often a second or even a third level. There are petroglyphs above many of these. There are some caves with pictographs too like the zig zag pattern believed to be a snake totem.
Once we hit the end of the canyon we crossed over the river and started back towards HQ and the carpark. By the time we got under way again it was well past lunchtime before we made our third destination for the day, Chimayo, the Lourdes of America.
Driving to Chimayo entailed driving back up the spur of the canyon then down another. Shane’s photo of the GPS might give you an idea of the roads. The benefit of this is the spectacular scenery that is the mountain ranges that around Santa Fe. Eventually we made the township of Chimayo which has a long, rich history in the weaving business. The symbol you see painted on the wall is at the premier textile shop in Chimayo which in the awe of the moment we didn’t sneak any photos of (which they ask you not to do so we actually did the right thing). The following pic is of a cross on top of a hill behind the church we’d come to see. Only a few days before it was Good Friday and Chimayo was packed with catholic worshippers, the deepest devotees of which climbed to the top of the hill in a pilgrimage here. (https://www.spiritualtravels.info/articles-2/north-america/the-holy-dirt-of-chimayo-new-mexico/)
It had been a big day by the time we got to the church and much of the grounds around the church were inaccessible but what we did manage to see was a wonderfully peaceful sanctuary. We could only imagine the throng here a day or two earlier over the Easter Weekend. They were here in the hope of receiving or seeing a miracle which Chimayo is famous for. There was not a single spot where worshippers hadn’t left a personal artefact no doubt in hope of some kind of peace in their life. Miracles have been reported here since the church was built in 1816. After a look in and around the church we turned the car back towards Santa Fe but got side tracked when we noticed the strange rock formations you see in the last few photos.
That’s it for Santa Fe and this blog. All we can say to you is that if you want a fantastic holiday in the USA you can’t go wrong at Santa Fe. What we have shown you over the last two posts is but a fraction of the activities here. There are also two world renown ski fields here and tons more history.
Watch for the next post. I hope to have it up very soon. We only have about 2 left on this leg. We’re currently in Denver where we’ll fly back to Australia to see our family for a few weeks then we’ll be back here to pick up our rig and continue on this fantastic road trip around the USA.
Cheers for now
Garry & Shane