New Mexico
Beauty, culture, will make you soar – and so will the balloons
Mix of motifs and cultures echoes across the centuries.
ALBUQUERQUE, N. M. — Striped balloons dot a bright blue sky. Red rocks silhouette a lone dead tree. A white ladder leans on a brown adobe dwelling.
On a road trip around New Mexico, this mix of motifs and cultures seems to echo across the centuries and turn up at every stop, whether you’re visiting 1,000-year-old native villages, churches from the era of Spanish conquistadors or the landscape that inspired 20th-century painter Georgia O’Keeffe.
Logistically, a trip that includes all these attractions is easy: Fly to Albuquerque, rent a car, and plan hotel stays in Santa Fe, 105 kilometres away, and Taos, 113 km beyond that.
Side trips might include Abiquiu, where O’Keeffe lived; Ojo Caliente, for hot springs; Sky City, a native pueblo about 97 km west of Albuquerque, and the Enchanted Circle, a scenic driving loop that starts in Taos. Driving between Albuquerque and Santa Fe, another scenic byway called the Turquoise Trail or High Road offers a nice alternative to Interstate 25, with stops in tiny places like Madrid, a former ghost town, and Cerrillos, a one-time mining town.
Albuquerque
Sunrise, sunset. Those are the best times to experience two of Albuquerque’s top attractions: the Sandia Peak tram and hot-air ballooning.
The 15-minute tram goes up 1,219 metres, with spectacular views of the Sandia Mountains, the city of Albuquerque and, if you time your trip right, sunset in the western sky; $20. For dinner, head to nearby El Pinto, 10500 Fourth St. NW. Try sopapillas, “little pillows” of fried bread, and carne adovada, meat marinated in a red chile sauce.
For ballooning, set your alarm early: Riders assemble around 6 a.m. for flights in May and June. And swallow your fears. Rides are gentle and downright magical. As I floated serenely above a forest and the Rio Grande River, the balloon’s shadow was perfectly silhouetted in black on the landscape below. Other balloons dotted the skies as children waved from schoolyards and drivers looked up. But get ready for sticker shock. Calls to several balloon companies found $159 was the going rate the day I went; eventually I chose World Balloon. Prices are higher certain times of year.
Other Albuquerque stops: Old Town, a plaza dating to 1706, with eateries, souvenir shops, and the San Felipe Church; and the Frontier Restaurant, 2400 Central SE, by the University of New Mexico campus, a lively cafeteria with simple, yummy fare like tortilla soup.
Acoma Pueblo At Sky City
For nearly 1,000 years, the Acoma people have lived on a sandstone mesa 113 metres above the desert floor in a pueblo called Sky City. Tours led by tribe members tell the story of how they have maintained their culture and traditions through centuries of challenges, including the Spanish conquistadors’ violent incursions beginning in the 1500s.
San Esteban del Rey Mission Church, a National Trust Historic Site that dates to 1629, was built by Spanish conquistadors using the forced labour of natives compelled to drag 20,000 tons of stone, mud, straw and wood to the mesa.
A few families live yearround in the adobe complexes, which are multi-level connected dwellings, with round adobe ovens outside and wooden ladders accessing upper floors. Beautiful pottery and other native crafts are offered for sale throughout the village. The 90-minute, $23 tour is usually offered daily MarchNovember.
Abiquiu And O’Keeffe
If you time your visit to Abiquiu right, you can spend the night, take a morning hike, grab a green chile cheeseburger at Bode’s General Store for lunch, and squeeze in two O’Keeffe tours.
O’Keeffe owned a rustic home at a remote place called Ghost Ranch, and a bus tour takes you around the ranch to see features in the landscape that inspired her.
A lone dead tree in a field, framed by distant red rocks, is unmistakably the subject of her painting Gerald’s Tree.
A flat-top mesa called Cerro Pedernal, another of O’Keeffe’s favourite subjects, is easy to pick out as you gaze at the Jemez Mountains. And O’Keeffe’s famous Ladder to the Moon shows a ladder like the ones outside adobe homes in the pueblos; she used a ladder to climb on her roof for stargazing.
A separate tour takes you inside O’Keeffe’s main home and studio, located 29 km from Ghost Ranch in a Spanish-colonial era hacienda.
The décor and setting epitomizes her modernist esthetic: moulded Eames chairs, a paper lantern that was a gift from sculptor Isamu Noguchi, and a door in the adobe-walled courtyard that inspired a series of paintings.
Both O’Keeffe tours sell out, so reserve early. Ghost Ranch tours are $25. Abiquiu home and studio tours are $35.
The Abiquiu Inn offers lodging and a terrific restaurant. Rooms are also available at Ghost Ranch, now a retreat centre owned by the Presbyterian Church; be aware that the cabins are spartan and hard to find after dark. (The ranch logo is an ox skull, another familiar O’Keeffe image.)
The ranch’s most popular trail goes to Chimney Rock, a five-kilometre round trip.
Chimayo
About 48 km from Abiquiu or Santa Fe is Santuario de Chimayo, a pictureperfect adobe church with wooden gates. This 200-year-old National Historic Landmark attracts 200,000 visitors a year, many of whom seek cures and miracles from a well of holy dirt called el pocito.
Taos
Taos has many identities: ski town, arts colony with an upscale hippie vibe, and home to the Taos Pueblo, a UNESCO World Heritage site with centuries-old adobe dwellings framed by mountains and the bright blue sky. Pueblo tours led by tribe members tell of the Taos natives’ participation in an uprising against the Spanish conquistadors in 1680 that included the destruction of a pueblo church. The church ruins can still be seen, along with a 19th-century church that replaced it. Tours are $10.
Taos also has four art museums, a historic square lined with souvenir shops, and the Hacienda de los Martinez, an 1804 frontier ranch that is now a museum. The Mabel Dodge Luhan House, 240 Morada Lane, was a magnet for artists and intellectuals in the early 20th century, with Luhan, an heiress, hosting folks like photographer Ansel Adams, dancer Martha Graham and psychoanalyst Carl Jung.
The Luhan House is now a conference centre that offers lodging, but anyone may visit the grounds and public areas.
From outside, look for colourful patterns on upstairs windows painted by novelist D.H. Lawrence in the 1920s.
Historic hotels include the Taos Inn, which offers charming rooms with a rustic feel and a terrific restaurant, Doc Martin’s, named for Taos’ first doctor, who began practicing in the 1890s. Enchanted Circle And The Rio Grande Gorge
The Enchanted Circle is a 137-km loop of lovely, varied scenery: mountains, valleys, rivers, lakes, small towns, ranchland, and the Kit Carson National Forest. From Taos, take 64 West; then 522 North and 38 East to the towns of Questa and Red River; stay on 38 to Eagle Nest, and pick up 64 back to Taos.
About 16 km from Taos on 64 West, look for the Rio Grande Gorge. Walk across the bridge to see the river trickling 172 metres below.
Ojo Caliente
Love spas but not the high prices? At Ojo Caliente, access to mineral springs, steam, sauna and mud baths is just $18 Monday-Thursday ($28, Friday-Sunday).
Historic buildings include an 1868 bathhouse, but Ojo’s history stretches back to indigenous tribes and Spanish conquistadors.
Also on-site: a hotel and excellent restaurant with desserts like tres leches mango cake and pumpkin tamales.
Santa Fe
Santa Fe Plaza is ground zero for tourists. Markets, shops and street vendors sell everything from red chile wreaths to turquoise and silver jewelry to decorative cowhides. The Palace of the Governors, 120 Washington Ave., built in the 1600s as the seat of government for Spain’s Southwestern territories, is now one of a halfdozen museums in Santa Fe devoted to history, culture and art.
The Cathedral Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi, 131 Cathedral Place, completed in 1886, was modelled on Europe’s Gothic cathedrals, but includes a chapel that preserves part of an earlier adobe church, along with a 17th-century wooden icon. Nearby, the Loretto Chapel is famous for a helix-shaped spiral staircase.
The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, 217 Johnson St., ($12) is another essential stop for her fans, with artifacts, photos and artwork including her years in Abiquiu and Ghost Ranch.
Santa Fe is known for excellent dining. Expect long lines and competition for reservations at spots like The Shed, 113 1/2 E. Palace Ave., and Café Pasqual’s, 121 Don Gaspar Ave.