vacation 2010 - New Mexico

My last day of work was Thursday Sept 30. The next Saturday, we were at the airport bright and early to start a ten-day vacation. We went to northern New Mexico. From the beginning, we were already thinking about our next trip out to that area.

We started in the tiny town of Ojo Caliente, where there is a hot springs resort. The resort has been there for decades but has recently been updated, probably with new ownership. We stayed in the "historic hotel" section, where we had a bathroom in our room and used the showers associated with the hot springs. Each guest is issued a robe, which many people wear around the tiny grounds. It's all very casual and equalizing. Some guests look like they just came out of the mountains and some look like they breathe money.

The springs themselves have several pools ranging in temperature and mineral content. One set of pools is under a cliff, which is dramatically lit at night. When in Rome, etc etc, so we also got massages. Mine was very good. I later ran into the aunt and uncle of my massage therapist; she apparently recently switched her career from being an opera singer. She's very talented.

Oh, and the on-site restaurant was extremely good - fresh, inventive New Mexican cuisine. We spent some quiet time sitting in rocking chairs on the hotel's porch and sitting in Adirondack chairs inside the pool area. It was good to just "be" for a few days after the intensity of my last weeks at work.

We also hiked a few times, up into the hills above the resort, onto a site containing potshards from centuries ago, then into the tiny town, where we talked to a transplant from Baltimore who was full of pepper and vim.

On our way to our next stop, we headed over to Ghost Ranch at Abiquiu, where Georgia O'Keefe did so much of her work. The saying goes that she didn't exaggerate the landscape, she understated it. Two years ago, we'd arrived at Ghost Ranch just when the museums were closing and vowed to return. This time, we arrived on a Monday when the museums are closed, so we'll need to go back again. (None of the museums contain Miss O'Keefe's works.) Instead of heading indoors, we hiked for a few hours and admired the scenery. Back down on flatter ground, we admired a group of painters en plein air under a huge tree, set up as if they were transplanted from 100 years ago.

We checked into our hotel in Santa Fe, the same place we stayed two years ago. We ended up in a "casita," literally a tiny house, complete with living room, bedroom, kitchen (which we barely used), and bathroom. We also had bed and breakfast privileges and enjoyed talking to the other guests. On our last day there, I finally asked if the manager had been part of a singing duo; turns out he was. It was a group I saw many times, both in Boston and in California. He and his ex-partner both live in Santa Fe and are still good friends.

While in Santa Fe, we went to museums:

• The Georgia O'Keefe museum had an exhibit on materials that went into paintings. Many of the paintings were accompanied by sketches and photographs. There was a small exhibit of paint brushes and paints. And there was a gorgeous exhibit of photographs of the artist by famous photographers who visited her in Abiquiu.
• The Museum of Contemporary Indian Arts was interesting, though not quite what I had expected. It will be good to revisit it when their second floor opens.
• The Wheelright Museum of the American Indian is displaying a beautiful, moving exhibit of Master Weavers of the Toadlena/Two Grey Hills Region, an area famous for its woven rugs. The rugs were presented in chronological order, showing the development of the technique. Downstairs is a recreation of an old trading post that contains beautiful contemporary and historical work for sale. It feels like a continuation of the museum's collection except that you can buy everything there. Prices range from a few dollars to a few thousands and beyond.

We visited two artists we like:

• Barbara Bowles photographs old rusty trucks. Sounds boring, but in her hands, the results are beautiful. We bought a third photograph to add to our tiny collection.
• Delores Nieto is a jeweler who lives on the Santo Domingo pueblo. I've bought several pieces from her over the years. This time I saw a bracelet I liked and asked her to make a necklace for me, which she did.

We visited people:

• Robert's uncle and aunt came into town and swept us away for a long visit - great to see them.
• We of course saw GrandMarvin, Robert's 102-year-old grandfather. His hearing and physical abilities aren't too great, but we did take him outside for a while, had some nice chats with him, heard stories, shared a meal, and even went to a religious service with him.
• We saw my dear old friend Grace, whom I met just before I went off to college (a story for another time), then knew at college. I'd last seen her 30 years ago on my round-the-country adventure. She's happily and lengthily married to a great guy. We had a wonderful evening together in her beautiful, art-filled house.

We took field trips:

• With Robert's uncle, we went up to Los Alamos and wandered around the science museum. I was especially struck by the movie, which had some rather thought-provoking moments, and by an oral history project consisting of photos and stories about people who worked in Los Alamos during the war. Because Robert's uncle has lived in the town since 1950, it was especially poignant to be there with him.
• We visited Bandelier National Monument and Valles Caldera, a preserve on its way to being a park. Bandelier is a 30s-style park based around cliff dwellings of native people. It's actually fascinating, but the park gets in the way a little bit. I suspect that today, it would be designed differently. Valles Caldera has only recently come into government hands. It's a 15-mile wide volcanic caldera, with cones in the middle that look for all the world like those rocky, tree-lined islands that jut out of the ocean in Maine. There are also huge elk herds. We got close enough to see one such herd with the naked eye, but we were still pretty far away.
• We went back to Abiquiu for artist's open studios. While there, we bumped into an art collector from Santa Fe, who clued us into the best studios to visit. We visited a man we saw on the last trip, someone who lives in the tiny village of Abiquiu and maintains a gallery in his living room. We had a good long talk with him. Robert bought a painting; I bought a necklace that he had bought from a lady trying to raise cash. We also bought some pottery - six beautiful bowls by a guy who's been working in clay for forty years. Before that, he studied (and taught?) philosophy.

We ate well, but that goes without saying, we bought ristras (strings of hot peppers that everyone and all businesses hang outside their houses), and we bought New Mexican chili powder which we now have to cook with!

On our way to Albuquerque, we stopped off in the little village of Madrid (emphasis on the first syllable) and met up with friends Dan and Alison. Unfortunately, Madrid, which is filled with cute little shops, has been discovered (!). Just before we got there, a huge bus of elderly tourists arrived and was letting off its passengers as we were parking. The motorcyclists were in town, and so were people taking a break from the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. The town was jammed, so we poked around a little, ate a late lunch, and headed down the road.

We ended up at a strange little place called Tinkertown, the vision of one man who carved, collected various stuff, arranged it all, created tiny villages with moving parts, collected more stuff, made more signs, and so on. The man eventually died young of Alzheimer's but his little place lives on, thanks to his children.

We checked into our hotel, then had a lovely evening with Dan and Alison around their back yard firepit.

The next day, we planned to go downtown, but ended up enjoying the Petroglyph park. We went to two parts of it. It's an odd place, really several small parks under one umbrella. To get to the second part, you drive past many strip malls and park behind one containing a Mexican (not NM) one-off fast-food place and an oil change garage. We walked for miles and enjoyed spotting the petroglyphs; there are very few clues about where each is, so you just have to keep your eyes open.

For our last night, we headed back to Dan and Alison's and went to a sweet dinner party where we sat outside and ate informally. The food was delicious and the conversation fun. Dan's son, like his dad, went to the college I went to and was home for the weekend. It was great hearing about his experiences and telling him about some of ours.

Good trip. Great travel companion as always. Lots of walking, art opportunities, great food. For our next venture to that area, we want to concentrate more on the four corners area, where Utah, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico come together.