Tag Archives: New Mexico

Hiking the Trails in the Mountains above Santa Fe

One of the things we did on our trip Santa Fe last month was going hiking. I asked a friend of mine who spends a lot of time there and hikes and he suggested the Dale Ball Trails. This is a public trail network of about 25 miles located right outside Santa Fe up in the mountains. So we decided to go do that. We weren’t going to do 25 miles, we went for 2.5 miles seeing how we are flatlanders Oklahoma where the elevation is about 400 ft compared to Santa Fe’s 7200 ft.

Heather near the start.

Son Logan who doesn’t really like hiking but is always up for anything.

The trail is very well marked and was in very good shape. Not very many technical areas at all.

Our merlin app was going crazy on all the birds here. There were the small extremely small and rude birds that hard to see and don’t sit still long enough to take a photo. So this is one of several photos I made of trees hoping that I could spot birds later. The laugh is on my because I can’t spot any birds in it.

Yucca cactus!! I’ve hiked a lot in Oklahoma and have yet to run across this cactus. I spend sometime growing up in Albuquerque, New Mexico and it was pretty popular there. Nobody could afford the cost watering grass so xeriscape landscaping (landscaping using plants and methods that require very little if any supplemental watering) was popular. Yucca plants were often planted underneath ground story windows as a security measure. If you have ever run into one of the “swords” of the plant you would understand.

Trail Shadows - Dale Boll Trails in Santa Fe

I’m not a forester but the trees I think were pinon pine and juniper.

More cactus, prickly pear.

Even though the trail is adjacent to houses and close to town you never really see the houses. Also the trail was not that steep. There was a climb at the start but afterward he wound around at the same elevation.

So anyway, almost 2.5 miles at a pretty slow pace. We were taking our time and I was taking lots of photos.

This is a screenshot from the Dale Ball Trails website showing the trails. I added the red showing our approximate route. The Dale Ball Trails has about 25 miles but their trails interconnect with other trails including forest service trails in the Santa Fe National Forest. I would hate to guess how many miles of trails are on the total network.

A good time was had by all but we crashed afterwards.

I am linking with Through My Lens.

Through My Lens – Santa Fe’s Canyon Road Summer Walk

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On our recent vacation to Santa Fe and other places, my wife Heather and I decided that by gosh we were going to check out the Canyon Road Art Galleries. So in the evening one day we ventured over there and we stumbled into the Canyon Road Summer Art Walk. It happens the first Wednesday of every month in the summer. The event even has its own web site.

The first thing we saw were these two women and a guy drumming their heart out in some sort of warrior pose. What a great introduction.

The streets were closed to cars so we just followed everyone else. It went on for about a mile.

Art galleries and people everywhere you look. We didn’t go into any of the galleries. There was plenty to see outside.

And everywhere people were talking with each other. Heather said it was like everyone knew each other.

So we walked a mile out to the end of the event and walked back.

It’s the best way to see Canyon Road in my opinion. I say that and I had never been there before.

It was a blast. It is the first Wednesday of each month from 5 to 8 pm.

The Cathedral of Saint Francis of Assisi in Santa Fe, New Mexico

The first thing we looked at in Santa Fe during our recent vacation was the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi right adjacent to our hotel.

Franciscan Friars and settlers came to the area in 1598 and in 1610 the city of Santa Fe was established and the first church was built. The church was destroyed in 1680 during the Pueblo Revolt. The Spanish returned in1693 and by 1714-1717 a new church in honor of Saint Francis was established. In 1853 the Diocese of Santa Fe was established and construction started on the Cathedral in 1869. It was dedicated in 1887. Complete except the spires were not funded and never built.

Almost all the buildings in downtown Santa Fe are adobe or faux adobe. The Cathedral is of Neo-Romanesque design with round arches and Corinthian columns. It’s quite beautiful inside and out.

Kateri Tekakwitha - First Female Native American Saint

On the grounds of the Cathedral is statue of Kateri Tekakwitha (1656-1680). The first Indigenous American Saint. Canonized in 2012, she is known as the Patron Saint of Ecology. She had a Mohawk father and a Christianized Algonquin mother You can read more about her here.

The grounds have a Station of the Cross installation that is very powerful.

On Cathedral Square is this sculpture honoring the priests and settlers who came and claimed the area for Spain.

Saint Francis of Assisi himself.

And a ceramic installation of the Virgin of Guadaloupe.

The inside of the church is gorgeous. It is a very active church with many different activities for members and non-members and is welcoming to all. Check out their website for more information.

The sanctuary is very peaceful and there were a lot of people praying during out visit.

I love all the stained glass windows. They are beautiful.

I am linking with Through My Lens

My Corner of the World – Santa Fe’s Georgia O’Keefe Museum

One of the things Heather and I did during out stay in Santa Fe last month was go to The Georgia O’Keefe Museum in Santa Fe. We’ve seen a lot of O’Keefe’s art over the years but they had a lot of things that were different from what we were used to. (And check the link, they have over 1000 works of art by O’Keefe, over 800 photographs, and other pieces of art from people inside O’Keefe’s circle.)

Black Cross with Red Sky

In the Patio, VIII

Red Hills and Sky

Turns out that O’Keefe was a photographer as well. From what I understand she used a camera to help her remember scenes that she was going to paint later. She was quite prolific artist.

I loved this photo of her cooking, she looks very open and friendly. She didn’t show this side of herself much.

I highly recommend the museum if you happen to be in town.

My Corner of the World

My Corner of the World – El Santuario de Chimayo

El Santuario de Chimayo (The Sanctuary at Chimayo) is a Catholic Church and shrine located in the little town of Chimayo just a few miles north of Santa Fe, New Mexico. It was originally built in 1813, and rebuilt since, and is still an active church. For years it has been a pilgrimage destination, especially during Holy Week, for 300,000 or so people a year, many of whom walk long distances to ask for healing and offer prayers of Thanksgiving.

In a little side room to the church is El Pocito a small hole in the ground that contains sacred dirt that some say heals them from various ailments. I went in the room and saw El Pocito. I didn’t take a photo. It felt disrespectful to do so. I went into the church and the interior is beautiful but they explicitly asked for people not to take photos so of course I did not.

According to tradition, in 1810 the landowner, Don Bernardo de Abeyta experienced a vision of the apparition of Our Lord of Esquipulas in his field while plowing. He petitioned the local priest for permission to build the church in 1813 and replaced it with the current building in 1816. Strangely enough the Abeyta family owned the church and lived off the gifts from pilgrims until 1929 when the Spanish Colonial Arts Society in Santa Fe purchased it from the family and donated it to the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.

It is a beautiful building though it does look more ancient and rustic than the St Francis de Asis Church that we visited earlier that day. The tin caps on the spires give it a lot of character. It has been a National Historic Landmark since 1970.

The building is surrounded by a large complex containing a visitor center, gift shop, a sizeable outdoor worship area, and several other chapels. You can see they are geared to greet many people. There is no charge for admission and there is plenty of parking. I have never been to this before even though I had heard about it my whole life. It was a nice visit. Very cool visiting a church that has been active for over 200 years.

I am linking with My Corner of the World

Sources:

Sanctuary of Chimayo
National Park Service
Wikipedia

Skywatch Friday – Saint Francis of Asis Church – Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico

The Saint Francis of Asis Catholic Church is located in the northern New Mexico town of Ranchos de Taos. It was constructed between 1772 and 1816 and is still an active church. It is built of adobe and the church members spend two weeks in June ever year remudding the exterior with a mixture of mud and straw. If you look closely you can see the straw in the exterior walls. It is considered to be Spanish Colonial architecture.

It was designated at National Historic Landmark in 1970 by the National Park Service.

It’s obviously well loved by the parishoners.

The church has been a favorite subject for years by artists and photographers including Georgia O’Keefe and Ansel Adams. (Check the links for images of the art work.) The artists have focused almost exclusively on the back of the church which has three massive beehive shaped buttresses. I guess that I am not artist because I find the front of the church to be much more interesting.

The interior is gorgeous. The altar looks beautiful. I brightened the image above so you could see but did not advance beyond the closed entrance door. It was almost pitch dark and did not want to disturb anyone who might be in there praying.

SaintFrancis original-2_DAP_Aqua-Real — Dynamic Auto Painting rendering.

I’ve been seeing this church almost my whole life. Whenever we went through the area when I was a kid we would stop and look. I think it has an almost magical presence. It had been almost 30 years since I last saw it though before our recent trip and I still love it.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday

Shadow Shot Sunday – Vigas and Canales

Shadows of the Vigas and Canales at the St. Francis de Asis Catholic Church in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico.

Vigas are the wooden beams poking through the adobe wall. They are used for supporting the roof. Canales are the roof drains. You can tell that they have been extended for some reason. I’ll have photos of the whole church later.

I am linking with Shadow Shot Sunday

A Home Where the Deer Roam

Red River, New Mexico, high in the mountains was home to a bunch of deer.

This guy was watching me closely as I hunted for geocaches in the local cemetery.

Near the ski areas we saw lots of deer.

Near our condo we saw deer close to the river.

Walking the short hop to town we would see deer in the neighborhood.

Ducks liked the area as well. They seemed very acclimated to humans.

This one was ready for her closeup.

I loved seeing the duck convoys patrolling the river.

I am linking with Saturday’s Critters.

Hiking the Carson National Forest’s Columbine Creek Trail in New Mexico

Continuing our saga of our New Mexico vacation. We got to Red River in the beautiful Sangre de Cristo Mountains and didn’t waste any time hiking the day after we got there. I hadn’t been in the area in 50 years and back then I wasn’t a hiker. So we consulted the redriver.org website and the alltrails app and kind of converged on the nearby Columbine Creek Trail as a good moderate trail. Plus it was only about five miles from town so off we went.

We didn’t see much in the way of critters but there were wildflowers. I had my Merlin App going and it captured the Northern Flicker in a particular section of the trail and not much anywhere else. I caught glimpses of it but not enough to feel comfortable adding it to my “life list.” Those dang birds need to sit still for at least 30 seconds for me to get my camera out, adjust the settings, focus and all that to get a good photo. Those little birds are so rude they way they hop skip and jump all over the place. Just call me Karen and point me to the manager.

Gotta tell you walking through an aspen forest got my feels going. Did that all the time when I was just a kid. Haven’t hardly done it since. I love it. Brings back lots of memories.

And a cold, clear mountain stream. We have lots of water in eastern Oklahoma (and I love it here) but very few clear running streams.

Just one more time on the aspens. Promise!!

The trail crossed Columbine Creek several times. The Forest Service put in these deluxe bridges. I cannot imagine the amount of work to put the bridges in and then keep them maintained.

And I loved the rock cliffs.

I googled the heck of “Quetta” so I don’t know who this person is but they obviously loved the trails.

Here’s two of my hiking team.

We didn’t make it to the promised waterfall at the end of the trail. We were getting low on water and we are flatlanders playing around at over 10,000 feet so we turned around. There will be plenty of waterfalls in our future. So headed back to the trailhead and got there safe and sound. So we got four miles in for the day.

And now a blast from the past.

Our hike reminded me that when I was in high school our family hiked somewhere along the highway in one of the Forest Service campgrounds. I remember dad pointing up to a mountain and saying that there was lots of molybdenum in the rock and that it had been mined there for decades. The mineral is used to harden steel in everything from bulldozer blades to mountain bikes and is very valuable. So I looked it up and molybdenum had indeed been mined there for a long time and the biggest mine, owned by Chevron Mining, was an open pit mine right across the road from the campground where our trailhead was. I got on google maps and the mine looks a lot worse than it looks from the road. It is a huge open pit mine.

Chevron shut the mine down in 2014 and settled with the State and the Feds for over $140 million in cleanup costs from the damage of runoff from the mine into the Red River. Chevron is still cleaning it up and is still helping the downstream village of Questa deal with transitioning their economy from mining to something else. Mining is necessary for our modern life but cleaning it up is an expensive, lengthy process. I think they are pretty close to completing the project.

Hey I apologize for digressing but I found the mine fascinating and was amazed at how much damage it caused to the surrounding area.

Still more to come later on our vacation.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday.

My Corner of the World – Red River Happenings

https://flic.kr/p/2q8gTzm

We decided to take a last minute vacation to New Mexico. Spend a few days at Red River, up in the moutains and then go spend some time in Santa Fe. It has been a long time since we have escaped to the moutains.

Of course we had to drive the endless miles through Oklahoma to the mountains. Including endless waiting for trains where one literally could not see the end of the train!!

But hey we got there, gasping at the 8750 ft elevation but thrilled at the low temperatures. We have been getting baked in Oklahoma lately so the low temps and humidity were welcome.

The food and drink there were not bad.

The Red River winds through town. It is not a big river but the ducks like it. The trout did as well. People were pulling them out pretty regularly. Apparently the city has spent a bunch of money over the years creating “fish parks” narrowing the channel, planting trees and shrubs on the banks. The fish have responded. They like it.