Around Santa Fe

Santa Fe is a shopping city.  Not just that, but first and continuing impressions (and the guide book we looked at as we prepared for our visit) confirmed that this is a prominent raison d'être of the city.  But it is also elegant and attractive.  Our first evening saw us at La Fonda hotel, just off the Plaza and next to the Cathedral.  Maybe we should have stayed there - Alan did many years ago when he first came to Santa Fe - rather than at a 60s motel 2 miles out of town. 

The bad thing about our motel was that its so-called hight-speed internet was snail-slow and weak as water.  The good thing was the covered swimming pool in which I swam each morning of our stay, almost always the only taker at that time and with a lovely hot tub to relax in afterwards.  I solved my internet problem in a nearby recreation room, but only discovered on the last morning that the best internet hot spot was actually beside the swimming pool!!  The hotel breakfasts were not at all exciting either - too little space, weak coffee and nothing much else exciting - we ended up eating at the very nice Café Olé the other side of the parking lot, which actually served espresso coffee!

We spent plenty of time round the city centre.  At any rate you could always call into the La Fonda bar for (Tex-Mex and other) food, as we did on our first evening, beer (including excellent New Mexican brews) and of course margaritas.  They are as essential to my alcoholic appreciation of SW USA as is pastis to my enjoyment of the South of France!!  But that hotel and the Plaza and the streets around were lined with boutiques and posh shops for boots and clothes, Indian traders and much else.  Mary drooled (but not literally of course) over the collection of Issey Miyake 'Pleats Please' in one shop.  Shopping photos here.

Our first morning was spent on walking tours.  Mary and Barbara went on a history tour from one museum, while I opted for the art tour from another, on which there was one other tourist, a lady from Cape Cod, and our guide, a local volunteer who was friendly and chatty, very informative.  Many of the pictures in the album here are from this tour, but you'll see others of the cathedral and parks. 

 

'Art' on this tour meant mostly architecture, and during a tour of half a dozen city blocks our guide explained the layers of building style from the early authentic Adobe buildings, through attempts by American incomers in the Mexican period before 1912 to improve them - one simple addition is brick capping along the tops of the walls to stop erosion - or to replace or convert them with brick-built houses that look more like English Edwardian detached ones than anything else, with sloping roofs sometimes of tin rather than tiles.  The predominant Adobe style still favoured in modern buildings contrasts with the conscious attempts in the late 19th century of Federal US incomers to impose more 'American' styles using brick and with pitched roofs. There was a reaction to this among locals who reasserted the traditional styles. As a result there are genuine adobe buildings, adobe disguised as brick-built and brick-built disguised as adobe. I hoped to remember which is which but after a while it became a blur!  On top of this, locals often take care to preserve water with gardens which thrive with little irrigation - Federal buildings habitually are surrounded by lawns to cock a snook at local sensibilities.  There were a lot of fascinating details, more about Santa Fe adobe architecture here.

While we were in Santa Fe Alan drove us for a day trip to Taos Pueblo, one of only 2 sill-occupied Indian village/settlements in the north of New Mexico.  To reach it we drove north through the stunning Rio Grande gorge, shining with the first bright autumn colours of the cottonwood trees.  The Pueblo itself is a huge square of carefully maintained adobe buildings including a catholic church, around a huge open space in which a tall pole provides the focus for community ceremonies.  There is no electricity, piped water or sewage in the compound, though some tribal members live in more modern accommodation outside the adobe brick boundary wall. 

The community survives through crafts and trading, and lots of what they make and sell can be seen in the photos here.  Mary talked to one ex-teacher who makes dream-catchers - she was brought up in the pueblo and still lives in the compound, has teenage children and remembers with pleasure her visit to France during her teacher training.  During this and other visits we learned about the care taken by government agencies to protect Indian crafts - the link is to official documents which are quite dry, but this is important because it is the means of survival for many tribespeople, and because fakes are all too easy to find.  We were astonished at the amount of turquoise around, and only later read the warnings about plastic substitutes.

On our final morning in Santa Fe we drove just south of the City centre to Museum Hill.  This is a remarkable complex of 4 museums in a beautiful rather wild setting.  We had to follow our street map in the absence of much signposting.  Mary particularly wanted to see the Museum of Spanish Colonial Art.  It includes household and religious objects from the 18th-19th century, some lovely tinwork, and has a focus on traditional craft methods.  When we were there there was a group of women learning a traditional embroidery technique.  The photos tell the story of our inspiring visit to the museum, and to the neighbouring plaza between the two neighbouring museums and the sculpture garden by the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture.

Then on to Albuquerque for the final stay of our trip...  See you there!!