Soon after our arrival we were wandering along Central Avenue towards the Old Town when we saw a sign invitig us to an open house at the Manzano Day School. The following morning we went along. Mary's account of the visit is here. This was a completely unexpected and very welcome extra in our visit, which we knew would interest our family and friends involved in education.
We visited the very touristy Old Town Plaza of Albuquerque, and ate in restaurants there, a couple of times. There are plenty of good outlets for Indian crafts, some under the arcades where traders sell goods in a similar way to those in Santa Fe, but perhaps less formally organised. And just nearby there was the Albuquerque Museum of Art & History which was one of the best museums we saw during our fortnight in New Mexico (photos here). On Saturday morning we awoke to see not only the balloons ascending to the north, but also a farmers' market setting up on the green just opposite our hotel. The stalls appeared to be genuinely local and small-scale producers, and much of the produce (including goats cheeses I tasted and liked, one of them, naturally, was chilli-flavoured). I took a lot of photos, some of which you can see here.
Albuquerque, although it's in the Rio Grande valley, is still at an altitude of nearly 2000 metres. During our staywe had two memorable outings to even higher areas. One was the Acoma Sky City Pueblo, which like the Taos Pueblo north of Santa Fe is one of the few remaiining inhabited Indian villages in northern New Mexico. This one, which belongs to the Acoma tribe, is as different from Taos as is chalk from cheese - perched high on an escarpment and reached only by a bus with guide from the visitor centre, the village is not really picturesque. A big contrast from the Taos pueblo which was all adobe buildings and which you wander into from the car park and tour without a guide, with little shops now taking up the front rooms of most houses.
But it symbolises the struggle for independence and dignity of the tribe over centuries in the face of colonial invasions. The often violent and bloody history of the Acoma people and their ultimate survival after Spanish and then American oppression was the focus of the guided tour which involved long spells of listening punctuated by walks past the many local traders who (as in Taos) gain their livelihood here. The guide was passionate about the sufferings of his tribe in history - Alan thought he overlooked some of their bloodier doings against others - and since we spent so long sitting listening to him, so thankfully the rain held off. They need rain - it's incredibly arid up there - and have prayers and incantations to encourage it to fall! But we found later in Albuquerque that the highest quality goods are sold not to tourist visitors here but in the major craft outlets in the city. Photos of our visit to Sky City are here.
When wandering around the Old Town Mary encountered a mime artist/magician who produced an extra ball from her hand at the end of an elaborate series of gestures. Lo and behold, this turned out to be Dan Kamin, a Charlie Chaplin expert (he trained Johnny Depp for his role as the Keaton imitator in Benny & Joon and Robert Downey Jr for Chaplin). We had booked to see him with the revived New Mexico Philharmonic in a show celebrating the importance of music accompanying silent films. This was at the Kiva Auditorium, part of the huge Albuquerque Convention Center. The concert hall alone seats 2300 people in one huge semicircle: it was only 1/3 full and the sound and acoustics were not great, but the two scores (composed by the conductor) introduced by Mr Kamin and played to accompany 2 Chaplin films were really good, and - as he said - enhanced the film.
We left Albuquerque and New Mexico early on Monday morning full of memories and impressions of vast landscapes, completely new cultures and above all of the generosity and kindness of our hosts throughout these 3 weeks.
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