A Love Affair with Santa Fe
“Santa Fe will set you right
She’ll take you in to stay the night
And leave your head still aching by the morn”
Take the High Road, they said. You’ll thank us later.
This is Part 2 of the narrative of our trip through New Mexico (if you haven’t read Part 1, you can find it here).
There are two main highways that connect Taos and Santa Fe, the High Road and the Low Road. In accordance with advice from people who had done this before, and based on our own research on the internet, we decided to take the High Road. This is the more scenic of the two main highways connecting the two towns, and while the Low Road follows the picturesque Rio Grande for much of the distance to Santa Fe (I had driven the Low Road on a previous trip to New Mexico a few years ago, and we had also driven on it for part of the way to Abiquiú just the day before), the High Road is by far the more beautiful.
We fueled ourselves for the drive ahead with a satisfying breakfast at the Sagebrush Inn in Taos, said goodbye to the town one last time, and turned off the main thoroughfare onto Hwy 518. It was slow progress with all the stops we made, not that I’m complaining. The drive was gorgeous. We passed the Fort Burgwin campus of Southern Methodist University and wondered how anyone could get any studying done in a setting as beautiful as this, surrounded by the Carson National Forest and the Sangre de Cristo mountains. We stopped to pet the horses in the fields along the road. We stopped at every church along the way – Nuestra Señora de San Juan at Talpa, San José de Gracia at Las Trampas, Santo Rosario at Truchas, El Santuario de Chimayó and Santo Niño at Chimayó – so many, so full of character and so beautiful.
Clockwise from top left: The Sagebrush Inn, Taos, Nuestra Señora de San Juan, Talpa, Santo Niño, Chimayó, and San José de Gracia, Las Trampas
It was slow progress with all the stops we made, not that I’m complaining. The drive was gorgeous.
The churches at Talpa, Las Trampas and Truchas were relatively small, and it didn’t take very long for us to walk around a take a few pictures. We needed significantly more time at Chimayó. El Santuario de Chimayó is a National Historic Landmark and is considered the most important Catholic pilgrimage site in the United States. Pilgrims from all over the world walk to the church, especially during Holy Week, many hoping for miraculous cures to ailments that traditional medicines had failed to ameliorate. And much like at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes in France, discarded crutches and other artifacts at El Santuario de Chimayó bear testimony to those who made the pilgrimage here and were healed.
El Santuario de Chimayó
We walked around the little village of Chimayó for a while, exploring the local shops. We bought some of the red and green chile that New Mexico is famous for to take back to Texas. Afterwards, we had a late lunch at Rancho de Chimayó. The fresh, warm sopapillas drizzled with honey were TO DIE FOR and I couldn’t get enough of them (Note to self: Find a reliable source of sopapillas in Houston). Thus satiated, we continued on to Santa Fe, which at 7200 feet above sea level is the highest state capital in the United States.
Our hotel in Santa Fe was conveniently located, a ten-minute walk from the historic Plaza. It doesn’t take one long to realize that there’s a LOT to see in this gorgeous town. As the sun went down and painted the old adobe buildings in shades of orange and red, we wandered around the Plaza and explored the little shops along the side streets. We visited the San Miguel Chapel, built in 1610, the oldest church in the United States. We braved the cold evening air, sat outside and had a drink at the Plaza Café.
In and around the historic Plaza, Santa Fe
We had a full itinerary planned the following day. We had tickets to the Georgia O’Keeffe museum, which is where we started our day, viewing a collection of some of the artist’s greatest works, particularly from the 5 decades that she called New Mexico home. We explored more shops and restaurants along the Plaza, the adobe buildings with their turquoise highlights, the iconic La Fonda and Eldorado hotels, the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi and the Loretto Chapel. We walked all the way up Canyon Road and back to see the art galleries, replenished ourselves with a rich, dark New Mexican hot chocolate at Kakawa, and walked all the way down to the Railyard District.
Clockwise from top left: The La Fonda hotel, part of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, the New Mexico Museum of Art
Someone in Taos had told us to dine at The Shed while we were in Santa Fe. They didn’t take reservations, so we added our names to the list and waited in the cold for an hour. It was worth it.
Over dinner, we decided to move to this town someday.
Clockwise from top left: The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, the San Miguel Chapel, a rooftop along San Francisco Street, the Inn and Spa at Loretto
Someone in Taos had told us to dine at The Shed while we were in Santa Fe. Over dinner, we decided to move to this town someday.
A shop window on Canyon Road, and the Railyard District
The agenda the following day was to visit Bandelier National Monument. But first, brunch at Tia Sophia’s. Calabacita enchiladas. Breakfast burritos. More honey-drizzled, warm, pillowy sopapillas. Delectable! The drive to Bandelier National Monument was pretty, it was a spectacular place, but the light was harsh. While we enjoyed our hike, I wasn’t very happy with the pictures I took of the rock dwellings. Sunset or sunrise would have been better, but unless we camped here for the night, that was not an option. The little town of White Rock was charming. We enjoyed a cup of coffee at the Pig and Fig Café. In the evening we drove all the way up Hyde Park Road to catch the sunset. It was cold but frozen fingers were a small price to pay to photograph the last light of another spectacular New Mexico evening on the fall leaves of the cottonwoods and aspens.
Bandelier National Monument
Back in Santa Fe, we went to the Chile Line Brewery to spend our last evening here and sample their signature chile brew. I was skeptical at first and tried another beer before I tried the chile. My skepticism was unwarranted; the beer was actually really good. As we walked back to our hotel for the last time, we talked again about someday being able to move to a place because we WANT to, not because we HAVE to. And we knew that Santa Fe would probably be at the top of that list. There is something about this town, something in the air, the water, the food, something about the history and the people, that gets inside you and makes you want to belong. It’s beautiful, no doubt, but there’s something more than beauty about this place that makes one want to call it home.
The sight of cottonwoods catching the last rays of the setting sun on a fall evening in New Mexico is one I will remember all my life
We started our long drive back to Houston the following morning, this time taking a different route from the one we took on our way here. We went along historic Route 66 for a significant portion of the way (stay tuned for another blog post on this part of the trip). After two days and 900 miles of driving, and about 15 minutes from home, we briefly considered repacking our bags with fresh clothes and driving all the way back to New Mexico.
No matter. We’ll move or retire there someday.
Round trip: 2315 miles (and I want to do it again)!
