20240914 EF Go Ahead National Parks Bus Tour Day 3/20 - Santa Fe, New Mexico

American West Bus Tour Day 3/20 - Santa Fe, New Mexico

Today was the first full day of the tour. After breakfast, the group gathered with Tour Director, Geoff, in the hotel lobby for our first full briefing as a group. We got a general plan for the day, met our local guide for the day, Jerry, and headed to our waiting bus and bus driver, Robin.

We headed out from the Doubletree toward downtown Santa Fe, the oldest state capital in the United States. It is also the highest state capital at 7,100 feet above sea level.

We passed the Santa Fe National Cemetery

Our first stop was at Cross of the Martyrs Park.

From the park, you can see the back of the Cross of the Martyrs, commemorating the deaths of 21 Catholic clergy during the Pueblo Revolt.

L. Bradford Prince Memorial

Pinyon or piñon pine - they produce pine nuts

Prickly pear cactus

New Mexico State Capitol

Former New Mexico State Capitol building

We boarded the bus and headed to the plaza area downtown. Our first stop was Loretto Chapel, the source of one of the Roman Catholic Church's greatest mysteries.

A model of the staircase

The actual staircase - the railings were added later

The following is from Loretto Chapel.

Legend says that to find a solution to the seating problem, the Sisters of the Chapel made a novena to St. Joseph, the patron saint of carpenters. On the ninth and final day of prayer, a man appeared at the Chapel with a donkey and a toolbox looking for work. Months later, the elegant circular staircase was completed, and the carpenter disappeared without pay or thanks. After searching for the man (an ad even ran in the local newspaper) and finding no trace of him, some concluded that he was St. Joseph himself, having come in answer to the sisters' prayers.

The stairway's carpenter, whoever he was, built a magnificent structure. The design was innovative for the time and some of the design considerations still perplex experts today.

The staircase has two 360-degree turns and no visible means of support. It is said that the staircase was built without nails—only wooden pegs. Questions also surround the number of stair risers relative to the height of the choir loft and about the types of wood and other materials used in the stairway's construction.

On the way to our next stop, we passed the San Miguel Chapel, originally built in 1610 and often referred to as the oldest church building in the continental United States

Our next stop was outside the New Mexico State Capitol. At the entrance, we viewed a sculpture called Gate/Negate by artist Bob Haozous. 

The names on all four sides of the base are names of extinct native tribes- the razorwire at the top represents isolationism

The racially stereotyped profiles in the negative space represent America's melting pot

Morning Prayer sculpture outside the entrance

The State Seal

Dan Namingha's 1999 sculpture, Passage

Art can be found all over Santa Fe.

A classic Southwest icon

Well, art and chilis

Our local guide, Jerry (in the print shirt), described some of the interesting places in town (photo courtesy of tour director Geoff in the EF Go Ahead mobile app)

Art is certainly subjective

We entered one art market where we were shown this plaque.

The art market, Rainbow Man, stands on the site of the intake office for the Los Alamos Labs - every single person affiliated with the Manhattan Project walked through here

It was time for lunch so we headed to Tomasita's.

There was a small scheduling snafu on the restaurant's part but we were eventually all seated and enjoyed a good southwest meal. There is some potential that we also tried their famous reposado frozen house margarita.

Fully stuffed and slightly liquored up, our options were to either head back to the hotel at 2:15 or spend time on our own in town and catch the bus at 4:15 or 5:45 back to the hotel. We opted to stay in town.

We made a stop at The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi.

Notice anything odd? Anything missing?

Funds ran out during construction so the planned twin spires were never built

Saint Kateri Tekakwitha (1656-1680), a Mohawk and Algonquin and the first North American Indian to be canonized by the Catholic Church

The statue of Mary in this side altar is said to be the oldest continuously venerated Virgin Mary likeness in the United States

Yesterday, we spotted a hummingbird. Today - a hummingbird moth outside the church.

Look at the schnoz on that thing!

We continued our tour of the town, browsing jewelry stores and art shops. After a couple of hours of meandering, we met the 4:15 bus and headed back to the Doubletree.

Our tour director, Geoff, posing outside the historic La Fonda Hotel

As Geoff predicted, after the big lunch, we weren't in any mode for dinner so we just chilled in the room for the evening, watching TV and working on this missive.

Tomorrow's plan is to depart at 8:00 for Durango, Colorado, about a four-hour drive. We will spend a few hours in Durango before heading to Mesa Verde National Park where we will spend the night and the following morning. We will spend the night at the Far View Lodge atop Mesa Verde at 8,200 feet. Yay for more heavy breathing!

IMPORTANT PROGRAMMING NOTE

Tomorrow night, there is a strong possibility that we will have limited or no internet or cell service. If that is true, there will be no blog post tomorrow (Sunday). As soon as practical on Monday, I will get the post uploaded. There's nothing I can do about it so we'll see what happens tomorrow evening. Worst case, you'll have more to read on Monday. :-)

20240913 EF Go Ahead National Parks Bus Tour Day 2/20 - Albuquerque to Santa Fe

American West Bus Tour Day 2/20 - Santa Fe, New Mexico

First off, let's make some corrections to yesterday's blog. I had forgotten to update state totals after our visit to West Virginia in July, so New Mexico was Arlona's 41st state, not 40th, and I am currently at 45 states visited. Dang - I have to keep up!

We slept in until 7:00 this morning. That's impressive given that 7:00 here equates to 9:00 at home and the fact that we went to bed at 9:15 last night. We must have been tired. This should get us shifted the two hours to Mountain time so we'll be good to go.

The hotel's breakfast was decent with waffles, sausage, and pre-made cheese omelets that look pre-made. Still, it was fine and saved us from having to search for chow. The plan was to hang out in the room until 10:30 and take the shuttle back to the airport to meet our tour director, Geoff. We would then take the first of two buses to Santa Fe.

Around 9:30, Geoff texted us that plans had changed due to delayed inbound aircraft. So, we took advantage of the hotel's 11:30 checkout and then hopped the shuttle to the airport to meet Geoff a little before noon.

We found Geoff and the group. We had to wait about 45 minutes for a 12:06 flight with 12 more tour members before departing for Santa Fe.

Our route today - just about an hour 

We had a total of 19 tour participants gathering today. A few arrived early directly to Santa Fe and a few more were arriving later today. We will have a total of 30 participants on this tour and we'll meet everyone tomorrow morning at breakfast or on the bus. After the 12 new arrivals gathered their luggage, Geoff gave us an initial briefing for today and tomorrow morning and escorted us outside.

Our bus arrives - we will be on this bus all the way to Missoula

As we departed Albuquerque and headed northeast, we caught some nice views of the Sandia Mountains.

We arrived at the Doubletree Santa Fe and checked in for our two-day stay. Unlike our hotel in Albuquerque, this hotel was located within walking distance of a bunch of restaurants and stores including Albertsons and Target.

After getting settled into our room, we scanned Google and Yelp and decided on Plaza Cafe Southside for a late lunch / early dinner. Plaza Cafe is the oldest restaurant in Santa Fe. It opened in 1905 and has been in the hands of the current owner since 1947. They have two locations - the original downtown location and this Southside location that opened sometime later.

Hmm...we're in the American Southwest. What should we drink?

$5 house margaritas it is

We opted to sit outside and enjoy the 90-degree heat with nearly no humidity - a nice change from Florida's wet blanket weather. Arlona enjoyed her blue corn enchilada and I also enjoyed my crispy fish tacos. While we were eating al fresco, we were treated to a hummingbird's antics less than three feet away.

As we started walking back, another local flitted by.

We made the short walk to Albertsons for some supplies.

Coffee and tea drinkers have it easy as every place that serves breakfast offers coffee and most offer tea. For those of us who prefer our caffeine cold and carbonated, it's tough to get that morning jolt when traveling. Therefore, we took the opportunity to pick up some Coke Zero and Diet Mt. Dew to fuel our morning routine. We also grabbed some Diet Sunkist Orange for caffeine-free evening sipping. There is a rumor that a bottle of ready-to-drink Margaritas might have slipped its way into the bag along with some Orville Redenbacher microwave popcorn, just for emergencies, of course.

Let me flip back to yesterday for a minute. On the way back from the store after dinner last night, the last block or so was uphill back to the hotel. By the time we got there, I was huffing and puffing more than I thought I should have been. Weird, right? Fast-forward to today where I was feeling a little out of breath on the relatively flat walk to lunch. What was happening? Then, I got the bright idea to Google Albuquerque elevation. Guess what it said? 5,312′. Albuquerque is slightly higher than Denver! Who knew! That explained what happened yesterday, but what about today? It turns out that Santa Fe sits at 7,199′ - almost 2,000' higher than Albuquerque. Wow! So, that explains my huffing and puffing. The next hotel we will visit on Monday ups the ante another 1,000' to 8,200' in Mesa Verde National Park. Looks like a few days of labored breathing. At least that's something we experienced after our time in Ecuador and Peru earlier this year.

We toted our haul back to the hotel and deployed strategic items into the fridge. After hanging out for a bit, we donned swimsuits and went to enjoy the hotel's hot tub. Unfortunately, poor maintenance meant all the jet nozzles had fallen off leaving only open pipes. Turning the jets on resulted in wild bubbling along the edges of the tub, splashing everywhere. It was quite annoying. We turned off the jets and just relaxed in the hot water.

We returned to the room, rinsed off, rinsed off our suits, and settled in for the night at about 7:30. We will watch a little TV and turn in early again tonight. We expect that most of the other travelers will do the same as they all had a long day of travel and we all have an early morning tomorrow. 

Tomorrow, we will get a guided tour of Santa Fe and a group welcome lunch at Tomasita's, a restaurant that has been operating for 50 years in Albuquerque and Santa Fe. We'll spend some free time in Old Santa Fe to wrap up the day.

30 of us will be on a 58-passenger bus with only 19 continuing on the extension to Missoula so we should be comfortable as we travel. The tour starts in earnest tomorrow. We've briefly met a few of our fellow travelers and look forward to fully meeting everyone tomorrow.