The Santa Fe Day

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Oy, what a day! We started out pretty early, leaving the hotel around 7:30 to get to the Santa Fe plaza pretty eartly. The Santa Fe Plaza is a historical district, with one of the oldest continuously occupied buildings in the U.S., a grand basilica dedicated to St. Francis of Assisi, the area of which is basically a big shopping mall. It's a little dis-heartening that such a grand building, dedicated to such a grand man, is basically a tourist attraction.

However, beyond that observation the plaza was somewhat interesting. This is coming from someone who HATES shopping so it must be good. There was an arts fair going on and the entire plaza was covered with artisans selling their wares. Laurie purchased a glass cross necklace, and something else, and we bought a really cool abstract painting from an artist who infused her paint with metallic components, giving it a brilliant sheen (the opposite of the Charlie version).

Prior to going into the plaza we went to a cafe just outside the plaze (a picture of the sign should be viewable). I had a regular espresso and Laurie had a vanilla latte. If you are ever in Santa Fe (and love coffee) you NEED to go here. It was the best coffee we had ever had. Made Starbucks taste like day old Nescafe. I have had some good coffee in my life but this was the first time I had tasted perfect coffee. Yes. It was that good.

Before we left the plaza we stopped at a little french restaurant and shared some ratatouille and onion soup. Now I know what the movie was about... at least the one that wasn't about french onion soup. We had lunch there at about 10:30 or 11:00. We looked around a little longer before going BACK to the coffee shop (had to get one for the road) before heading out to the Ghost Ranch.

If you're not familiar with the Ghost Ranch (I'm not), it is the place where Georgia O'Keeffe lived. There we saw Chimney Rock, which is a large spire coming out the top of a cliff. The whole area is about an hour north of Santa Fe.

So, that was the "Oy". We spent the morning in the Santa Fe plaza and then drove an hour north (and back) to some gorgeous scenery, as you can tell from the large numbers of pictures we took. 30 to be exact.

Well, tomorrow we're getting up bright and early and heading to Cheyenne, Wy. Laurie wants to visit the Room and Board in Denver, so we'll spend some time there. Google Maps says it'll be about a 7 and a half hour drive. Then, the day after that we'll be driving to Jackson Hole, WY through the Grand Teton National Park before going into Yellowstone. Unfortunately, the road I wanted to drive into Yellowstone was closed due to an avalanche. We were planning to come in to Yellowstone from the north via 212, but that won't work now. So the Tetons are a good alternative.

Anyhoo, enough for today. Later.

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Photos

Fountain in St. Francis garden
St. Francis was known to preach to the birds (a euphamism for people?). Fitting that there's a bird in his fountain

Loretto Chapel
Front view

Coffee House
Absolutely best coffee in the world can be found here

Sales dogs
There are 4 live dogs selling hats here