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Published: March 18th 2008
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Obfuscator writes: It was pretty cold in the mountains north of Santa Fe. Luckily, the predicted 50 mph winds never got us, so it was not an entirely uncomfortable night, just a bit on the cold side. We were up and about pretty early, and by 7:30, we were heading in to Santa Fe itself. We were a bit torn on what to see or do in the town, but we had to at least see the State Capitol. This took a bit of doing, since unbeknownst to us, Santa Fe has a disconcerting habit of marking all of its landmarks well when you are further from them, and increasingly poorly as you approach them. Miles out, you'll see signs. Several blocks away, you'll see signs. Within a block or two . .. you're on your own.
Ordinarily, for a structure like a State Capitol, this would not pose too big of a problem. They always have such distinct domes and looks to them. You know, the enormous marble buildings that stick out among their neighbors and have huge cultivated gardens around them, and so forth. New Mexico's capitol actually is pretty big, but it's of such an unconventional design
as to be more or less unrecognizable. It's a big round building, actually built in the shape of the Zia, the state's symbol. It's a bit like a circle with a cross in it, and the hallways of the capitol form both the circle and the crossways. In the middle of the circle is a small, but pretty rotunda. It's got such a small dome though, that you won't recognize that feature from the outside. It's a nice enough building, they claim in the style of Santa Fe Greek Revival. Not being much of an architecture person, I'm not sure I see too much resemblance to either Santa Fe or Greek Revival. The building mostly resembles the 60s in which it was built. There's no ostentation or huge statues about the things New Mexicans like, or stand for, or any of that. The House of Representatives and Senate are both large, open chambers with good looking facilities, and no real decoration other than the state seal.
What the capitol does have is artwork in spades. The entire capitol, from the top to the bottom, and into the expansion building, is full of artwork done by artists from New Mexico.
There's a separate collection in the Governor's Office as well, but also done by New Mexican artists. Sculptures, paintings, drawings, photographs, and mixed media are all there. These range in size from tiny to huge. In one place, you can find a life-sized installation that looks like a Buffalo head, except that it's made entirely of recycled materials. We were told a remarkable fact, that the capitol contains more than five million dollars in art, several times. A nice security guard there also told us about a neat church just a few blocks away, so we determined to check that out before we left.
The first church we found was actually not the one he told us about, but turned out to be likewise quite interesting. San Miguel Mission is the oldest church constructed in the present-day United States. It's a small, mostly adobe construction, originally built by Indians who accompanied some Spaniards north from Mexico. The church went through many uses and phases during its life, but is currently owned and maintained by a Catholic Monastic Order (The Christian Brothers?). It's a lovely little chapel, and well worth the $1 admission, if only for the historical overview of
Santa Fe it can give you. The chapel was built over an Indian Kiva, or spiritual site as well, so as they say, they can date the use of the site for worship purposes back to the 1200s.
Down the road a little ways, we found the church the guard had been referring us to. This church was the first built in the Gothic Style, west of the Mississippi, and is another old and lovely building. The church's claim to fame is in the “miraculous” staircase. The spiral staircase is made entirely of wood (without nails), and runs from the floor of the church up about 23 feet to the choir loft. It has no external supports, nor does it have the typical center post support of most spiral staircases. How exactly it does support people is a matter of some speculation and conjecture. Moreover, according to the church's materials, a lumber expert analyzed the wood from which the staircase was constructed, and concluded that it was a form of spruce not found anywhere in the world (based on its cell structure). All in all, a bit of mystery, but the staircase is pretty remarkable, especially when you consider
that it was originally built without a handrail, and that was added only much later for safety.
We stopped in the downtown at a place called Uppercrust Pizza for lunch. The pizza was pretty good, and the restaurant resembled a pueblo, which was kind of neat. The skylights work pretty well in Santa Fe. From there, we proceeded to the Plaza, in order to see the Palace of the Governors, which was the old seat of government from the Spanish times till Statehood. The Palace of the Governors is in many ways an unimpressive structure, except for its longevity. It's a sprawling, one story adobe construction. We were going to go inside and look around, but they wanted $8 a head, and wouldn't let us take pictures. These facts, combined with the fact that we were thinking it was about time for us to move on anyway, led us to decide that it was not an equitable trade.
We wandered around the Plaza for a bit longer, since we had fed the meter. It's a bustling place, with lots of Native American's selling crafts and jewelry on the sidewalk, and galleries and cafes all along the streets. We
wandered by chance into Gallery Züger, the only gallery in which Gib Singleton displays his work. He's the sculptor who designed the crucifix carried by the last two Popes, as well as a lot of other famous sculptures. His work is pretty incredible, and the gallery had quite the collection of other outstanding work as well, including a collection of sculpted leather, and lovely paintings.
When we were about out of time on the meter, we hit the road for Fort Sumner, which had camping along the way to Roswell, as well as the Grave of Billy the Kid, and historic Fort Sumner. The town was a bit of a disappointment, really. There's not much to see there, and historic Fort Sumner is nothing at all. We couldn't find any remnants of the fort or anything. They just have a museum. There's a couple of Billy the Kid Museums, one right next to the cemetery in which he's buried. We checked that one out, and were not impressed. It has a lot of antique junk that by this point in the trip, we've seen in dozens of other places, and very little Billy the Kid stuff, other than paintings
and drawings of him. It's not a worthwhile stop. Besides, you don't even have to pay to see the grave, you can just skip the museum and walk around into the cemetery. Still, unless you're a huge Billy the Kid buff, I'd skip the whole town. The grave just isn't that remarkable.
Fort Sumner Lake State Park is nice enough. For one thing, after driving around the arid Southwest for a while, you sort of forget what lakes look like, and Fort Sumner Lake is decently sized. They call it the Paradise on the Pecos, or something, and when you look around the incredibly dry surroundings, you can see why. Their facilities are adequate, and some of the campsites have neat little structures in them. When we pulled in, the wind was blowing quite strongly, so we selected one such site, since we figured we could sleep under the structure, and it would function as a windbreak for us. It did so quite admirably, though it turned out not to matter, since the wind again died down in the evening. It should be mentioned that there is a massive heard of very stupid deer in the state park. As
we were cooking our dinner over the fire, several of them wandered within about 10 feet of us and waited, as if wondering when they were going to be fed. It was pretty tempting to try to get one with a rock and have venison instead. We later discovered that this herd has largely been domesticated through the efforts of someone in the park who has been feeding them regularly. Needless to say, a herd of deer with no natural fear and utter dependency would seem to be a bit of problem, but we of course, were just passing through, so whatever.
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