Santa Fe -- Wrappin' It Up!

Alrighty, I'm going to try and wrap up my Santa Fe trip in this post because truthfully, I'm ready to move on. Plus, with the weather being kinda shitty while I was there, I didn't get that great of photos. And blog posts are so much better with photos, no?

So on my third day in New Mexico, we stayed in Santa Fe and went to a place called Canyon Road -- a shopping and art gallery section of town. It was really cute and it wasn't raining -- probably one of my favorite days in Santa Fe!  There are so many art galleries in Santa Fe - it is incredible. Lots of sculptures everywhere. We stopped to look in a few shops along Canyon Road and found a cute little area with a ton of brass sculptures.

I think my dad was pretty pumped to get to sit next to Mark Twain.

I liked this not-so-little-piggy. If I had an extra $15,000 dollars hanging around, I would have brought him home to live out his days in my back yard.

I thought this archways was super cool - for those nerds out there, those brick like pieces are actually books, complete with little kid reading on top.

This lady was incredible in person.  In this same area there was a home decor and furniture store called Leslie Flynt. I found and fell in love with a cabinet by David Marsh. I didn't think I'd end up buying a piece of furniture in Santa Fe, but I thought why not?  I loved it and I had a way to have it transported back to Washington, so it was a done deal.  Here's a photo of it in my house, still love it:

It's bright, quirky, and one of a kind. Not something I'd probably ever find in Seattle, and it will remind me of my trip to Santa Fe forever.  Definitely my favorite acquisition from my trip.

Santa Fe is super colorful -- lots of bright colors and bright signage.  And art, lots and lots of art.

On my fourth day in New Mexico, we drove to Albuquerque -- to the plaza of course :)  I didn't take but a few photos because the weather sucked, again. Did get some red hot chili pepper shots though!

My last day in Santa Fe, we went back to the plaza in town. My mom and I had both seen some souvenir items that we wanted to pick up.  And of course, we had to check out The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi.

This church was, by far, the nicest one we had visited the whole trip. Lots of super cool stained glass.

We decided to take a few photos outside as well.  I think I ended up getting in to like 2 photos on this trip, this is one of them.

Despite the cruddy weather during my trip, I'm glad I was able to check out Santa Fe! If you're ever in the area, definitely worth stopping by for a few days. Not sure when, or if, I'll ever visit again, but I'm happy to check it off my list of places I want see :)

Santa Fe -- Part Two

On my second full day in New Mexico, we went for a long drive to Taos.  We took "the high road" there, which was this really narrow, windy road through the mountains. At one point the two lane road turned into a one lane road and I thought for sure we were going to meet our maker. Luckily we made it to Taos in one piece. More on that later. 

On our way to Taos, we stopped at another church in a town called Chimayo.  My mom and I had fun singing "Schlameezle Chimayo Hassenpepper Incorporated!" (our version of the Laverne & Shirley theme song) all the way there. The church is well known for being a place of miraculous healings. There is a small room off the sanctuary of the church that holds photos of people that are praying for miracles for either themselves or people they know -- there are also a bunch of abandoned crutches, wheelchairs, walkers, and casts of people that have come to the church and have been healed. In that room there is also a little hole in the ground filled with dirt.  Supposedly the dirt has healing powers.  People come and rub their hands in the dirt, or take some of the dirt with them when they leave to heal a family member back home. Here are a few pictures from our trip to Chimayo:

My parents at the entrance up to the church. Pretty cool doorway!

Entrance to the church -- pretty rustic, but beautiful.

There was an area where you could light a candle and say a prayer.  My mom bought a candle in the gift shop and said a prayer for our family.  Coincidentally, while we were there, they held mass. My dad decided to stay and check it out while my mom checked out the grounds, gift shop, and small street in town. We managed to get talked in to buying some spices by a smooth talking Chimayo resident. I managed to find the oldest, mangiest dog resident in Chimayo. I love a crusty old dog - wanted to take this guy home.

After leaving Chimayo, we made our way to Taos. It was there we decided to fill our starving bellies with only the most authentic New Mexican quisine -- Applebee's. I think by this point in our journey all three of us were so ready to not be in the car, we didn't care what sort of food we were eating. It was at this point that my mom wrapped one of her fried mozzarella cheese sticks up in a napkin and put it in her purse for future snacking purposes. I think she also put about 5 jam packets in her purse as well. You never know when you're going to happen upon a rogue piece of toast and need some jam. She'll be covered. Can I offer you some orange marmalade? Why yes, thank you!

Mom enjoying her cold cheese stick on drive back to Santa Fe

While in Taos, we visited the "plaza" -- it seems like every New Mexican town has a plaza with a church and lots of shops. While in Taos the sky opened up and dumped an ass ton of rain. It was like torrential down pour type of rain -- rain you only see in the desert.  The Pacific Northwest may be known for its rainy climate, but we had nothing on the rain in Taos that day. It was like build your arc and put on your water wings because we'll be lucky if we don't wash away type rain. So we headed back to Santa Fe.

More Santa Fe to come......