New Mexico: Feasts, Friends, Family, Forests. Part Two

Sunday: A Feast and Family

The whole fam damily got together for a noontime meal at Rancho de Chimayo. Meal of the day: a departure for me! Chicken tacos with green chile instead of salsa to accompany. Natillas for dessert. The tacos were good, but I should've stuck with my go-to: cheese enchiladas, Christmas!

Why no pictures? That's what I'd like to know. We got nary a single selfie. And no out-the-window shots of the beautiful Northern New Mexico landscape either. 

Being in the moment comes at a cost, and that cost is: no photos. Lame!

I carry wonderful memories, though, of good food and good fellowship.

Monday: All of It

What a wonderful surprise to be waiting inside Sugar and Cream, the cafe that is nestled in the NE corner of the building that housed TG&Y, and see gorgeous, wonderful, compassionate, smart Anne walk in! 

Yes, we had coordinated our respective family-visit trips, but it was a fun small-town moment when she walked in unexpectedly. 

Another small-town moment came when my Mom's lifelong best friend's granddaughter stopped by to say hello. 💖

When my brother-in-law Allan arrived, he and Anne and I all sat and chatted with a nosh 'n a cuppa until Anne went off to her hike and Allan and I set out for ours. 

Allan is one of my favorite people on the planet. He took me to a new place to walk, at the west end of Pueblo Canyon, at the bottom of The Hill. We parked outside the gate on the road to the water treatment plant ("The Potty Place!" as li'l Little Sister Adventurer would call out whenever she spotted it on the drive home up The Hill). We had a wonderful chat and walk! Thanks, Pee!

Now, I have photos.

And a few mule deer in town:

After our walk, we stopped at El Parasol for lunch. Today's fare was veggie tacos. Just the right combo of potatoes and other veggies, plus guacamole and salsa. Really good!

After lunch I drove Poppy to her spot for the night behind Bathtub Row Brewing Co-op and after a short rest, I laced up my hiking boots and set off a few blocks to the Graduation Canyon trailhead. I walked through the shady canyon to the Pueblo Canyon Rim trail. I headed along the rim back east toward town, coming up along Canyon Road and back to Poppy. 'Twas nearly 3 miles all told, a nice cap to the afternoon.

I loved seeing Spring's new growth on everything!

...even on a downed tree. Still trying to eke out an existence.

Coming out of Graduation Canyon to the rim always takes my breath away.

I love seeing life in unexpected places.

Mandatory Ponderosa-sniffing

Fungus doing its job to lay to rest this hundreds-of-years-old Ponderosa

I had time after my hike for another rest. This time I fell asleep, but woke in time to take the few steps inside to meet my fam for beer and pizza! 

Super good time eating green chile pizza and good craft beer in the company of the best people: my two sisters Pagrs and Poss, my sister-in-law Michele, my brother-in-law Allan, my niece Xin, her boyfriend Jake, and good friend Anne again! Poss had made a delicious applesauce spice cake to celebrate sister BobBIE's birthday, but she wasn't feeling well, and didn't make it. We raised a glass and a forkful of birthday cake in her honor.

Again, no pictures. Gah! Where was my millennial daughter to take pics, or at least remind me?! 

When the festivities were over, it was dusk and I walked past the Lodge and around Ashley Pond before turning in for the night. 

This dad of a young family carried two ducks, ostensibly to release to the pond. Later I walked by, and mom and dad were consoling the little boy who didn't want to say goodbye to his friends. 

.

Next: my last day and the jaunt home. Stay tuned for Part Three.

New Mexico: Feasts, Friends, Family, Forests. Part One

 I may sound like a broken record, but the truth is that my heart resides in New Mexico.

And so, another jaunt east for an abundance of feasts, friends, family, and forests. I drove two days-plus each way, and spent six days in the Land of Enchantment.

Albuquerque and Santa Fe

I slipped into Albuquerque on a Wednesday night. It has become Poppy's and my tradition to stop there on my second evening to enjoy a visit with my good high school friend and hero, Lola. 

We had a wonderful meal on el patio at El Patio near the Rio. My first enchiladas had! This time chicken with green. Yumm.mmmers. It was great to catch up with an incredible woman. I'm honored to call her my friend. 

She was preparing for a trip to D.C. to lobby for cancer research funding. Go, Lola!

After a night at good ol' Cracker Barrel, I started off again. My sister had texted me that she would not be there when I arrived to her house, so I decided to stop in Santa Fe for feast #2. 

I walked 15-20 minutes from a nearby mall with easy parking – it felt great to stretch my legs and get my body moving – to the Plaza, where I visited the Georgia O'Keeffe museum. I enjoyed her paintings and her story, but learned she has a controversial reputation in New Mexico, her adopted home from the 1930s until her death in 1986.

There was a special exhibition of artists from Tewa country, which encompasses the northern New Mexico Pueblos that surround the area O'Keeffe lived and painted. 

Their responses to O'Keeffe were varied, but most were skeptical, to say the least, of O'Keeffe's claim about the sacred peak known as Tsee Pʼin, Hest'e'yanyik'othe, or Pedernal, that, "It’s my private mountain. It belongs to me. God told me if I painted it enough, I could have it."

Umm.... no you can't. 

For some reason, I didn't take any photos of O'Keeffe's paintings. The only work I got a snap of was this striking piece in that same Tewa Country Exhibit. 

It reminded me of this shot I got of that same devastating fire in May, 2022.

To see images of the collection at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, follow this link.

Second feast of the trip after the museum, walking the plaza, and seeing the native artists' wares at the Palace of the Governors: cheese enchilada (Christmas) and chicken taco with so-so-so yummy beans and vegetarian posole, at The Shed just off the Plaza. Oh my.

Los Alamos/White Rock

Friday morning my sister BobBIE! and I went up the Hill to have one of my favey breakfast burritos from Chili (weirdly, with an "i") Works. It was wonderful to have sister Poss join us too! 💓

Poss brought this for me. It's baby Little Sister Adventurer! I was in my early-to-mid-20s here.

It was a bit breezy at Ashley Pond, but the burritos warmed us up. Yummy red!

That afternoon, Bobbie and I walked her neighborhood and stopped to look at White Rock Canyon and the Rio Grande 1000 feet below.

We found some friends.

What a thrill! 

This herd of Bighorn Sheep has been hanging around the area for the past few years. They are new residents; there were no bighorn when I was growing up there!  It was special to see them. I do kinda wish we'd seen the daddy one, though.

Da view:

Saturday morning, while BobBIE! and her husband Jack went to pick up a Brand! New! Big! Honkin'! Truck! I went along the White Rock Canyon Rim trail for a 5-mile round trip walk. So pretty! 

Here ya go.

Then I came upon a couple of these imprints. I wish I had reached back to my forensics technique of using oblique lighting, but here you go. What do you see?

This is what I see. 

Big kitty!

Maybe it's time to head back....

When the truck got back near lunchtime, we (literally) crawled way up to get inside the beautiful beast, and we took off to Española, picking up sister Poss on the way, for a luncheon feast at La Cocina. 

Today's fare: cheese enchiladas, green, with an over-medium egg on top! and the best sopaipillas in the state. Oh Lordy. Yum yum yum. 

We had a great chat, three sisters catching up.

I'm handily meeting my goals.

Stay tuned for Part Two of Feasts, Friends, Family, Forests.