Dreamy Day Trips
Taos is pretty northern New Mexico, but if you keep heading North towards Colorado you pass some diverse and breathtaking views.
The Georgia O’Keefe house and visitors center in Abiquiu are still closed for Covid, but the drive is beautiful and the gallery and grounds at the Abiquiu Inn are worth the stop. I made a brief field trip to the Abiquiu Lake & Reservoir before heading up to the Heron Lake State Park. I happened upon the Echo Amphitheater and I’ve been daydreaming for weeks about movies and performances there ever since. The landscape out here is truly spectacular and I couldn’t stop thinking about how quickly and drastically the scenery changes.
I went so far north, I figured I might as well wander over into Colorado while I was there. Chama is a cute little town with a scenic train ride. I was too early in the season for me to catch a ride, but I would definitely look into it if you have any sort of affection for trains. Alamosa, Colorado is ADORABLE. Skip the Square Pegs brewery and sit on the patio at San Luis Brewing Company . You can build your own flight, and I loved every single beer I tried. Trust me, you don’t want to leave without trying the green chili cheese fries. Holy Moly.
It was too windy for me to try the Great Sand Dunes park, but I did make it back up to Colorado another day to try the Pagosa Hot Springs. I don’t know where this new found hot spring fascination came from, but these were pretty unique. There were almost a dozen hot tubs of varying degrees fed by the hot spring, and the river served as a plunge pool to reset. It felt like an old gold rush town and there were plenty of great coffee shops, bars, restaurants, and stores to wander into. Riff Raff Brewing Company was my favorite brewery of the entire trip. There are a lot of Big Lebowski references on the menu, the food was tremendous (the beer brined eggs were epic) and I had to leave with a growler of green chili lime seltzer. The drive was gorgeous and it was a panoramic sunset I will never, ever forget.
Under no circumstances should you come to New Mexico with any sort of inclination for Georgia O’Keefe and skip the Ghost Ranch Georgia O’Keefe scenic trail ride. It was absolutely a moment that will linger when my life flashes before my eyes when my time comes. I told you I was obsessed with the landscape out near Abiquiu, but I couldn’t possibly have prepared myself for what it felt like to ride through it on horseback, hearing stories about this famous ranch and its crazy history. We had perfectly weird weather which made for gorgeous clouds and color, our tour guide was wonderfully engaging, my horse Nacho was a dream to ride, and it was by far my favorite part of the adventure. They filmed some classic movies on this ranch including City Slickers, 3:10 to Yuma, No Country For Old Men, Wild Wild West, and it is an important archaeological site with an incredible amount of dinosaur fossils. Right now the ranch is closed for anything but trail rides, but there are some hiking trails and museums and other things I’d love to do on property. DO NOT SKIP IT. I’m serious.
A lot of people come to New Mexico for the native artifacts, cliff dwellings, and to visit the Pueblos. Unfortunately the Pueblos and most of the cliff dwellings (particularly the Puye, which I really wanted to see,) are currently closed to the public. I did make it to Bandelier Monument just before it closed and got to peek at some ancient cliff dwellings. I’m barely willing to camp without bathrooms, wifi, or air conditioning, so asking me to live in a hole in a rock is a bit beyond my comprehension. It is definitely worth checking out, the drive is beautiful, and the caldera is amazing. Puye/Bandelier/Los Alamos New Mexico would make an awesome day trip. Los Alamos is home to the lab that developed the atomic bomb, and the area is known for creating technology that changes the world. It’s also the gateway to some really beautiful and historical scenery (and home to the excellent Boese Brewpub.)
