Category Archives: 98-Santa Fe, NM

98-Santa Fe, NM

The Rio Grande Gorge

During our stay in Santa Fe we drove up to Taos. It’s a quaint town but the real attraction in this area is the Rio Grande Gorge! At this point in the river’s travel to the Gulf, it goes through a wide flat plain with volcanos dotted around the edges. The plain is very flat, and unless you look closely you won’t see the gorge! As you drive up to the gorge and the very high bridge that crosses it you see how deep and steep it is! On the bridge there are call boxes to suicide hotlines – sadly I guess that some people decide to end it all by jumping off the bridge onto the rocks 250 feet below.

But the gorge is very awesome. Deep and steep all through the plain near Taos, then as the land develops into rolling hills the gorge isn’t as steep. We drove across the bridge, stopping at the rest area right on one side to take pictures and see the vendors selling jewelry and pottery. Fairly close to all the traffic and noise were two mountain sheep grazing on the hillside! A vendor told us they are always nearby, often crossing the hiway and jumping the fences to get to the land on either side of the hiway.

Then we took a side road, parts of it dirt and VERY STEEP with switchbacks going right down into the gorge. At the bottom it crossed the river and there was a parking area and boat ramp where lots of people start rafting trips down the Rio Grande. We saw many people launching their kayaks and inflatable boats We saw one guy run up to the bridge and jump into the water about 25 feet below!

Here are pictures we took:

98-Santa Fe, NM

Los Alamos – where the first atomic bombs were designed, created and tested

Just outside of Santa Fe is a little town nestled in steep canyons – Los Alamos.  Before WWII it wasn’t a town at all, just some ranches and a boys school.  During WWII our country decided we needed to develop an atomic bomb, in large part because we were pretty sure Germany was developing this technology.  We had several scientists that had escaped from Germany and knew what was being developed there.

So, the little town was built in secret and scientists from all over the country and from our allies were whisked away in secret to live at Los Alamos and develop nuclear fission before Germany could do it.  Many families came with the scientists and all lived in secret – their address was a P.O. Box in Santa Fe, their mail was heavily censored, and they could not travel under their own name but instead used aliases if they had to travel for any reason.  There was a woman who ran the office in Santa Fe that managed mail, supplies, anything the folks in Los Alamos needed.

The bomb was designed and a test version was created and set off in the desert near White Sands.  It was successful, and a few weeks later Fat Man and Little Boy (the two bombs detonated over Japan) were sent out to end the war!

On a personal note, Jeff’s mother had a cousin who worked on the Manhattan Project and disappeared during the war, coming to Los Alamos.  His name was Paul Olum and he was a math genius.  Some of his papers are still used today as the basis for certain types of calculations.  Here’s his ID picture from the Manhattan Project, which we found in a museum in Los Alamos about the Manhattan Project:

98-Santa Fe, NM

Valles Caldera – a supervolcano that exploded 1 million years ago!

Over 1 million years ago a volcano near Santa Fe erupted, and the core collapsed creating a huge caldera. This was a super volcano and the caldera is huge! Up to about 50,000 years ago there were magma ‘leaks’ that caused several dome-shaped hills within the caldera, separating the caldera into several areas.

The caldera is at 8,500 feet and the surrounding peaks are up to 11,000 feet. There are grassy meadows in between the dome-shaped hills, and is home to the largest herd of elk in the state. There are also bears, cougars and coyotes in the caldera along with thousands of prairie dogs.

Ranchers used to live in the caldera and there used to be a lot of snow in the caldera…up to 5-6 feet that would last all winter. Now there’s little snow and it doesn’t last more than a week.

Here are some pictures we took:

98-Santa Fe, NM

Ancient Puebloan site containing both walled structures and cliff dwellings

While in the Santa Fe area visited another ancient Pueblo dwelling area, this one encompassing both cliff dwellings and a pueblo walled area similar to Chaco Canyon. The cliffs are composed of “tuff” which is heavily compressed volcanic ash from the Valles caldera, a supervolcano that erupted over 1 million years ago in the area.

The canyon is very pleasant with a stream that runs year-round and lots of trees. This of course means lots of wildlife and the ability to plant and harvest fields in the canyon. The pueblo dwelling containing over a hundred rooms and several large kivas is on a level area above the stream flood area and near to the cliff caves that were enlarged by the ancient Puebloans to make dwellings. The cliff dwellings had some walled rooms built in front of them creating quite a large living and storage area.

We did one of the hikes that took us through the pueblo and up to some of the cliff dwellings. There are many more areas showing where the ancient people lived…but we were at over 7,000 ft and we felt one hike was enough!

We learned an interesting fact while here – we had thought this was an Anasazi site but we were told Anasazi translates to “ancient enemy” in the Navajo language and was incorrect to describe the people who lived here and elsewhere in the Southwest as they were never enemies but instead share common ancesters  So, that term is no longer used and instead the term ancient puebloans is used to described the people and sites in this region.

Here are pictures we took: