USA - New Mexico's Top 10

3 Pages·2003·0.469 MB·English

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New Mexico’s 10
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By Norman Martin
They range from a dazzling underground world to an out-of-this-world museum
dedicated to alien life forms. They are New Mexico’s “Top 10” tourist attractions
from the New Mexico Department of Tourism.
Carlsbad Caverns M
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Amid enormous rock formations, crystal- OU
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clear pools and gigantic subterranean OF
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chambers lies southeastern New Mexico’s N
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top attraction, Carlsbad Caverns National T
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Park. Geologists believe that the caverns DEPA
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began forming about 250 million years C
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ago, when a vast shallow sea covered ME
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part of the state. Today, the park contains NE
more than 97 known caves, including HE
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Lechuguilla Cave, the nation’s deepest OF
limestone cave at 1,567 feet. Carlsbad TESY
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Caverns is highly accessible, with a vari- O
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ety of tours offered year-round. The geo- OS
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logic treasure has been a national park H
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since 1930.
Into the abyss:Carlsbad Caverns, right,
contains gigantic subterranean chambers
and formations that are home to some
300,000 Mexican free-tail bats.
Santa Fe
Santa Fe’s remarkable history, art and cul-
tural heritage make it among the nation’s of International Folk Art and Georgia Stepping up:Above, the Loretto
top tourist destinations. Starting with the O’Keeffe Museum. Santa Fe’s tourists add Chapel’s “Miraculous Staircase,” was built
Santa Fe plaza, the city’s 1.7 million annu- about $26.2 million to the local economy. sometime between 1877 and 1881. Both
al visitors can fan out to see more than Other attractions are St. Francis Cathedral, its builder and its engineering remain
300 galleries or visit several top-flight and the Loretto Chapel and its legendary subjects of Santa Fe mystery.
museums, including the Palace of the Miraculous Staircase, which spirals upward
Governors, Museum of Fine Arts, Museum without a center pole for support.
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Taos Ski Valley Billy the Kid Museum T
UIS
One of New Mexico’s most Fort Sumner, a small eastern MQ
celebrated ski resorts, Taos Ski New Mexico town where Henry HOL
Valley is a year-round alpine McCarty, aka “Billy the Kid,” AEL
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playground, famed for its slopes spent his final days, offers several MI
in winter and hiking, biking and interesting sites, not the least of
horseback riding in summer. It which is the legendary bad boy’s
remains one of the few family- final resting place at the Old Fort
owned and operated ski resorts Sumner Museum. It’s said that
in North America. In addition Billy, who was about 5 feet, 8
to snow adventures, there’s inches tall, loved music and danc-
the nearby Kit Carson Home & ing, along with robbing and
Museum,as well as the five-story killing. At the nearby Fort Sumner
adobe Taos Pueblo, which is the State Monument is the old Max-
largest multistory pueblo well house, where 21-year-old
in existence. Billy was shot and killed by
Sheriff Pat Garrett in 1881.
Downhill run:Taos Ski Valley’s first
lift, a Bridger-Boseman J-Bar, was Grave news:The Kid’s tomb-
installed by Ernie Blake, 16 men stone reads, “The Boy Bandit
from Taos Pueblo and a mule King. He Died As He Had Lived.”
named Lightning in fall 1956.
International UFO
Cumbres & Toltec Museum at Roswell
Scenic Railroad Eastern New Mexico’s Roswell hit
One of northern New Mexico’s the tourist lotto in November
most nostalgic attractions is the 1992, with the opening of the
Cumbres & Toltec Scenic International UFO Museum and
Railroad, a historic train that runs Research Center. This largely agri-
on a limited schedule between cultural community has become a
Chama and Antonito, Colo. magnet for the UFO curious, who
Riders taking the 64-mile, nar- search for the truth about a pur-
row-gauge line can sit back and ported UFO crash northwest of
hear the howl of the old train’s town in 1947. This monument to
whistle and see the old steam the event has drawn hundreds of
locomotive’s trail of black smoke thousands of visitors from around
as it plods along a high-country the world. The museum occupies
route. Many consider Chama to a former movie theater down-
be the trip’s highlight. This tiny town and claims to be a world-
town located about 10 miles wide center for UFO information, M N
snoeuxtth t oo fa t hpeic tCuorelosrqaudeo v baollerdyer sits aasli ewne bll oabsb ale g hoeoadd p alancde stilok -buy an OF TOURIS MONAGHA
below the peaks of the San Juan screened survivor cap. T N
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Mountains. ME D
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Truth seekers:Roswell’s DEPA
All aboard:The Cumbres & Toltec International UFO Museum and O
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Scenic Railroad takes visitors into Research Center has become the MEXI
the past to relive an era when clearinghouse for UFO-related W
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steam-powered locomotives and phenomena. HE
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the trains they hauled were an OF
essential part of the real Old West. TESY
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8 FALL 2003
R Gila Cliff Dwellings Chaco Culture
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M National Monument National Historical Park
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More than 700 years ago, a mys- Since the 1890s, when the first
terious band of migrating major excavations of Chaco
Indians, probably numbering Canyon in northwestern New
fewer than 60, established a ten- Mexico were undertaken, archaeol-
uous foothold on the West Fork ogists have found scientific treasure
of the Gila River in southwestern in the ruins of the Anasazi culture in
New Mexico. Their new home southeastern San Juan County. In
wasn’t on the water; it was 180 about A.D. 850, the Anasazi—or
feet above in a series of large the Ancient Ones, as the Navajos
caves. In the caves, the cliff call them—produced a flowering of
dwellers constructed 40 rooms, a civilization that vanished as quick-
crafting their quarters from near- ly as it had bloomed. Over the next
by stone, mud mortar and tim- three centuries, Chaco Canyon
ber. But less than 50 years later, near Nageezi was transformed
the cliff dwellers were gone, from a community of crude surface
abruptly abandoning their homes dwellings into a complex of elabo-
and fields. Some archaeologists rate stone pueblos. By the early
believe the retreat was triggered 1200s, however, the great stone
by drought, but no one knows cities were deserted, the likely vic-
for sure. tim of an extended drought.
Living on the edge: Gila Cliff The ancient ones: Chaco Canyon,
Dwellings National Monument a major center of ancestral Pueblo
appears much as it did when culture, was a hub of ceremony,
the Mogollon people inhabited trade and administration for the
the rock houses in the late 13th prehistoric Four Corners area.
century.
White Sands
Sandia Peak Tramway National Monument
Sandia Peak Tram, the world’s Deep in southern New Mexico lies
longest aerial tramway, is a slow, a vast sea of glistening snow-
gentle lift that climbs 2.7 miles white dunes that continually
to the peak of the Sandia draws visitors from across the
Mountains. Reaching the top at world. One of the nation’s top
10,378 feet, visitors can see geologic treasures, White Sands
more than 11,000 square miles National Monument was formed
on a clear day. From the tramcar, by gypsum, hydrated calcium,
riders see striking views of inter- deposited at the bottom of a shal-
esting rock formations and low sea that covered the region
sometimes even mule deer, black some 250 million years ago. Only
bear, raccoons, bobcats and a few plants grow rapidly enough
golden eagles that live on the to survive burial by the silky, fine-
mountain. At the crest, visitors grained sand. Surrounding the
can enjoy 24 miles of hiking park is the 4,000 square-mile
trails that offer fabulous views White Sands Missile Range.
down the mountain.
Shifting sands:White Sands
Engineering marvel: The Sandia National Monument is part of
Peak Tramway climbs 4,000 feet the world’s largest gypsum dune
in about 18 minutes, depositing field, where glistening dunes
riders at the top of Sandia Peak. rise 60 feet high and cover
275 square miles.
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