As I mentioned previously, Kevin, Jeff, and I ate breakfast at The Pantry yesterday. We’re all four going back today before we get on the road back to Albuquerque. I’m craving doughnuts, though, so I thought I’d get a couple while I waited for everyone to get ready. Unfortunately, the Dunkin parking lot was packed, and everything around it was reserved for other businesses. I suppose don’t need the sugar and fat, anyway. (Sour 🍇.) But back to yesterday.
The New Mexico Museum of Art was beckoning yesterday, but on the way, Jeff wanted to stop at shop that sold pottery and metal sculptures—you know the kind: cactuses, frogs, dogs, etc. formed from panels of rusty metal. I think we all reached the conclusion pretty quickly that it was mostly of very low quality, so while Jeff and Kevin wandered, Mark and I retreated to the warmth of the car. (It’s very cold in Santa Fe right now.) Bur not before Mark captured this guy.
The museums’s collection is a lot of what you’d expect to see in a state museum in the southwest, but it had surprising exhibits, too, and a lot of modern/contemporary art. The exhibit that I found most interesting was “The Plain of Smokes,” which introduced me to a portfolio of art and poetry that I’d not previously known but am now very interested in reading/seeing.
The museum is not atypical—lots of rooms and a couple courtyards (one is below). It also includes what I’m going to call a church but that the museum calls the St. Francis Auditorium. It’s a very dark space barely illuminated by high, small clerestory windows and filled with a stage that’s very much like an altar and pew seating. What I thought was interesting, though, was an easily overlooked plaque noting that Stravinsky’s “The Flood,” premiered in the auditorium in 1962 with the composer in attendance. (There was a typo on the plaque, but I didn’t point it out. I’m sure that the museum is aware of it after all this time.)
We wandered over to the state house, which has its own very large, impressive collection of art. The legislature is in session, so it was quite the beehive of activity. Folks milling around. Well-dressed people doing deals in the hallways. Legislative assistants talking on their phones or drafting legislation or responses to constituent letters or researching various topics on their computers. A student band playing in the rotunda. It was a bit of sensory overload, and I was glad to get back out into the open air and just take in the architecture.
As you can see, it was a beautiful day, despite the cold.
Rather than return to Canyon Road, Jeff suggested that we visit a newer arts area, the Railyard Arts District. We ate lunch in the area at Tomasita’s. I like “Mexican” food, but a little sometimes goes a long way. New Mexico has a LOT of Mexican/New Mexican/TexMex restaurants, and I was kinda quesedilla’d out. I had a hamburger. It was fine.
By the time we finished our late lunch, Kevin was pooped, so he took an Uber back to the VRBO while Mark, Jeff, and I continued on. I think we were all also a bit tired and cold, and we really only made a perfunctory foray into the district. We stopped in a store with imported home furnishings, a store with some really beautiful African furnishings and accessories, one gallery, and an art auction house. It’s a testament to our state of mind that I can’t remember the name of any of them to provide references. One thing I did notice is that in multiple places, an employee followed me from room to room. 🙄 I had a bag on my shoulder, and since the district is in an up-and-coming area, I guess they were suspicious. 😂 I’d like to go back to the Railyard Arts District because I’m sure we missed a lot. As we were driving back to our place, I saw several galleries that I would like to have visited.
We got back around 4 or 4:30, and then mostly just puttered around (Jeff walked over to The Pantry and had pie) waiting for the day’s main event. I had scheduled for us an astronomy tour for that evening. (Actually, for the previous evening, but it was cloudy on Tuesday night, so we rescheduled.)
Around 7:15, we jumped in the rental Rav 4 and headed out into the dark lands where Peter, our astronomer guide, was scheduled to meet us. I wish I had some pictures of what we’d seen, but I forgot my good camera, and frankly, I don’t know if my hands would have worked to press the shutter button. It was extremely cold. I think the thermometer registered 27, but we were on a windy plateau, so it felt more like the low teens. Jeff and Kevin had to retreat to the car at one point. (They’re fully San Diego boys now. Their hearty Columbus blood has thinned.)
I think we all agreed that the tour was well worth the cold. Peter has a 20-inch telescope on site through which he showed us Venus, Jupiter, Mars, and several star clusters and nebulae. Totally by chance, we spotted a falling star that looked like a green firework raining down only 100 yards away, and we saw at least a half dozen satellites. I didn’t even know satellites were visible from the ground!
Peter spent about 90 minutes with us, and though at first, I think his approach was more geared toward a juvenile audience, he realized that we were a little more advanced than that and matured his talk a little. The main thrust of his presentation was to explain the science of how, since Galileo, astronomers figured out that the earth is not the center of the universe or of the galaxy and where in our galaxy our solar system is positioned. Obviously, we knew we aren’t the center of, well, anything, but to learn how scientists actually figured that out was pretty neat. Don’t ask me to explain it, though. 🤣
Around 9:30, we said goodbye to Peter and headed back to our VRBO. We spent the rest of the evening just trying to get feeling back in our toes.
It’s Thursday morning now, and still very cold here. I’m grateful for the sun, though. We’re getting ready to get breakfast, clear out, and head back to Albuquerque (where it’s warmer). More to come.