Day 7 - Tucumcari, NM to Santa Fe, NM

This morning we set off early out of Tucumcari, along the interstate as again, most of the old route is either buried or old dirt roads. As we passed through Santa Rosa, we followed the pre-1937 route which swung north on a loop through Santa Fe, which was bypassed by later alignments. We climbed steadily into the mesas and yet another perfect blue sky, and although today the temperatures stayed below 80 this may have been due to the altitude, because the sun felt very hot.

Driving over the hills into the mesas of New Mexico

Not far from Santa Fe We stopped at the Pecos Pueblo, a National Historical Park with a very good self guided tour around the remains of a native American settlement which was settled in the 14th century, the site of a Spanish Catholic Mission in the 17th century and abandoned in the 19th century. Having steadily climbed in altitude over the morning, we could definitely feel its effects just from walking around the ruins.

The remains of the Pecos Pueblo, abandoned since the late 19th Century

Inside the Spanish Mission church of the pueblo

Old roof supports from the church

The walls of the of the church were up to 22ft thick in places

This was the plodge of the pueblo, no joke!

This is the top of a kiva, which is an underground room in the pueblo

Inside the kiva; it was nice and cool

The mesas surrounding the pueblo

Luckily this did not become and issue for us, but we certainly tread a little more carefully around the paths and kept an ear out for rattles after reading this sign.

From Pecos we continued to rise to the highest point of the route at the Glorieta Pass at 7,500ft, and then headed into Santa Fe.

Driving into the Glorieta Pass. The altitude was showing its effects on the Mini too, with a noticeable drop in acceleration.

Historic Santa Fe provided a glorious contrast to many of the places we've seen on the route, a thriving tourist town with loads of artsy crafty shops and galleries, selling local Native American jewelry, pottery and textiles.   The city dates from the 15th Century, originally founded as part of the expanding Spanish empire in the new world.  Perfect window shopping for me.   First however, an absolute must, the Georgia O'Keefe Art Museum (couldn't take photos in the gallery though). 

Route 66 follows part of the Santa Fe trail, and old trading route from the horse and wagon days, going from Kansas City to Santa Fe

Looking out across the city

The adobe style of building is prevalent throughout

And because we've been very restrained in terms of buying mementos of our trip, and because window shopping only goes so far, we bought some (small!) pieces of local pottery. The town really is beautiful and we're staying in the historic La Fonda hotel, built in the adobe style which is very common in Santa Fe.

La Fonda; the bell tower on the roof is now a very nice bar, with excellent margaritas

The front of the hotel