Santa Fe and Kasha-Katuwe National Monument

September 23rd and 24th-  The drive to Santa Fe from Ruidoso was a fairly easy one, and we arrived in Santa Fe around 2 pm.  The last time we were here, we had intended to visit the Georgia O'Keefe Museum, but had run out of time.  We took advantage of our early arrival to head downtown.  Georgia O'Keefe, a well-known American artist, spent the last years of her life in New Mexico, living in the outskirts of Santa Fe.  The museum showed her works from early times in the East, on into her later years in this area.  She is known for her bright colors, and semi-abstract works.  Dale was not a real fan, but he toughed it out.  After our visit, we headed downtown. Being Sunday, many of the shops and art galleries were either closed or would be soon.  We did stop in one that had some wonderful horse sculptures, and more realistic paintings of the west- more to Dale's liking!  There was an art exhibit going on, and we spent  few minutes looking through the works of various artists.

We had two possible National Monuments to see here and, to be honest, I thought we would have time to do both.  We had booked a Wyndham stay in Pagosa Springs, CO for the next three nights, so did not have an option to extend our Santa Fe stay- a city we both enjoyed on our last visit.  My preference was to go to Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks, with a visit to Bandelier if we had time. 

Kasha-Katuwe is located on an Indian Reservation, the Pueblo de Cochiti, and is managed jointly by them and the Bureau of Land Management.  There is not a visitor center as is done on National Parks land, but there was a nice center a mile or so prior to the entrance.  We actually went to the park first, turned around and went back to get more information on hikes in the park.  She recommended the Cave Trail, but also suggested we might want to hike in as far as we wanted on the trail to the top, which was a steep climb near the end, but we would have an opportunity to see the slot cave prior to the steep area.

By the way, if visiting this site and you are traveling with a dog- dogs are not allowed in this site at all, unlike most National Park locations where they are allowed on leash in limited areas.  Not sure if it is because it is located on an Indian reservation, or the nature of the site- viewed as a special place by Native Americans.

Heading back to the park, we were surprised at the number of vehicles in the parking area- this is a little-known park, and it was a Monday!  The lot was almost full.  We headed up the Slot Canyon Trail first.  It is funny- sometimes you are just caught by surprise with what you find in these parks.  When I researched the area, the information spoke primarily of the tent rocks; these rocks, shaped like tents as you will see in the photos, were formed by volcanic eruptions 6-7 million years ago.  Many of the tapering hoodoos had "cap rocks" at their tops, which protected the softer rock underneath from disintegrating.  Those that have lost the cap rocks are deteriorating.  The layering of the volcanic rock is obvious by the alternating bands of gray, beige and pink rock.  This is what I expected to see. 

What I didn't expect is that, over time, wind and water would carve out these deposits to create arroyos, canyons and ravines- creating the slot canyon.  The canyon was the most impressive part of this park, and was really fun to hike- climbing over and - once- under rocks, squeezing through narrow spaces- a great time!

After hiking through the canyon, we headed back to complete the Cave trail.  This trail is named for a man-made cave, which has been there for a long time, and still shows evidence of soot on the ceiling from camp fires.  The remainder of the trail revealed more tent rocks of varying styles.  Also- we noted a plant with both white flowers that, as they age, turn to pink fluffy flowers known as Apache plume, a member of the rose family.

We ended the hike in the parking lot, and headed out to find some lunch.  Obviously, we would not have time for Bandelier.  We were told at the visitor center that the nearby golf course had a good lunch.  The course itself looked impressive- being in the middle of the desert, it was pretty obvious they irrigate- a lot! 

We enjoyed lunch, then headed north to Pagosa Springs.  Friends had told us it was a beautiful area.  We drove primarily on two-lane highway through rural areas, which became greener the closer we came to Colorado.  The mountains in the distance were more rugged than we had been seeing, and they formed a dramatic background for our drive.  We planned to stay for three days here, and hoped to play a little golf and play catch-up on our blog!