A Busy Saturday

The Taos Pueblo and the Rio Grande River Bridge were our goals for Saturday. We arrived at the Pueblo around 10:30 a.m., bought our tickets and ventured inside. The first thing that grabs your attention is the church. This is the most important building in the pueblo. Unfortunately, they do not allow photos to be taken inside the church, so I'll describe it as simple but elegant.

There are currently about 100 people still living in the pueblo. The buildings are handed down from generation to generation and they are having the same problems as other people, the young ones are moving off. Therefore some of the pueblo is in a more deteriorated condition than other areas. The natives now use some of the rooms as "shops" to sell their wares. While browsing one of the shops I entered into a interesting conversation with the lady. She was telling me how she had been married, had children, lost her husband and eventually decided to marry a man from Louisiana (not a Native American). She told me how this caused some trouble as they (the council) want you to marry within the tribe. She said she told her father that there was no one she wanted to marry there as they were all to closely related! She was married in the church with her husband in full native costume out of respect to her father. She also said that their way of life is like living in a communist country - they have to watch what they say and do or they will be called upon to report to the council and can possibly be incarcerated. In other words - The Council Rules! A very interesting conversation this was and I would have loved to talk and listen longer, but she had some paying customers so I hugged her goodbye and thanked her for sharing her story with me.

After finishing our tour of the pueblo, we drove to the Rio Grande River Bridge. We parked and walked out on the bridge to get another look at the Rio Grande. Funny it just don't look big, but in a few minutes I spotted some rafters coming down river and once we saw them below us it was evident that the river is bigger than it appears from the bridge.

Marti, the campground owner told us to continue on past the bridge to the Earthship Community. I said what? She explained that there is a community where part of the house is covered by dirt (which I've seen in other states) and that they recycle things and use them in the building of the houses. They also harvest water, use solar/thermal energy for heating and cooling, produce their own food and more. For more information on this community you can visit their web site at www.earthship.com Different to say the least.

By this time we were hungry and headed back to Taos to Michaels Kitchen that had been recommended to us by Marti. Well, it was great. I have to go back again as they also have a bakery and the items looked so yummy, but I was good and didn't get anything this time. I've posted a couple of pictures of the food from there - look for yourself.

After a quick stop at our favorite store - Wal-Mart, we drove off in search for San Francisco de Asis Catholic Church. This church was completed in 1815 and is well known in this area. You can't tell by the pictures that I took, but the entire church is in the shape of the cross, if viewed from the air. Very neat - again no pictures allowed inside.

Driving back to Eagle Nest we decided to take the Route 64 detour which is a dirt road. Well, we drove and drove and drove and kept getting deeper into the mountains. We had passed a road on the right that we discovered we should have taken. I finally did a turn-around and went back to that road - there where no signs! The drive on this dirt road was not bad even though we had a good bit of rain over the past week. There where some washed out areas but I managed to maneuver around them. The views from the side of the mountain where awesome. I've posted a few pictures that I took - yes, I did stop to take them!

That about completed our day yesterday. This morning we attended church at the United Church of Angel Fire. A very nice service and friendly people. We will go there while we are in the area.

Tuesday, we are going with others from the campground to a lake on top of a mountain - should be interesting. Check back to find out......

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