What happened Wednesday and Thursday? Well, we had heard that Madrid, a town of only 225 (mostly hippies, artists and misfits now) was about 40 minutes down the road. Who doesn't want to see a ghost town revitalized and full of hippies, artists and misfits? Count us in! Saddle up, Bailey, let's go!
This is New Mexico's version of Garden of the Gods on the Turquoise Trail (NM 14, the highway between Tijeras and Santa Fe, is called the Turquoise Trail). See that tiny sign on the left? That tells me so. Also tells me it's Private Property, and the barbed wire fence tells me we must not trespass.
After a while, we found the town of Madrid, NM, artist and hippie haven. There is evidence of coal mining as early as mid-1850's and by 1892, production in "Coal Gulch" was sufficient to warrant a 6.5 mile standard gauge rail road to connect the area to Santa Fe. By 1919, the town of Madrid was flourishing and population was about 2500, with a Chrysler dealer, a hospital (and the first X-Ray machine in New Mexico), a church, a grocery store, elementary and high schools, a LIGHTED ballfield (the first in the country), and an employee club. It was a model "Company Town" under the leadership of Oscar Huber. Homes for the miners and their families were dismantled in Kansas and brought to the town in halves & reassembled on site. The townspeople were paid in script, spendable at the Company Store & Mercantile, and they were required to participate in the town events, like the Fourth of July and Christmas parades, as well as dye Easter eggs for the children to find down at the ballfield on Easter morning. The Christmas light display was such a sight that TWA was known to have diverted flights just so their passengers could enjoy the sights as they flew over the town. Walt Disney even came to visit and asked Mr. Hubert if he could set up Toyland as a permanent exhibition in the town, but, unfortunately, Mr. Hubert declined. Mr. Disney went back to California and built Disneyland instead. Whoops. Most of the coal mined went to Los Alamos, to the north, for the Manhattan Project, that produced the first nuclear weapons. However, the Christmas parade and displays ended with WWII, and the mines closed at the end of the war, when natural gas began to supplant coal. Most of the miners just packed what they could into their cars and drove off, to find other opportunities. The town was left with only 12 residents, including Mr. Huber and his family and pretty much turned into a real live ghost town. Ghosts included.
In the 70's, Oscar's son, Joe, put the town up for sale, but there were no takers, so he offered the church and individual houses for rent and sale, dirt cheap. That's where the hippies and artists came in....neither group had much money, and houses for $1000 or less were very attractive and affordable. Mind you, nothing in the town worked, nor did most of its new inhabitants. The well water was so bad, it was only pumped into the houses twice a week. Houses were ramshackle and falling down, and there were no Home Depots, so they had to be patched up and repaired with and by whatever means the new residents had available at the time. Some of the homes still show the seams, where they were put back together originally. Today, the population stands at about 225, and there is very little "industry" in town. Most of the homes have been turned into artist shops, studios, eateries or in one case, a general store, featuring old time candy. This was the first set of shops we came across.
Can you see the price tag on that little cactus? I'll spare you the trouble....$125.
How about this little glass cat? He stood about 4 feet high. He was marked at $400. Did you want one? Oh, sorry, we didn't know, so we left him there, along with his brothers and sisters, priced the same.
One of the shops was housed in Mr. Huber's original house, the only house that was built on site, not brought in and reassembled. The locals refer to it as the Huber Mansion, even though, by today's standards, it's not a mansion by any means. Thomas Edison took an early interest in the town, as he was already engaged in iron ore mining and processing in the east. He made the long journey from Menlo Park, NJ, to the Madrid, to try his hand at recovering gold from the Ortiz mountains. (Barbara S - the Resident Engineer would find this process extremely interesting, so have him check out that link!) Anyway, because of the plentiful and inexpensive power supplied by the coal being mined, Madrid became one of the first cities in the country to have lots of indoor lighting. You can see evidence of the early wiring and lighting up near the ceiling of Mr. Huber's office.
This is how his office looks today. Most of the pieces are original and his own possessions. Excluding that display case in the middle of the room, of course.
This is Mr. Huber's front porch. We (pup and I) sat here a bit and enjoyed quite the breeze. The tree to the left is a crabapple, and it was loaded!! The tree on the right is a redbud, which is actually quite uncommon for the area, and the shopkeeper was amazed that I could identify the tree simply by its leaves.
See, by today's standards, it's not exactly a mansion, but compared to the employees' shacks, it's a mansion.
This is more typical of the miners' homes. Small, quaint, and wildly painted.
We journeyed on to Cerillos, where a lot of the turquoise was, and still is, mined. Apparently, it's getting more and more scarce, and the farther away from Madrid and Cerillos you get, the more expensive it will become, we've been warned. It runs about $9 a carat here, and a carat is pretty small, so a slice, about an eighth of an inch thick (THIN) and about a half an inch long, ran about $22. There was a mining museum in Cerrillos, but we were told Bailey could only come in if I carried her...and after about 5 minutes, I couldn't carry her any longer, so I had to carry her right on outside. Driver was right on my heels, so we left after viewing the "petting zoo" animals, a llama, some chickens and some goats, all of whom couldn't care less that we were there. As we drove around the little town, we came across an elderly gentleman, struggling to hang a birdfeeder. Yes, we stopped, right in the middle of the road, and Driver gave him a hand. The homeowner was a bit shocked, but I think, grateful, for the assistance.
This type of cedar fencing seems to be pretty popular in the area. I guess it's because cedar is so commonplace. I dunno, but it always seems to look pretty ramshackle and run down to me. I think if they would only cut the tops off even, maybe it would look neater??? But, then again, judgment in mine, sayeth the Lord, right???
This home had a quite an interesting wall around it. Wonder what was hiding behind the wall???
Fast forward, now, to Thursday. We had heard there were hot springs and mineral springs in the area. The hot springs were about an hour's journey north of town, and they offered 50 minutes, in any of their springs for $45. Once your 50 minutes was up, you were done and you went on your merry way. The mineral springs, just outside Santa Fe, on the other hand, are owned by the same company, but set up a little differently. There's a pond, which you cannot swim in, and a set of four different "Repose Pools," each a slightly different temperature, ranging from 72 degrees, straight out of the spring, to about 102 degrees. This facility offered all-day (10 am to 10 pm) soaking for $60/couple, and was only about 20 minutes from the campground. We chose to visit Sunrise Springs for the convenience and the fact that we weren't far from home and could come back to walk the dog easily.
There are also private rooms you can book for overnight stays, a spa, offering massages, manicures, pedicures and facials, and a highly patronized restaurant. This is the al fresco dining area, at 10 am.
When we left, around noon, every chair was filled. When we returned, around 4 pm, again, every chair was filled.
This was one of the Repose Pools, overlooking the pond. There was a nice firepit, too, and it was lit and warm, when we returned after dinner. It provided a soothing ambiance, as well as some much needed warmth after we left the hot pool. Yeah, no surprise there, we stayed in the hot pool, day and night! I must admit, it was soothing and relaxing, and it's a darned good thing we saved the spa for our last day/night, otherwise, we might not have seen or done anything else while we were in Santa Fe!
On our way back to the camper, after our morning soak, we stopped in at Blue Mesa Alpaca Ranch. It was originally a scheduled Harvest Host stopover for us, but we decided with the weather being so warm, we might not be able to go without electricity and air conditioning, so we called to cancel. Turns out, the ranch's zoning has been changed to residential (???), so they were no longer permitted to have overnight guests. The rusty colored, fluffy baby, on the very right, is Alecia. She's about 3 months old, and she was about 10 pounds when she was born. The little hairy guy, laying down in front, on the left, is Chewbaca, and he was born only 3 weeks ago, weighing in at 17 pounds at birth! He spent most of our visit just lying there, soaking up the sunshine.
On our way back to the spa, after dinner, we were treated to a beautiful sunset and moonrise. The two pictures below were taken within seconds of each other. The first is looking west, toward the setting sun; the second photo is looking east, toward the rising moon. Striking, eh?
Next up is Friday, our travel day. I can't wait to tell you all about it, but it's now 5 minutes till midnight, and we still have to walk the dog one last time, so I guess you'll have to wait!! Till next time!
Been out of range for the past week, and so I'm just catching up. I love NM. So much color and culture.
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