A Fall Road Trip Through New Mexico

Dear Bob and Sue: A National Parks Podcast

Hosts Karen and Matt Smith guide listeners through a comprehensive fall road trip itinerary across New Mexico, traveling from the northern archaeological

Key takeaways

Chaco Culture National Historical Park features massive sandstone structures built between 850 and 1150 AD.
The Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta is a major October event where visitors can walk directly among the hot air balloons.

Main topics

New Mexico National Parks
Southwestern History

Notable quotes

This is like a pilgrimage.

Conclusion

A highly practical and inspiring guide for travelers looking to explor

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) And when he died in 1976, they returned his remains to New Mexico, to this place. And he's actually buried there. And there is a charming little outdoor area with a pathway. You can go and see his... I don't know why this makes me feel like crying. You can see his grave and the marker. Yeah, it's for all Smokey Bear fans, this is like a pilgrimage. Speaker 1 (0:32) Welcome to the Dear Bob and Sue podcast, stories from our journey to all 63 U.S. national parks and other public lands. I'm Karen Smith. And Speaker 2 (0:41) I'm Matt Smith. We're the authors of the Dear Bob and Sue series of books. There's nothing quite like a fall road trip. And while a lot of people head to the eastern side of the country, we're heading to the southwest, to the great state of New Mexico. Speaker 1 (0:55) Come with us as we take you from the north to the south through some remarkable public lands, charming towns, and unique places you won't want to miss. Speaker 2 (1:03) Thanks for joining us today on our fall road trip through New Mexico. All Speaker 1 (1:16) right, we are excited today to be talking about New Mexico because it's always, always a fun road trip through New Mexico. Speaker 2 (1:23) Yeah, I love all of our trips to New Mexico. Speaker 1 (1:26) It's such an interesting place. And, you know, the slogan for New Mexico is the land of enchantment. And I feel like not only is that really accurate, but the marketing department was working overtime on that one because doesn't it just make you want to go? Speaker 2 (1:41) It does make me want to go. Some other good ones are, well, Utah's is Life Elevated. I like that one. And, of course, Montana's Big Sky Country. Those Speaker 1 (1:50) are both so good. I also really like South Dakota's. Great Faces, Great Places, you know, with a nod to Mount Rushmore. And of course, How Can You Beat West Virginia's Almost Heaven? Speaker 2 (2:04) Yeah, of course, there's Washington, the evergreen state. What about Pure Michigan and Sweet Home Alabama? There's some good ones there. There Speaker 1 (2:11) are. It seems like a lot of songs have turned into slogans. Yeah, those are all good. But today we're taking you to the land of enchantment. And specifically, we are recommending this as a fall trip. Speaker 2 (2:24) Yeah, fall's a great time. Well, fall's a great time to go to a lot of places, but New Mexico can be super hot in the summertime, right? And then in the fall, I think it's just perfect. And some of the things we'll talk about actually only happen during the fall. Speaker 1 (2:40) Right. So a couple things. We're going to talk about these places in a geographical order from north to south. And given that, and we can talk more about this at the end too. A lot of people, including us, fly into Albuquerque. I think that's maybe the biggest airport where the flights are fairly inexpensive. It's kind of centrally located. You could also fly into Santa Fe, right? You Speaker 2 (3:06) could. We've flown into Santa Fe before, and we've organized this as a road trip, and we wanted to be all-inclusive for New Mexico, cover all the interesting things to see. But a lot of those places up north that we'll talk about, Chaco, Culture. and some of those, it might be hard to fit it into a road trip loop because they're pretty far away from either Albuquerque or Santa Fe. They might be better attached to, let's say, a Colorado. road trip if you're visiting like Mesa Verde. Now, Speaker 1 (3:36) specifically, we're talking about one of the absolute best NPS sites, which is Chaco Culture National Historical Park and a few other things to do around there. But, you know, it's about a three hour drive from either Santa Fe or Albuquerque. That's one way. So it's tough to go out there and back if you're headquartered in either one of those towns. And there's really no place to stay. So as Matt said, we didn't want to leave this. out and we're going to talk about these places in more detail. But really, if you want to see these particular sites in the northwest corner, they're only two hours from Durango. We added it on to a trip to Bluff, Utah, headed over there, stayed in Farmington. So when you look at a map, you can kind of see that these places are pretty remote from the other parts of New Mexico we're going to talk about. So Speaker 2 (4:28) you want to dig into Chaco culture? Speaker 1 (4:30) Yes, we loved that park. Speaker 2 (4:32) Okay. Well, first, let's talk about how to get there. It's a rough road. It was dry. It was in good shape when we were there. But if it's wet or if they've had a lot of flooding or rains, I could see that road being pretty much of a challenge. So Speaker 1 (4:48) what you want to do before you visit is check the park website. Of course, we say that about every park, every visit, but they will let you know on the website if... the road is impassable, which sometimes it is, and you definitely don't want to try it then. If it's passable, I mean, we had our 4Runner, but we did see other just regular passenger cars on it. Speaker 2 (5:10) Oh, I think when we did it, any kind of passenger car, if you go slow enough, you could certainly do it. I think towing something would be a little bit more of a challenge. It was washboarded in places. We didn't feel like it was as necessarily as rough as a lot of blog posts say it is. Speaker 1 (5:29) So Chaco Culture, if you're not familiar with that, it's one of the great pre-Columbian ceremonial centers. of North America. It's an archaeological site that people lived in between 850 and 1150, and it was really the trade center of this entire area in the Southwest. It extended across the entire Colorado Plateau. And what's left are these great houses, these multi-story sandstone structures. Really, really impressive. It's so much bigger than I thought it would be. Speaker 2 (6:03) Yeah, the houses themselves are huge. Matter of fact, they're more than houses. They're entire complexes with a bunch of houses built within them. I mean, this was a major area with, I don't know, did you say how many people lived there at one time? I Speaker 1 (6:21) didn't. Speaker 2 (6:21) It was thousands. And Speaker 1 (6:22) another cool thing is that a lot of these structures were built to align with solar and lunar cycles. Now, there are a couple ways to see this park. One is there is a drive, the Canyon Loop Drive. It's nine miles one way. It takes you kind of in the heart of it. And there are parking areas where you can stop and get out and you can look at these great houses. Speaker 2 (6:45) Yeah, here's a pro tip that we didn't follow. When you go there and if you're let's say you're going to you want to visit some of the sites or even do a hike. Plan what you want to do in what order, because I think we weren't totally sure where the trailhead was for one of the hikes. And it's a one-way loop road. We missed it by a block, which is a nine-mile mistake. You have to then drive nine miles to get back to that spot. Speaker 1 (7:16) Right. But we did get to see everything a couple of times. We did. Now, there are several hiking trails there, and we have to recommend the one we did because I can't imagine any hike is better than this one. It's called the Pueblo Alto Trail. five and a half mile loop, about 600 feet elevation gain. That's if you do the entire loop. But you can shorten that if you don't want to do five and a half miles because there are different like viewpoints along the way. So you could, you know, just go out a mile or two and come back. But remember, Matt, when we got to the trailhead and we looked up? Speaker 2 (7:51) Yeah, this is a fun hike for a lot of reasons. It starts off with this. Well, you can't even really see how you're going to get up to the top of the cliff. And then it's an easy to follow trail, but it goes up through this narrow passage up the cliff. A little bit of scrambling, but yeah, it was actually a lot of fun to scramble up through this. I don't know. It's like a slot. Speaker 1 (8:14) It is. And you're scrambling over boulders. Now, when you look up at it from the bottom, it looks very intimidating. And I think I said, oh, heck no. Maybe. some stronger language than that. But once we got into it, it's not that hard. It really isn't. It looks worse than it is. And once you get up to the plateau, it's incredible. There are more houses up there. There are all kinds of things to see. So if you have a chance, do the Pueblo Alto Trail hike. That's Speaker 2 (8:46) right. Speaker 1 (8:47) Okay, so also up kind of in that area is Aztec Ruins National Monument. This is a reconstructed great kiva. It's about 55 miles north of Chaco. If I remember right, Matt, it's very close to the town of Farmington. Speaker 2 (9:01) Yes. So if you're staying in Farmington, which actually is what we did on one of our trips, and that was pretty convenient to some of these places. Speaker 1 (9:09) Yeah. Speaker 2 (9:10) Yeah. We also, while we were up there, we went to Ashi Slaypa Wilderness. It only took me five times to say that correctly. Do you want Speaker 1 (9:19) to say the next one that's right next to it? I had to work on this pronunciation. Speaker 2 (9:24) Bistidinozin? Speaker 1 (9:27) Bistidinozin. There you go. Bistidinozin Wilderness. Okay, so both of these sites close to each other. They are both managed by the Bureau of Land Management. are these Badlands landscapes with hoodoos and petrified wood. Lots of very cool mushroom shapes is what stood out to me. Speaker 2 (9:46) Yeah, the hoodoos are pretty interesting, kind of similar to, I guess, Goblin Valley, but not red. They're white. Yeah, it was a really unusual landscape. And if you go and you park at the trailhead, You have to walk out a ways and you don't see the rock formations right away. So keep following the path and you'll discover them. Speaker 1 (10:09) Yeah. You know, here's the thing, too. The websites say there are no trails. At Oshislepa, there was a bit of a trail that we followed. But anyway. Definitely, you want some navigation with you. Also, again, you're headed out on dirt roads. If it's been raining, don't try it because you will be swallowed up into the mud. Speaker 2 (10:28) Yeah, it was. The road was wet when we drove it, and it was a little challenging in places, and we had a 4x4. But yeah, you want to be out there when it's dry. Speaker 1 (10:39) Yeah. Okay, so again, this is what we just talked about. That's the northwest section. Really fascinating, but you might want to add this on to a Utah trip, Southern Colorado trip instead of a New Mexico road trip. But let's move on to what should be included in your road trip. Speaker 2 (10:58) Yeah, the Santa Fe area. Speaker 1 (11:00) Lots to see around Santa Fe. Speaker 2 (11:02) Yeah, the first thing we're going to talk about in the Santa Fe area is Bandelier National Monument. Every time we go to Santa Fe, we go up to Bandelier. Speaker 1 (11:12) That's right. They are ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings in Frijoles Canyon. Really cool to see. And they did such a great job laying out this park. So you can actually go up some ladders and peek into these alcoves. So it's actually a really fun, fun way to learn about history and see where these people lived. Speaker 2 (11:31) And the place itself has a lot of modern history, if you will. I mean, it was established in 1916 as a national monument. And it also, Karen, did you know that it has one of the largest collections of CCC buildings in the United States? Speaker 1 (11:46) I may have heard that before, Matt. It's a very cool place to see. And they've done a lot of upkeep on them. And so one of them is, you know, the Visitor's Center. And there's a restaurant there and a gift shop and all that. And then they also have, some of them are employee housing. It's a historic district, I guess is what we want to say. Very cool to see. Now, one of the highlights that you don't want to miss, if it's open when you go, sometimes it's closed, is the Alcove House Trail. This takes you back to this area where you climb a 140-foot ladder. Actually, there's a series of ladders to get up to this site up there. Speaker 2 (12:25) Yeah, we've done that a couple of times. You've got to be watching for... visitors coming up the ladder. You kind of take turns going up and down. But yeah, it's definitely worth doing. And the park is, you know, they open and close some of these exhibits from time to time. Sometimes they've had flooding issues in the past. So sometimes that closes some trails and they've had some vandalism. So they're doing their best to take care of the park. But yeah, it's definitely worth seeing. I Speaker 1 (12:52) think it's actually one of my favorite national monuments out of all of them. Yeah. Speaker 2 (12:57) And it's also close to the town of Los Alamos, which, of course, is where the headquarters were for the Manhattan Project in World War II. Speaker 1 (13:06) And it is a national historical park called the Manhattan Project National Historical Park. You know, and now all of a sudden it's very popular because, of course, the movie Oppenheimer, right? Now, if you're not familiar with it, in Los Alamos, this was the location for the secret laboratory where they designed and built the world's first atomic weapons. And of course, the most famous scientist who did this was Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer. Now, when you go visit, the national laboratory is not accessible to the public. They don't let you just go in and Speaker 2 (13:45) see what kind of weapons they're developing now? Speaker 1 (13:48) Yeah. Shocking, isn't Speaker 2 (13:49) it? Speaker 1 (13:49) But there are different Manhattan Project era sites throughout the community. So definitely check it out. This was established in November 2015. So, you know, one of the newer NPS sites. Speaker 2 (14:02) Yeah. So check out Los Alamos if you have the time. All right. So let's talk about Santa Fe proper for a minute. Speaker 1 (14:08) Oh my gosh, we love Santa Fe. It's such a beautiful city. You know, it's the oldest capital city in the U.S. It was founded in 1610, and it's the highest in elevation at 7,000 feet. Speaker 2 (14:21) Yeah, you got to keep that in mind when you're there. You do. And you're walking around, when we're walking around the square and I'm out of breath, I have an excuse. Right. It's at 7,000 feet. Speaker 1 (14:32) Now, it's... Also the hub, it connects three national historic trails. So this is interesting to all you history buffs. It's the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro. Did I say that right? Yes, that's right. The Santa Fe Trail and the Old Spanish Trail. So they all connect here. So much history. And let's start with, Matt, the Old Town Santa Fe and the beautiful plaza. I Speaker 2 (14:57) love walking around the plaza. I mean, there's shops, but there's also a lot of historic buildings. I like the architecture. Essentially, it's the civic center of the town. The capital's close