To Follow along or access to our discounts visit: www.millersinmotion.com/links
Ever dreamt of visiting the enchanting land of Santa Fe, New Mexico? Well, buckle up, RV enthusiasts, foodies and history buffs, because Lauren and I, your hosts from the RV Shenanigans show, are about to give you a front row seat to our favorite destination. We'll recount our drive from Dallas Fort Worth with a horse trailer, share the thrill of navigating gas stops, and uncover the joy and challenges that come with towing a new truck. What's more, we'll relive our trips to Santa Fe and how we fell hard for its rich history, vibrant culture, and delectable cuisine.
Hold on tight as we embark on a ride filled with whitewater rafting, a visit to the oldest church in the US, and a peek into the oldest house in Santa Fe. We'll lead you through the heart of Santa Fe: the Plaza, a bustling hub of local artisans and cultural entertainment, and the Cross of the Martyrs, a monument with a view that will leave you breathless. Curious about the birthplace of the famous Frito pie? We’ve got you covered! Join us as we talk about our visit to the Five and Dime and the taste explosion that was the iconic dish.
Our journey doesn't stop there. We're taking you through Santa Fe's vibrant and unique culinary scene, dishing out details on its hybrid cuisine that's a symphony of Tex-Mex and traditional Mexican food, with the star of the show being green chilies. Join our exploration of the historical national parks, specifically Bandelier National Monument and Pecos National Historic Park, filled with awe-inspiring natural beauty and historical landmarks. So, are you ready for an unforgettable ride through Santa Fe with us? You might just end up adding it to your travel bucket list!
To Follow along or access to our discounts visit: www.millersinmotion.com/links
Ever dreamt of visiting the enchanting land of Santa Fe, New Mexico? Well, buckle up, RV enthusiasts, foodies and history buffs, because Lauren and I, your hosts from the RV Shenanigans show, are about to give you a front row seat to our favorite destination. We'll recount our drive from Dallas Fort Worth with a horse trailer, share the thrill of navigating gas stops, and uncover the joy and challenges that come with towing a new truck. What's more, we'll relive our trips to Santa Fe and how we fell hard for its rich history, vibrant culture, and delectable cuisine.
Hold on tight as we embark on a ride filled with whitewater rafting, a visit to the oldest church in the US, and a peek into the oldest house in Santa Fe. We'll lead you through the heart of Santa Fe: the Plaza, a bustling hub of local artisans and cultural entertainment, and the Cross of the Martyrs, a monument with a view that will leave you breathless. Curious about the birthplace of the famous Frito pie? We’ve got you covered! Join us as we talk about our visit to the Five and Dime and the taste explosion that was the iconic dish.
Our journey doesn't stop there. We're taking you through Santa Fe's vibrant and unique culinary scene, dishing out details on its hybrid cuisine that's a symphony of Tex-Mex and traditional Mexican food, with the star of the show being green chilies. Join our exploration of the historical national parks, specifically Bandelier National Monument and Pecos National Historic Park, filled with awe-inspiring natural beauty and historical landmarks. So, are you ready for an unforgettable ride through Santa Fe with us? You might just end up adding it to your travel bucket list!
Welcome back to the RV shenanigans show. I'm Ryan.
Speaker 2:I'm Lauren, and together we are Millers in Motion. We sold our ranch here in Texas and now we're living out some new adventures in our RV, an Alliance Valor toy hauler.
Speaker 1:And we are learning how to podcast, as evident because I forgot to hit the record button, so sorry for YouTube. You got a little armpit shot when we first kicked in there, but you're welcome. I guess we have a fun show for you. This week it's we're going to be doing another destination guide. Little disclaimer it's been a little bit since we've been to this destination. It's been a little over a year now. But last time we did a destination, we talked about Pigeon Forge, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and you said that was one of your favorite spots. This week we're going to be talking about Santa Fe, New Mexico. This was one of my favorite spots.
Speaker 2:I think anywhere we go ends up being a little bit of a favorite spot because, like we make memories, we have fun. We try new food. So to an extent, they're all our favorite.
Speaker 1:Anything that's a little different than we're used to in our, in our personal life. So we have a couple of quick favorites before we dump into the show. I don't know why I said dump, but I said it. Do us a favor If it's your first time here, please consider giving us a look over on the website. That kind of gives you, where you can listen to us, a little bit more information and you can see all of our previous shows. That link will be in the show notes or the description, depending on where you're listening. Slash watching this. Also, if you are going to be in Tampa, florida, for the 2024 Florida RV Super Show, we are going to be doing live podcast recordings on Wednesday, thursday, friday and Saturday.
Speaker 2:Doesn't that sound like an opportunity for shenanigans errors?
Speaker 1:I will say we're going to be in the Alliance RV booth. So big thank you to Alliance and our little duck friend, even though apparently the Gators are taking over. But there's a Greek food place right there. Bring some falafel and come on over.
Speaker 2:Yes, please. Falafel is my favorite.
Speaker 1:All right, we're going to dive into our destination guide right after this. The land of enchantment.
Speaker 2:Just like you.
Speaker 1:I'm the land of enchantment Fat joke, somehow. No. So we're going to be talking about Santa Fe, New Mexico. Now, like we said at the beginning of the show, it's been a little bit since we've been there. So we took our old RVs. So our valor never has seen New Mexico quite yet, but our solitude did. We were there for a horse show when we took the RV.
Speaker 2:Surprise, yeah, shocker.
Speaker 1:If you're not aware, horse shows for us are kind of some of our bigger staples. We plan those well in advance and then fill around for other things. We have actually been to Santa Fe twice. We went once for a horse show, but no RV. We stayed in a hotel. And then we went a second time for the exact same horse show but stayed in an RV. So we're going to talk a little bit about some things because we did some different stuff in both trips. So we'll just let you know which trip was what when we talk about that as we get into it. So, as far as Santa Fe itself, we drove from the Dallas Fort Worth area up and because Lauren was touring the horse, the hoist, the hoist trailer, lauren was to hoeing the horse trailer.
Speaker 2:Maybe less coffee for you.
Speaker 1:No, I'm just the right amount of shake. We're good. We drove separately. So I had the solitude and the truck and, I believe, klondike, and I think you had the girls. We had three dogs at the time too. You had the girls Mishka, bailey and all the girls and Stella all the girls and Stella. So how was the drive for you, with the horse trailer getting up and in?
Speaker 2:There was a lot of singing to my musicals and my favorites. No, the drive really isn't bad, and so it's boring, if anything, as you get through like Amarillo and all that sort of stuff. But at least it's flat and you're not up and down through a bunch of mountains. There's not a bunch of big cities on the way, so to me the drive was really easy, as long as you plan like your gas stops.
Speaker 1:For you.
Speaker 2:I think that may have been a bigger issue trying to get into the truck stops that they're fewer and far between than some of our other drives.
Speaker 1:Right, I was going to say there's more gaps, especially when you get like West Texas is bad about that and like the Eastern portion of New Mexico to you, get closer to the southern portion of the Rockies, like Albuquerque, santa Fe, that whole area, and they exist. You just have to like. I stopped once and then I realized, like about at about a third of a tank, that there isn't another one for an extended period of time, like a crap. So like an hour and a half into the next section of the driver, I had to stop. We did do this drive straight through because of the horse trailer. Typically we probably wouldn't do this kind of a drive day because it was about 12 hours 13 hours.
Speaker 2:It ended up being about a 12 hour drive day. I mean it maps, I think, in like nine hours from door to door. Stops, right, but because of the stops and because of the horses. And also remember that when we did it with the horse trailer, that was my first big toe with my new truck.
Speaker 1:It was.
Speaker 2:I forget about that, and so it had a different size gas tank and a different engine, so I didn't know how far I could make it on a tank of gas with the horse trailer attached.
Speaker 1:Well, and obviously anytime you add something like a suspension system or, in our case, a whole new truck that has a different kind of suspension. I mean it was similar to a old truck, but again it's every truck's a little bit different and so you had to get used to kind of the engine tendencies, the up shifts, the down shifts and the suspension and how it towed, because you're also worried about Stella in the back too, of course yes.
Speaker 1:So as far as the RV side, like Lauren said, we stopped way more than I wanted to, but that was kind of an necessity. But it was pretty simple. It's actually once you get into, like we get off the main highway and you start to turn north up towards Santa Fe, you're kind of starting to move around some of the foothills of the mountains, is that's when it gets gorgeous.
Speaker 2:It is, but beware, there is nothing. From when you turn off the major highway till nearly when you get to Santa Fe, there's not a gas stop.
Speaker 1:Oh, no, yeah, In fact there is a big gas stop right there on the corner, and that's it until you get into Santa Fe.
Speaker 2:For that reason. So, yes, don't think. Oh, it's only 90 minutes, I can make it. No, no, no, you stop.
Speaker 1:I mean, if you got a full tank of gas, you can maybe yeah. But, but it is pretty. I actually was one of those times I wish I could have gotten a drone shot, but when it was just me in the truck with the, with the RV, there's no way that's going to happen, and when we came in with the horse trailer and the solitude, it was raining, so that made some of that a bit more difficult, but it is still.
Speaker 2:It's gorgeous.
Speaker 1:So as far as RV parks, I'm sorry we're not going to touch base on a whole lot of them, because we stayed at the equestrian center called Hippaco on the Southwest side of town, kind of by the airport.
Speaker 2:They do offer RV parking. Oh, like without the show you can actually book through it, but it's not really a destination necessarily, and it's a little further away from, I think, a lot of the things people want to see in Santa Fe.
Speaker 1:It is. So it's. It's about a 20 minute from downtown, the plaza area, you know, to this area, to this spot and it is just a parking lot, and I say that it's a dirt parking lot in this scenario. Now, we never had an issue with electricity Sewer went down, so it was a solid spot. I would say it's a fairly pretty spot. You know it's not a whole lot going on, but it's right on the foothills of some pretty big I don't know if we're going to call mountains, but big hills that you can hike through there. So a couple of hikes down there and you have some pretty views of the mountains, Absolutely. But outside of that, that's unless you're there for a horse show, I'd probably say pry and find somewhere a little more up and close. But if last resort, go on down to.
Speaker 2:Hippaco. I mean it worked for us because we needed to be there for the horses and it was prime walking area for the dogs.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's a nice spread out area and maybe you're just in the horses or you just looking to adventure out, like if you're a full time or looking for something just different pace for a week to see what it's like. Try it out. People don't realize you can camp at most equestrian facilities that are show equestrian facilities.
Speaker 2:Yeah, always make sure to ask if you're not involved with the show at that time.
Speaker 1:I don't know the rules, but I would imagine and this is me making an assumption that if they have a big show and they know that they're limited in sites, they probably wouldn't take a non show reservation, but not during show, because there's not a show all the time.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Those times I'm sure they're happy to take your cash. So, as far as Santa Fe itself, we have a couple of really big topics, but we're going to hit you with all the kind of random stuff up front and that's kind of RV related.
Speaker 2:So your rapid fire jazz hands.
Speaker 1:Kind of not necessarily rapid fire. I don't know where jazz hands came in on that one, but but as far as our you know, santa Fe itself, there's a ton to do. For me one of the more random things that's kind of cool is it's a departure from a lot of other architecture we're used to like on the East Coast. They're used to kind of the colonial architecture. In Texas we have the ranch houses, kind of a little more simplistic here.
Speaker 2:Definitely.
Speaker 1:Out there you get it and you've got the Pueblo and Adobe sided. You know that that architecture, it's just so different in the plaza it's just kind of cool to be surrounded. It feels like you're being transported somewhere else. You are somewhere else, but kind of far further away than where you actually are. So what's another thing for you?
Speaker 2:So for me there's a lot of like art and culture and we didn't get to indulge in a whole lot of the art side of things whenever we were there. But it is really renowned for that and I really like that about a town that as far as the culture goes back and that the art just runs so deep.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think the other thing you don't realize is how old Santa Fe actually is because of its location, like everybody automatically assumes. Like the oldest city in the U? S is St Augustine, I believe, in Florida, because that's where the settlers came in, that's just where they landed, but you wouldn't realize, like, how much age there was, because about that same time the Spanish were settling in the New Mexico area and so you know New Mexico and Santa Fe specifically. It's not that far behind and in a lot of cases a lot of the original, like there's a lot of things on this list that are like the oldest in the U S because it was just settled a little bit faster as far as all that, as far as, like, some municipality stuff and structures and all those types of things. So that was shocking to me of how much history there really was in New Mexico. So you want to jump into the activity section?
Speaker 2:Let's do it All. The room for activities.
Speaker 1:So there is a lot of room for activities. This is by far our biggest section, but, with that being said, it's cool, so I'm going to knock the first trip off. So when we went down to when we flew, we drove.
Speaker 2:No, we drove.
Speaker 1:When we drove in and stayed in a hotel. We didn't have an RV. We were only there for a handful of days, but one of the things we wanted to do on an off day was we actually went whitewater rafting. I didn't expect you could do in Santa Fe.
Speaker 2:It was so much fun, but when you think about it and its relationship to like towels and some of those ski towns, it's right there, and when the snow melts, where does it go?
Speaker 1:That's true. So prime time's gonna be spring, obviously, and then the rapids kind of go down slowly throughout the summer and then they pick back up in the spring, kind of a thing.
Speaker 2:And that was a blast.
Speaker 1:That was a blast. It was a half day trip that we did not gonna lie. It was so long ago I don't really remember who. There's a ton of rafting companies but they kind of pick you up and meet you at the top and then when you end, you end near your vehicles but they bust you to where you're gonna go, all that stuff. It is not like some people see like class five rapids and call around like I'm not going rafting, this was not that. I mean, I think this was class three.
Speaker 2:Depending on the time of season and everything that goes into it. Yes, two to three, depending on and I think we caught a little bit of the excitement We'll say that, yeah, it was exciting.
Speaker 1:I never felt like we were potentially in danger. No, never I never thought I might fall out of the boat. Now I'm well anchored.
Speaker 2:Now for newbies. We also never like tipped the boat or anything like that, so I thought that was pretty cool.
Speaker 1:Right and there wasn't like massive amounts of obstacles you had to avoid. I mean, there was always a rock here.
Speaker 2:We got stuck on a rock once.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's more. Somebody bottomed us out more than it was anything else. But yeah, sure, but you can whitewater out there. Something else I actually don't have on my list, because I remember passing it on the way up there. Obviously, there's a lot of Indian reservations in this area. There's always a casino. I will say that's casinos are never going to be our jam. We're just not gamblers, and so we might talk about casinos as far as like camping, but not as far as the casino use. So that is something you can do in Santa Fe as well. Did you have like a favorite thing that we did?
Speaker 2:So I really enjoyed seeing the churches that are down in the plaza area, because you have a couple of really different, really important ones. So like, if you're starting at the Basilica, it's a cathedral basilica and has like 10 more words after that it is.
Speaker 1:Is the Santa. Cc is an important part of that.
Speaker 2:It is absolutely beautiful. It's not the oldest or any of those sorts of things, but the staff there was so friendly and I really enjoyed how absolutely beautiful it was and they were so knowledgeable it was also really free. It was really free, but you know that sort of a thing, I'd be willing to pay an admission fee, and so that's what I enjoyed was a lot of that. Now, it wasn't the only one.
Speaker 1:Right, so real quick, I will say that I will link, cause you can visually see all this stuff, and I know if you're watching this on YouTube I'm probably overlaying some of the video footage from when we were there. But if you wanna see our guides like for not just the National Park Service sites as well as Santa Fe itself, we have two videos on that that we did way back when Channel was all spankin' brand new back then. So forgive some of the you know camera editing choices, but I'll link those in the show notes as well.
Speaker 2:And so then there was also the same Miguel, I believe, and that one is the oldest, oldest church in the US.
Speaker 1:Oldest church structure.
Speaker 2:Structure in the continental US.
Speaker 1:Point to say structure, because I think there are organizations like church, organizations that are older, right, but they moved multiple times. The structure has been a functioning church since.
Speaker 2:Right, and then they've rebuilt parts of it, added on that sort of stuff, so it's not like it was when they first built it, necessarily, but it's pretty close.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and at one point I know it was burnt down because of in that area there's something known as the Pueblo Uprising, which was essentially a clash between Westerners and the Native Americans that were there at the time, and unfortunately that structure did burn a little bit, and so they had to repair the roof and some of the walls. But you know, the original Stucco walls now, whilst they are probably buried nice and deep, are still in the wall structure. And so that's what makes it the oldest church structure In the US.
Speaker 2:Yes, and if I recall, didn't we get there right when they were closing? I don't think we got to go into that one.
Speaker 1:I think they had, just we did not go into that one.
Speaker 2:We did not go into that one.
Speaker 1:It was either closed for the day or it had. We normally adventure during the week because things are less crowded and we have that ability, and so it was either closed because it was like a Monday or a Tuesday, or it had closed previously to us getting there if it was open that day. So just make sure and check your hours before you go.
Speaker 2:And if you are there like so, if you're standing in front of the doors right over to the left, was the house, and wasn't that the oldest house?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I still don't completely understand how this could be the oldest house, but yeah, so if you're looking at the doors, you're standing near the street looking up at it. There's a street, just to the left of it. I believe it's the north of the church. Down there across the street you'll see a little sign that says oldest house in the US, which was kind of cool.
Speaker 2:You can go in it, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm not gonna lie, it's owned by an individual and they seem perfectly nice, but it is a for-profit thing, so you don't have to buy anything to go down into the house. So that is completely free. But it is a store full disclosure.
Speaker 2:That was interesting. It was so small.
Speaker 1:It was. Let's just say I don't really fit in what they were building back in the 1800s.
Speaker 2:So, anyways, I really enjoyed those kinds of things. And then, if you're looking for something that's just a little obscure, that's where the Loretto Chapel came in, with that crazy staircase.
Speaker 1:The mythical staircase.
Speaker 2:The crazy mythical staircase.
Speaker 1:So hit them with a little bit of the story of that.
Speaker 2:So it doesn't have the supports in it that normal staircases have. And it wasn't witnessed being built.
Speaker 1:So real quick. It's a spiral staircase that's inside the church that essentially connected the lower level to their upper, like mezzanine area, and it had two 360 degree rotations and no center support and so, which is unheard of from an engineering perspective, Especially that long ago. Yeah, so all the stairs, all the weight of the stairs is resting on, like the next stair they built. So everything is essentially on that last stair.
Speaker 2:So now hit them with the rest of it, sorry. Well, you kind of covered a good job.
Speaker 1:The why the person. All that stuff.
Speaker 2:What do you mean? The person?
Speaker 1:So somebody I guess I'm gonna do it?
Speaker 2:Yes, you're gonna do it if you know where you're going.
Speaker 1:So, essentially, somebody came in and offered to build the stairs, and he came in, built them rather quickly and then bolted no payment, no nothing, no anything else.
Speaker 1:No name they really come. The sisters that started that church didn't really know what had happened, essentially, except for he built stairs, and to this day they still don't know who it is. There's been movies made about it, it's called the staircase, and so to this day it's still very much so a mystery as far as who that person was and how he was able to achieve this engineering thing. That's almost unachievable. So there are people inside the church that believe it was a you know, someone sent by God?
Speaker 2:How does he say an act of God, a saying to?
Speaker 1:something along those lines that kind of allowed it to happen. Now, as far as visiting this, it's cool to go visit. It was by far of all the kind of church historical things we did that felt a little commercialized.
Speaker 2:It did. Yeah, I'll give you that because it is.
Speaker 1:I don't remember the dollars. When it is, we'll put the website down below.
Speaker 2:I think it was like ten bucks, maybe something like a person that ballpark and so it's 20 bucks.
Speaker 1:There's really not a whole lot to see there, except for the staircase. Now there wasn't a ton of people, which was nice. It is an active church. So it did feel a little bit like you're spending ten bucks to be in a church which.
Speaker 2:And there was a store on the way.
Speaker 1:On the way out to there was a very extensive store like you could Tell that they were trying to make money at because of this, and so it felt a little bit Weird. I guess is the best way coming. I mean, we're fairly religious and so chocker, if you don't know, it did feel a little bit Like they were taking advantage of people that were there to see a miracle.
Speaker 2:Oh, I get what you're saying. Yeah, but part of the fun for me was knowing that you know where there's a mystery. There's always like conspiracy theories and different stuff like that. So if you Google this and like look for the government build it at all of the theories. I thought that was a lot of fun just seeing what everybody had to say. I did not so I'm curious now a little bit, but no, so so go do that if you're looking for it, because that's a rabbit hole.
Speaker 1:So one other place that probably hits again, another one of those histories big in this area. I think that's why I liked it so much, as I enjoy, like being in the place of history quite a bit, and so Another place is the New Mexico History Museum, which is actually so. They have a new structure, but it also encompasses the Palace of the Governors, so obviously the History Museum is exactly what it sounds it's a history museum and it was really cool. But their kind of star attraction is the fact that it is part of the Palace of the Governors, which is the oldest government building in the US. So again, another old thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the museum wasn't, I would say, top per se on my list. It was interesting but it was just kind of lengthy in my opinion. But I really enjoyed the Governor's Palace.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's say, I think most museums are lengthy for you.
Speaker 1:It's a possibility whereas I could spend half a day for to a full day in some, depending on which one. But yeah, they, it was really cool, so they were actually restoring some things while we were there, because obviously they have to keep this thing from falling. But there's, the Palace of the Governors is, like I said, the oldest municipal building, so government building In the US. In addition to that, it is the outward facing, so the plaza does this huge thing called the those like trade days, where a lot of people come in, and then there's all these vendors around. You see it Like if you look up at a picture of Santa Fe, like if you just Google Santa Fe, new Mexico, and click on images on Google, typically you see Palace of the Governors in the background and everybody like selling their wares, like jewelry, all kinds of stuff, out in front. That's Palace of the Governors. It's the exterior building, so it almost became a meeting place. And then there's a the plaza itself, the greenery portion. Their center of it is right outside Palace of the Governors as well.
Speaker 2:And so, in order to be qualified to sell your goods, there's actually a program they have to go through to be qualified for that. Yes and so they have. There's certain like history and cultural Requirements that they have to meet. So you're not just buying off of anybody that could have flown in from anywhere.
Speaker 1:No, the people they're actually made more than likely made the things that they're that they're selling. So it's not like walking into a gift shop and seeing the you know t-shirts for 299 and and the money goes back into that system for their support right, I mean you're actually.
Speaker 1:It's just like shopping small business wise, right, I mean you're, you're, they had, they make it, they sell it. It's start to finish farm to table, but stuff Workshop to table, I guess. So the other thing about it, though, is I thought was really cool is, again, they were restoring some things while we were there, so we got to see most of it, but we had to kind of look behind things to see. So one of the things that they were doing is they had finished this area and you could actually see to the original foundation.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:So there was this glass and you could see and they actually had it labeled in light so that when you look down through the plexiglass and the floor it actually had the time periods and it went all the way back to the Spanish in the 1800s of like this was the wood they originally used, to all the way up through the years, when they've had to obviously, you know, build on top of itself to structurally support the building the plaza itself is really cool Because if you actually just like sit in the middle in the plaza, they usually have An entertainment or something of the sort.
Speaker 2:That's always cultural based, it seems, and then just just everything around there and it was gorgeous, they had all these beautiful flowers, just a nice place to kind of hang out, and I think we even saw locals taking advantage of that. They'd go have lunch or something and just kind of sit out there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a ton of restaurants all around it. There's some pretty significant hotels around there as well and, don't get me wrong, it has that historical feel. It has been modernized a little bit in some ways too. Yeah, so I know that there was a Lucchese boot store right there, because just because I love the smell of leather, so those that stick out to me, and so there's some modern stores, your typical stuff You're gonna find, but there are a lot of like small local stuff as well, so I don't want to jump into food quite yet because that's where I want to go.
Speaker 2:Talking about the plaza, I think that's the first time I've ever heard you say that shucker.
Speaker 1:Because there is one other Attraction activity thing I want to talk about before, and it is you can get there from the plaza by walking. We kind of did, but you do have to walk a little bit and that's cross of the martyrs.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, where we went and saw sunset.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was gonna say this is a sunset spot, so absolutely, it is a little bit of a. I'm not using the term hike literally it's a walk. It's not long, but it is zigzag back up because you are going to one of the little foothills of the mountains right there. That's right adjacent to the downtown area, but it is. You know more about why the cross, the martyrs exist, at least you did the video.
Speaker 2:I did the video. That was a little bit ago.
Speaker 1:So during the public uprising, there was a church that was burned or something, and unfortunately a bunch of friars lost their lives, and I don't remember the date or how many, so we'll again We'll link all the actual information down below if you want to learn about that. But because this was built in dedication to them for losing their lives during that time, and so what it is. It's literally just a huge cross at the top, but it's surrounded by all these viewing areas now and it's one of the best sunset views we've seen off of, like actual inside the US. I think costals are always gonna be cool, like you know Sun going down with water, like down at Key West, around cruise ship that kind of stuff. But this is my land-based version of that.
Speaker 2:And the sunset over the mountains and things like that, it was really pretty. It turned into a little bit more of not a walk but a run because we misjudged our time we have a habit, apparently, with sunsets, of misjudging the time. So we need to move like earlier we do, and so it was like oh no, we're going, we got a run go.
Speaker 1:But we made this one I like the one that we did in Tennessee, where we kind of had to witness it backwards from a ski lift.
Speaker 2:We oopsied that one, but no, it was. It was gorgeous, and if you're just, you know, go have dinner and then go kind of walk up there and enjoy the Sunset. I think it's a great cap to the day.
Speaker 1:It really is.
Speaker 2:But when you're done with that, head back to the plaza right down by Palace of the Governors, and Time for some food time for some food, and we're gonna start at the five and dime, because everybody's should start at the five and dime, the home of the Frito pie my dad would be so proud just the home of the Frito pie.
Speaker 1:They are credited with creating the Frito pie.
Speaker 2:What do I say? The home of?
Speaker 1:well, there's a lot of places I have a home for. I can make a Frito pie here. That's now. I'm the home of the home of the.
Speaker 2:Frito pie.
Speaker 1:They wouldn't be shocking if you looked at me capital T for the the home, okay, okay, like the Ohio State University, exactly Great, so I just like them too. Um, you don't you?
Speaker 2:love Frito pies. I do like Frito pies All right, and this is a very non-descript little hole in the wall.
Speaker 1:It's a gimmicky five and dime. It's the five and dime you're exactly thinking of. It's where you can get all your snow globes, t-shirts, anything that's a gift that's mass produced. You know how. There's like three t-shirts that every city has, whether it says Durango, colorado, fort Worth, texas, santa Fe, new Mexico. That's where you get that shirt and they just print the new name on it.
Speaker 2:That's exactly it. And then tucked back way in the corner. I think they only have two or three tables and one little lady behind the counter. Their menu is about this big it's teeny tiny.
Speaker 1:It's Frito pie, fritos or chili bingo.
Speaker 2:So anyways, we went, we enjoyed that. I loved it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's just one of those like I definitely wouldn't make like a dinner plans around it, I mean it's too gimmicky, but if you need a like a lunch or something like that, pop in and grab one. For starters, they're cheap. I believe it was like three bucks.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say three or five dollars and it was. It was really good. Surprisingly, I kind of expected it to maybe not be and it was the hype, but I thought it was really good for what it was.
Speaker 1:Yeah it's homemade chili and we're talking legitimate chili. Sometimes in New Mexico and you say chili, they mean something else. Just full disclosure there on food Magic. It's gonna be green, but this was like legitimate what you're thinking of chili if you're from Texas or anywhere else in the US. So yeah, I mean it tasted homemade. Not sure if it was or it wasn't. If it wasn't good for them, they disguised the crap out of it.
Speaker 2:I did great.
Speaker 1:But yeah, and they literally leave it in the Frito bag. That cut it. So if you know, those like Dorito walking taco bags, I'm pretty sure they got the idea from this, so sure these people are just giving ideas out for free, apparently. But yeah, they cut it up, they dump in some cheese, dump in some chili, dump in some more cheese and give you onion, don't forget the onion. Some diced onions, stick a fork in it, and here you go.
Speaker 2:It was, and you know if you've ever made Frito pie or had them, like with families, stuff like that. It's nostalgic, so brings back all the warm, fuzzy memories too.
Speaker 1:I will say typically, frito pie is a winter or cool weather thing. For me, this one's good enough 100 degrees still get it. Maybe just split one then instead of like a full one because it's just Breaking your mold here. Well, I'm talking to them, I'm not saying I'm oh, you're not gonna, oh, okay. It's advice, not what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 2:I'm doing the same as I do pretty much.
Speaker 1:But yeah, that that's a quick little spot. There's tons of restaurants around here. We didn't eat it at all of them because we couldn't, but right around the corner I'm starting with after Frito pie, I'm going dessert.
Speaker 2:I expect nothing less.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna have you say the name of it, because I keep messing it up.
Speaker 2:Oh, kakao, the chocolate play so good. It was okay, so they're no little weird. They're known for their like chocolate elixirs and it's a fancy way I know everybody's like oh, hot cocoa, kind of it's more like melted chocolate in Drinky form, so like they're really small. They are. They're really small. And then there's other things that they say have holistic benefits and all kinds of things. I Don't know, I'm not gonna vouch that there's LSD in it.
Speaker 1:I'm just kidding, there's not.
Speaker 2:No. Lordy where are we gone? I was thinking like cinnamon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, there it's. It's not. If they have different, like they're their favorite famous one is like a chili based one, so it's a little spicy, you know, when you think of like spicy hot chocolate and not Mexican hot chocolate. Mexican hot chocolate is like Cinnamon and a different kind of it's Mexican chocolate versus regular chocolate, which has a little more of a carmely note to it. This is straight up like they put chilies on it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was, and the, I would say the profiles are very vibrant. Yes and that might be a good way to describe it, because even the chocolate itself, if you got one without the other flavors, was still very rich.
Speaker 1:There's a reason why they're this small. They're like they're tiny. We're talking like they serve it by like the three to four ounce size and that's like that's the normal size. And, to be honest, like because I got the biggest one thinking I don't want four ounces of hot chocolate, give me 10 or eight or whatever the biggest one was. And you took a sip and you're like oh, oh my.
Speaker 2:And that's why.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it one. One sip sits with you for a minute because it's very thick.
Speaker 2:So don't walk in thinking that this is your basic hot cocoa or Mexican chocolate, because it's neither of those. They do have those.
Speaker 1:I saw them on the menu and they play like they're much larger sizes, obviously, and they say traditional hot chocolate and then the elixirs are not that.
Speaker 2:And this is also another place that goes back into the history, where there's you know how it's owned and how it's run, and you know the communities that it supports, so do recommend going. And then they also, besides the elixirs, had just plain chocolate.
Speaker 1:All kinds of chocolates chocolate brownies. In other words, if you, if it's traditional and you make it with chocolate, they probably have a version of it.
Speaker 2:And it was delicious but very rich.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and again, I hate to keep going back to the video, but we will. We physically show you a lot of that stuff and kind of break it down. So definitely check out the video when you're done listening to the podcast. Don't go yet. Um, but yeah it's. I remember the, the. I had a peanut butter chocolate brownie.
Speaker 2:That was more of a fudge consistency than brownie. And I think that's exactly how the whole place was. You expect a brownie, you get fudge.
Speaker 1:No you're not wrong.
Speaker 2:It was. It was really good and unique. I don't think that there's a place like this that we've ever been to.
Speaker 1:Honestly, and it's almost the destination place. I will say we were going, they were getting ready to close Notice the theme here Um, so we didn't get to eat inside. It is a destination itself. I will say. So, if you do get to go there, uh, go there early enough where you can sit inside, enjoy it kind of take your time, kind of order as you go, cause I think that's the one thing I wish we would have done, because I don't know that I would have gotten a anywhere near as much stuff.
Speaker 2:That's a good point.
Speaker 1:And once I knew, understood it, I might've changed what I got because of different flavor, because it's really hard to describe not only the texture but the flavor profile of vibrance is close to the flavor profile you can come up with. The texture is still something that's super difficult, especially on the elixir side, because it's creamy but also not creamy, If that makes any sense whatsoever.
Speaker 2:None, welcome to my life, so it's like nothing.
Speaker 1:No, I'm just kidding, it just defaults themselves. But it is hard. It's almost like that last little bit, you know, like after you have a chocolate in your mouth for a little bit, and there's that last little bit and it's kind of mixed with. This is gonna sound gross, but you're spit and all that. That's almost the consistency of it, but in a drink form.
Speaker 2:And so I would say sit chocolate, spit my two cents also. Don't get there when they're closing, because Sorry, don't get them in the closing cause don't get there right when they're closing, because something that would have benefited us is to be able to talk to the employees and say what do you recommend? What's different? Tell me the story, not just what I can find on your website.
Speaker 1:Right, and so we kind of just took a stab and guess at it, because they were, you could tell. I mean they weren't like trying to kick us out by any means, they were super nice about it but you could tell that they were gearing down for the day and so we didn't want to be in their way and so we chose to take it and we just did everything in the truck at that point. So, but yeah, definitely check out the cacao Cacao.
Speaker 2:Dang it, dang it, dang it, dang it, dang it. There's no cows in it.
Speaker 1:Check out the chocolate place. I'm going to link below. Do you have somewhere you want to go after chocolate Cause I took the chocolate.
Speaker 2:Chocker, chocker, chocker. All right, a couple of other places that aren't dessert based and are real meals which we haven't hit yet, surprisingly, I'm not considering Frito Pie or real meal.
Speaker 1:So I actually think it's important to talk about the staples real quick. I we kind of got into this without like this isn't on the restaurant list.
Speaker 2:Oh boy, more of those.
Speaker 1:Well, but it's not Okay. So it's in New Mexico. Green chilies are a very big thing.
Speaker 2:Very big, very common.
Speaker 1:There are during season. So if you ever heard of hatch green chilies, that's from this area. Um, green chilies in general, like this is. They use it in everything, which is great until it becomes too much. Um, and for some, like I loved it, I ate it up because I knew it was going to end at some point.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, no, and we both like green chilies, but sometimes you just need a break. I didn't have that break.
Speaker 1:All right, it wasn't, I didn't need it. Lauren did a little bit more, but so one of the things that's super popular is the fire roasted green chilies. Literally, you just buy green chilies and they chunk them into a thing that's like torching them and they roast them for you in like a spick. It turned I don't know how what they call those big things, but um, literally the H E B, the hidden H E B there, um, the H E B, um was doing it for you. So we again.
Speaker 1:During the week, people, um, they only do it when they can do, enough of them that it makes sense, and so, like during the week, you're not going to see it as much. But like Friday, Saturday and Sunday, they're all firing up but you can't drive. You can't drive a half mile and not see one of these things on the side of the road.
Speaker 1:Very true, yeah, they're in the parking lots, they're everywhere, it's almost like a little food truck set up kind of a thing. But instead they have those two huge baskets on the back and they just throw a bunch of green chilies and there's turned the from the propane of fires on and and then it just rotates them and so green chili is a big portion of what they're what they do here, so a lot of the food is based around that. Sorry, I wanted to hit that before we got into the rest of the restaurant.
Speaker 2:So the other thing when we head to the restaurants is that here in Texas when we hear chili like um, we tend to think almost like a stew, you know with with meat and, debatably, beans.
Speaker 1:No beans.
Speaker 2:See debatably. Uh, so that's what we think of.
Speaker 1:When we hear stew, it's chili.
Speaker 2:That's what I'm saying. I'm trying to discern the different. There's different kinds of chili, so there's like chili that's peppers, there's one kind of chili that we're used to, and then there's the chili that Santa Fe knows. There's green pepper which is like Christmas chili, where you get a green kind of chili on your enchilada or whatever. You get a red kind of chili.
Speaker 1:So they mean chili. We're going to say sauce or the rice.
Speaker 2:Ryan's head's going to explode, it's more like an inch a lot of sauce is how I would closely describe it.
Speaker 1:You cross between like an inch, a lot of sauce and like a salsa.
Speaker 2:Right, yes, so if you're going and you think that something's going to be smothered in your favorite meat based chili, you're probably wrong, you're very wrong. Understand that they have a different mean for that, but anyways, so that being said, we went to this place Chili 101. We went to this place called the pantry that's known kind of for breakfast brunch stuff. I thought it was really good. It's going to take a lot to really impress me over breakfast.
Speaker 1:I think it's unique. I think it's it's important to understand the difference in like Mexican style cuisines, and I say that because you know a lot of people say, oh, let's get Mexican food. Well, here in the U S that typically means Tex-Mex, not actual Mexican cuisine, because Mexican cuisine is actually very fish-based, because a lot of ocean there, and it's just very different. Now there are things that are similarities, but in typical US fashion we throw way more cheese on it, way more carbs.
Speaker 2:As you say, the flour tortillas instead of the corn and all kinds.
Speaker 1:We US it up a little bit and so it's that cross and that's where you get Tex-Mex. It just kind of started in Texas. That's why it's called Tex-Mex. So it is a similar style of cooking in Mexico that they use in New Mexico, but they use the green chili way more prevalently and it's like this hybrid between the two, and so it's kind of an odd thing trying to describe food in New Mexico, because it's kind of like Tex-Mex, because it is a little carbier, it is a little cheesier, but it's almost like the meats and things are more prepared, like what I, at least, am more customarily used to in Mexico.
Speaker 2:Right, okay, I agree with you there. So sorry, all right. So what did you think of the pantry?
Speaker 1:This was the first time I got to do, I think, my favorite ordering thing of all times and say I want it Christmas style, which I didn't understand until I went there. And Christmas style is Lauren kind of touched on it earlier. So it's where you get the green. I'm calling it salsa or sauce, the green chili sauce and the red sauce, the red being the more traditional, not there greens. If you just order sauce, they're gonna get green, and it's a little bit of both. The green was typically a little spicier. I like it, but yeah, it was great. But it was kind of fun to have the contrast versus just one or the other. I do that because a lot of times in that type of cuisine it's like it's just chicken enchiladas, right, so it's like three chicken enchiladas and that's what you get. So the flavor profile never changes, but getting the two different sauces completely changed them Very true, and I got something very I think I got something very not New Mexico-ish.
Speaker 1:Pancakes.
Speaker 2:Right, I was a little over the green chilies at that point because we'd had so much, but so that was a good place for breakfast, brunchy kind of stuff. If you really want, like New Mexico cuisine, to know where the locals go and what the food is really about, there's this place called El Comal, and it's on Cereos Road. I believe is where this one was.
Speaker 1:But anyways, If it's not on it, it's really really close to it.
Speaker 2:A hole in the wall. That food was delicious, though it really was.
Speaker 1:So we did this on our second trip in the RV when we were doing a horse show. Again, the underlying thing with the horse show is that one of Lauren's trainers is originally from Santa Fe, so we're full on cheating at this point.
Speaker 2:Yes, we know who to follow.
Speaker 1:We found our Santa Fe Sherpa, just like we have the Tennessee Sherpas now. So this is somewhere that she grew up going and it's kind of like almost like a family staple for them. It's family owned it's very much, so you will miss it if you don't know where you're going.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Because in fact, there's two the exact similar restaurants next to each other and one happens to have the patio because, remember, everybody kept going to that one that's right Most of the barn went to this dinner so we lost a few people to the wrong restaurant and to pull them back over and this one's right down, but it was some of the best food yes I had. It was. It was might be the best food in New Mexico that I had.
Speaker 2:So to me, if you were going and like, just wanted a taste of true New Mexico, without any gimmicks, without anything else, I would head to El Camal.
Speaker 1:The only only little warning I would give you is that, because it is traditional for them, it had more. It wasn't as commercialized, which means it was a little spicier, which? I like but not everybody does. So just be careful, when you like, don't go ahead first into the sauce. So give it a little demo test first before you go dive into that and burn your taste buds off.
Speaker 2:And then if, like me, you kind of get over, I guess, the same flavors. I don't want to say that, but because the green chilies are everywhere Sometimes you're like, can I have a taste of Fort Worth back, or just a taste of regular American food? Mcdonald's, there was a place called the Ranch House who had really good, like quality food, but they had a little bit more variety if you wanted, not so much taste of Santa Fe.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they had. It was still Southwest food, but it wasn't so heavy. They trust me, they still have the green chili stuff. It's everywhere. You're not gonna wait for.
Speaker 2:You could just like a burger or a salad. They had plenty of other things as well, so and then, once we got done with the green chilies at the restaurant, somebody went to the store and bought green chilies to put on the burgers at home.
Speaker 1:Okay, hang on.
Speaker 2:And they were delicious.
Speaker 1:We.
Speaker 1:So one of the things we like to do is to experience the full culture, so not just the food scene, but kind of the history and all of that stuff, and so we try to immerse ourselves as best we can.
Speaker 1:At one point the dog hair flying if you're watching this at one point we were trying to come up with doing some other type of video for the YouTube channel and we were gonna do more of like the cooking side of it, so like there was gonna be a second video. I don't mind talking about it here because it's not happening now, but we were gonna do a second video, kind of like the podcast is our second thing to the main videos. This was gonna be like a experience the food. So we were gonna go find these food things and what made it unique and then come back and actually make it at the RV. And so one of the things that I liked that was like a cross between what we normally do and what they did was like they make this thing called a green chili stew which is a little thicker than like the sauces typically would be.
Speaker 1:Kind of like reduced yeah, it's just more condensed, essentially, and a little more. You can put it on a burger and it'll stay, whereas if it's sauce, it'll just go everywhere and put that on like a burger and then with like a jalapeno style cheese or something along those lines, and so that's what we were doing, and so you're blaming me for putting green chilies on a burger. At the same time too, like it was making the burger that making the sauce.
Speaker 2:We made enough for the barn they seem to like it and in the same breath I said it was delicious.
Speaker 1:It was good, it was a pain, it was Well, and I was also trying to film it, and there's a reason why that video never saw the light of day. It's really hard to film yourself cooking, unless you have like 14 cameras and you just hit on on all of them. So True, but yeah, we definitely immersed in the food scene.
Speaker 2:We usually do.
Speaker 1:And we had to find some way to burn off all the calories we were consuming there which obviously I didn't, but Lauren did.
Speaker 2:I rode my horse every day. I burned plenty of calories. Did you know you can burn like 500 calories an hour.
Speaker 1:Just sit. What type of horse riding I do? All you gotta do is sit.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm, you sit on my horse, tell me how that goes.
Speaker 1:Nope, I don't have a death wish, but we did find some hikes and there are a slew. So there's no actual national park right here. There is Right Kind of one, but there's a bunch of national park sites, that's right.
Speaker 1:So, shaker, if you didn't know, in the national park system. That's why it's called the system and not the national parks, because there are the national parks, the big ones, the Yosemites, the glaciers, the Great Smoky Mountains, but there's also a bunch of other sites, so we hit up a couple of them and we're gonna start with Bandelier National Park.
Speaker 2:Not National Park.
Speaker 1:Bandelier National Monument Monument. I just had a whole speech on how they're not national parks and I messed it up right like that and I even wrote down monument right there. But we're gonna start with Bandelier National Monument.
Speaker 2:That was the one we had to travel north for right, and that went to like the caves, we had to get on the shuttle. Yes, so they were working on the roads.
Speaker 1:We had to park up closer to like I think it was Los Alamos or that ballpark, and then they shuttled you down. There's a bunch of national park sites out here, so we only hit a couple of them, but, yeah, we had to take a shuttle. I believe that that parking area is now reopened. They were fixing the road when we were there and so they only had so much parking because of construction stuff and so they were asking you ready to park up and then shuttle you down.
Speaker 2:And so that's a good point. But they'll always check the website before you go, because this was on there, it was clear as day. It wasn't difficult to find because we knew what we were looking for.
Speaker 1:We went to the spot we knew we were supposed to go to, not the one we thought we were supposed to go to Exactly Not where Google Maps would have taken us.
Speaker 2:And then the other thing is remember that this is up in elevation and so sometimes it's gonna snow, and that may impair your ability to get to some of these sites, and some of them may be even closed. I think one of them is actually closed right now because of it, so double check before you go.
Speaker 1:We were there in the middle of summer, so we weren't worried about it.
Speaker 2:So we're not a concern for us, but if you try to go in December you may find otherwise.
Speaker 1:Typically if it says snow in the forecast, Lawrence out Out.
Speaker 2:Going to Florida bye.
Speaker 1:So that's a dead giveaway that it wasn't snow when we were there, but yes, so Bandelier. Yep.
Speaker 2:And so we took the little shuttle. They had their little welcome house thing. It wasn't very big, and then we just hit the trail. I think it was a one mile loop.
Speaker 1:Literally right out the back of the visitor center.
Speaker 2:And it is so flat and easy for the most part Now, once you get up to the little caves that had a bunch of stairs on it.
Speaker 1:If you've ever seen the Pueblo like cave structures, that this is where that is. It's in Pueblo. Now there's a bunch of them. There's other sites as well. This is just the most predominant one. Once you get up into that area, it does get pretty hilly and stary and tight in some places. So if you don't have the best balance or you don't have the best fitness, just consider you can walk all the way out to it and then there's a bypass where you don't have to go up.
Speaker 2:Right, so you can continue that perfectly flat and accessible.
Speaker 1:Right, you can continue that. So just know that it's. You can do that and you can get as close as you can get and still see them. You just are not going to get up and actually touch, and there's some you can crawl into.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:But this is also the home of the main version of the Pueblo Indians, because they had their structures. Now there's not a lot of the structures left, minus the ones in the caves, cause shocker things built 250 years ago typically don't stand up over time and so unless they're preserved and so you see a lot of the foundations and a lot of those types of things but they have. They did a really good job for markers and kind of showing what used to be there.
Speaker 2:Yes, and when you check in, when you first get there, make sure to go in and get the guide. I think it's like $2 and it's going to give you all of the information you need as to what you're looking at. So highly recommend $2, well spent.
Speaker 1:Cause there's a ton of history from the prayer chambers. I forget what they were actually called.
Speaker 2:I want to call a Saint Sinote's, and that's not what they are, that's a hole with water in Mexico, not this but in like different ladders going to different places. You can still see some of the fire burns where they would have fires and their little prayer centers and gathering places.
Speaker 1:It was so cool, all carvings they a lot of them would leave stories in the wall. So a lot of that's there and that trail guide is great because it goes over all that Right and it actually talks about the one specifically you're looking at.
Speaker 2:Cause there's they live little like numbered markers along the way so you could reference that book.
Speaker 1:Um, but yeah no it, that was so cool. And then down in back it started to rain a little bit on the second half of this for us. So we that second portion of that, the big fancy camera didn't love rain.
Speaker 2:I know and I saw a deer. I was really happy about the deer.
Speaker 1:I think we spent as much time looking at the deer as we did the structures.
Speaker 1:We probably did but we kind of booked it after that. Um, but Bandler national monument I didn't mess it up, I just paused like I was going Um, definitely worth a stop. There are quite a bit of other national park things not too far away from here. A little further north is Los Alamos. Why is Los Alamos sound semi familiar?
Speaker 1:Well, if you saw the movie that came out recently, oppenheimer um, this is the birthplace of the atomic bomb. So this is where they made this, the little makeshift city, not not Los Alamos itself. Outside of town, um, where they came, all the scientists came and it was like this big secret thing. There is a bunch of national park stuff going on with that and a bunch of sites. We unfortunately I think it was a combination of things being closed Right, cause it was like a Wednesday or something and we didn't have time because, again, horseshoe, so we didn't get to do a whole lot of that. But that's just why we love RVing, cause now we can go, now we get to go back and we have something we haven't done.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:And a lot of places touch on the atomic bomb and all that stuff. This one is just the actual sites and goes into a lot more detail. But that is right there as well. But if you head a little south and east, so from Santa Fe itself just east, um, you get to the Pekos National Historic Park.
Speaker 2:There you go, you got it right, good job.
Speaker 1:One for two. I'm batting 500 on this one.
Speaker 2:That one was pretty easy also. Oh, before I forget, at Bandelier, when we got done, there was a restaurant. Oh, that's right, and it was actually really good. I didn't know what to expect. I kind of thought it would be like amusement park food and it was really good. So plan for that like to have lunch there, because not only are you supporting that, which is really good, um, but also the food was delicious.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and this was an outside vendor that had partnered with the national part. They do that sometimes for, like restaurants and things. Instead of the national park service having to do it, they'll bring in an outside vendor um to to do that essentially, and they just have to operate inside park hours and all that good stuff. Uh, yeah, burgers, sandwiches. I mean kind of basic food, but really solid food. They had a bison burger. I didn't get it, I got the regular burger, cause I like how? Um not cacao. Uh, sorry, inside joke time, um, but yeah, just solid. So if you're looking for a meal, that's one worth stopping at. Sometimes the national park food stops aren't right.
Speaker 2:Go back to your RV. Go back to your RV and that's why I'm saying stop there. It's a good one, okay All right Back to Pekas, um, so that was more, uh, more flat walking, I would say. For the most part, um, and this one had more stuff in the ground to look at, but it also had the really neat church that had been rebuilt like three times and right and it's still for the most part, had a lot of the structure.
Speaker 1:Their roof was totally gone. Um, but again the national parks service at such a good job because at one of the lookouts they actually had the original structure with an overlay of the of the what used to be there, essentially, and they you can literally just go walk into this thing all around.
Speaker 1:I mean they asked you not to climb on it, obviously, um, sometimes kids need leashes to not do that. But, um, yeah it's. I don't even know how to describe. It's really hard to describe historical stuff because it's like this feeling of like, just you know, back in 1820s, 1830s, 40s, 50s, whatever this thing was built like, people were standing here that eventually kind of developed into what is now the Santa Fe area and everything, and so it's, it's awe inspiring almost, and and like that you just sit in that same spot where somebody with zero technology whatsoever built something that I'm pretty sure I couldn't figure out now with technology.
Speaker 2:Well, and that remnants are still existing, even with the weather and everything else that. You know we can't make a road without a pothole, but here there's part of a wall that still stands up. Um, so that's really neat. And then the maps will say you know, like this was food storage and this was a bedroom and and you know all these other things, and they're so tiny. I just couldn't get over that, like how tiny the rooms were. And I guess you know they did it out of necessity, not out of comfort per se.
Speaker 1:Right, they said like eight people would sleep in a room and it was literally like a 10 by 10, not even a 10 by 10. It was like a five by 10, five by eight, just something ridiculous. I'm like on top of each other. But I also remember two back then. People were smaller.
Speaker 2:They were smaller, yeah, and you know the meeting sites and those sorts of things, and then off to the side they would have these um where they would do prayers and rituals and things, but they were like in the ground with the ladders and so they were just so set apart that you could tell that it was meant for something entirely different. It was really neat.
Speaker 1:And you can though those prayer sites she was talking about. There were a handful that you could actually go down where they had put a. The ladder looked like it was from them, but it wasn't but it wasn't.
Speaker 2:It was meant for people like me, um.
Speaker 1:So they did have a few of those, some examples that were necessarily truly authentic, but they were really really close to getting an idea of what it would have been like.
Speaker 2:So and now this one. This park has two entrance sites, so know that and so we went in the one. I think this was further south, the one that's a little bit more north of it. That's where you can get to Gloria de Pass, which is a big like battlefield site from the civil war there's. They say that it's because it's between the mountains where there's actually a place to pass which is really unique. It was really important for travel and trade, but also for battle.
Speaker 2:And so there were several kind of big ticket items that happened there and if you go purchase the guide you'll know about them.
Speaker 1:Yep, exactly. So you know, this park is as close as you're going to get to an actual national park without it being a national park. In fact, a lot of national parks start off as what this was. So, it is encompassing enough to be one. It just doesn't have the classification, for whatever reason. I don't know how that all works, so I'm not going to pretend like I do.
Speaker 2:And this was thousands of acres. So if you think you're just going to walk up and kind of see it and walk away, not necessarily it's a lot bigger than that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're not going to like. If you park at the main visitor center and want to go to the battlefield, you're going to get in your car and drive. Like down the highway, yeah, and a lot of the area is off or unestablished I think is what the park service calls it to where you really shouldn't go out there because of wildlife and other conservation things. So you do have to exit and reenter.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely recommend. It wasn't I would say a whole day adventure for us, but easily a half day and definitely recommend.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Plus the drive out there was gorgeous because you're kind of weevil wobbling through all of the the mountain foothold, the mountain foothold.
Speaker 2:You got your footholds.
Speaker 1:Don't you have a foothold Foothills? There we go, all right, so Santa Fe overall. Never go back or wish you lived there.
Speaker 2:Oh, somewhere in between. Well, I mean our RV was there.
Speaker 1:So technically we did live there for about a week and a half. It's too cold for my blood.
Speaker 2:I will not be living there, but I'm sure we will go back. There will probably be another horse show involved with it, but that's, that's just a happy little accident.
Speaker 1:Well and one thing that we Lauren mentioned it a couple of times in there that's worth noting is you are right there on the foothills of the Southern Rockies, and so if you're into skiing or winter sports, this might be a good spot to go camp, where you don't have to drive your RV up into the mountains and then commute into Taos, red River, those types of places.
Speaker 1:Just kind of something to notate because, you are right there, there is so much to do in this area, and the food scene and the art scene, which we barely touched, true, and everything else, I feel like we could have explored for another month and not done something twice. Well, and it was.
Speaker 2:I don't want to call it a lazy pace, but it was an easy pace. You could just walk around and kind of meander a little bit and there wasn't an ever anything that rushed you. It's not a high pressure kind of place to see, unless you're at the horse show.
Speaker 1:Unless you're at the horse show.
Speaker 1:It's just super high pressure. So All right. So that is our Santa Fe guide. Hopefully you enjoyed it and you made it all the way to the end. If you did, thank you for starters. Secondly, if you could do us a quick favor, if you're listening to this on your favorite podcast platform, do us a favor and rate and review. It helps us get this out to as many people as possible. And if you're on YouTube, comment something down below, like what you your favorite green chili recipe would be, or when we go back the thing that we missed?
Speaker 2:what we need to see, or that?
Speaker 1:So thank you guys, so much for listening, and we can't wait to get into next week's topic, because I'm already excited about talking about it. You're just excited about talking.
Speaker 2:I am excited about talking.
Speaker 1:I am excited about talking. See you guys next week.