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Settled in
turn by Native Americans, Spaniards, Mexicans and Yankees, NEW MEXICO
is among the most ethnically and culturally diverse of all the states
in the US. Each successive group has built upon the legacy of its
predecessors; their various histories and achievements are closely
intertwined, and in some ways the late-coming white Americans from
the north and east have had comparatively little impact. Signs of
the region's rich heritage are everywhere, from ancient pictographs
and cliff dwellings to the design of the state's license plates,
taken from a Zia Indian symbol for the sun - the one near-constant
fact of life in this arid land.
New Mexico's
indigenous peoples - especially the Pueblo Indians , as the name
suggests clear descendants of the Ancestral Puebloans - provide
a sense of cultural continuity. Despite the Pueblo Revolt of 1680,
which forced a temporary Spanish withdrawal into Mexico, the missionary
endeavor here was in general less brutal than elsewhere. The proselytizing
padres eventually co-opted the natives without destroying their
traditional ways of life, as local deities and celebrations were
incorporated into Catholic practice. Somewhat bizarrely to outsiders,
grand churches still stand at the center of many Pueblo settlements,
often adjacent to the underground ceremonial chambers known as kivas
, and almost always built in the local adobe style.
The Americans
who took over from the Mexicans in 1848 saw New Mexico as a useless
wasteland. But for a few mining booms and range wars - such as the
Lincoln County War, which brought Billy the Kid to fame - New Mexico
was left relatively undisturbed until it finally became a state
in 1912. During World War II, it was the base of operations for
the top-secret Manhattan Project , which built and detonated the
first atomic bomb, and since then it has been home to America's
premier weapons research outposts. By and large, people here work
close to the land - mining, farming and ranching - with tourism
increasingly underpinning the economy.
Northern New
Mexico centers on the magnificent landscapes of the Rio Grande Valley
, which contains its two finest cities: Santa Fe , the adobe-fronted
capital, and the artists' colony and winter resort of Taos , with
its nearby pueblo. More than a dozen Pueblo villages can be found
in the mountainous area between the two, while to the west lie the
evocative ancient ruins at Bandelier and Puyé . The broad
swath of central New Mexico along I-40 - the interstate highway
that succeeded the old Route 66 - pivots around the state's biggest
city, Albuquerque , with the extraordinary mesa-top Pueblo village
of Ácoma ("Sky City") an hour's drive to the west.
In wild and wide-open southern New Mexico , the deep Carlsbad Caverns
are the main attraction, while you can still stumble upon old mining
and cattle-ranching towns that have somehow hung on since the end
of the Wild West.
For many visitors,
the defining feature of New Mexico is its adobe architecture , as
seen on homes, churches, and even shopping malls and motels. Adobe
bricks are a sun-baked mixture of earth, sand, charcoal and chopped
grass or straw, set with a mortar of much the same composition,
and then plastered over with mud and straw. The color of the soil
used dictates the color of the final building, and thus subtle variations
can be seen all across the state. However, adobe is a far from convenient
material: it needs replastering every few years and turns to mud
when water seeps up from the ground, so that many buildings have
to be sporadically raised and bolstered by the insertion of rocks
at their base. These days, most of what looks like adobe is actually
painted cement or concrete, but even this looks attractive enough
in its own semi-kitsch way, and hunting out such superb old adobes
as the remote Santuario de Chimayó on the " High Road
" between Taos and Santa Fe, the formidable church of San Francisco
de Asis in Ranchos de Taos, or the multitiered dwellings of Taos
Pueblo , can provide the focus of an enjoyable New Mexico tour.
You'll also
become familiar with another New Mexico trademark, the bright-red
ristras , or strings of dried chili peppers , that adorn doorways
throughout the state; festooned on restaurant entrances, they serve
as warnings of the fiery delights that await within.
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About
New Mexico
