Ideas for New Mexico trip?

[tRidiot]

So we're heading to NM on June 4th - hopefully. Assuming I get my motor and transmission in and my truck back by then... lol.

We have from the 4th until the 12th, when we drop The Boy at Glorieta Adventure Camp and head home. And we'll have our 2 year old German Shepherd with us.

We will drive to Santa Fe on the 4th and 5th, stay the weekend, and we have a rafting trip on Monday the 7th. We'll probably just relax around town, visit restaurants, maybe wander the town, etc.

On the 8th, we'll probably head NW towards Four Corners. Part of our plan to 'visit' all the states - we can knock out several at once, lol. For The Boy, not us, we've been to all 4. That's only 4½ hours from Santa Fe, so it's an easy trip.

We kicked around the idea of Carlsbad Caverns, but that's another 8½ hours to far SE NM from Four Corners. Our trip wraps up on Saturday the 12th back in Santa Fe dropping The Boy at camp and we'll head home with the dog.

We like nature and scenery and such, but we don't want to hike 6,000 ft peaks. We're going for leisure and hiking isn't my idea of relaxation. I'm more of a beach guy, but we ain't putting up with airline/flying restriction BS this year, so we thought we'd drive around NM.

Maybe southern Colorado would be nice, too? I think there're some gondola rides through the mountains or something? I dunno... again, we have the dog with us, so if it's someplace we can't take her, we'll have to find a doggy day care somewhere nearby.

Native American ruins and culture ain't really our thing, either - we have been to tons of that stuff in OK, and it's cool in passing, but it seems to get a bit redundant to me. So I know that's a LOT of NM - hiking and Native American stuff. lol. So why are we going there??? lol

Oh, and I think we're looking at some kind of hot air balloon thing near Santa Fe or Albuquerque as well?

So anyways, we've got a few days to kill from June 8-12th in northern NM, maybe southern CO, I'm open to ideas that don't make me walk mountains, right?

Let me know what you guys think.

 

[PanhandleGlocker]

If you like driving and haven’t done it, go north to Taos and drive the Enchanted Circle. You can always go through the canyon to Cimarron and head north towards Raton and go to the Whittington Center. Assuming you haven’t been before...

 

[tRidiot]

No, we've never been to any of these places.

 

[PanhandleGlocker]

No, we've never been to any of these places.

i suggest that area then. Red River has a really good brewery too if you drive the Enchanted Circle. Good food and beer. I think that whole town is dog friendly.

 

[BobbyV]

Durango and Silverton would both we worth the trip . . . when we lived in Farmington we'd drive up there often.

If you go to the 4 corners be sure to go south of Shiprock a little and actually visit the rock the town is named after. Be ware that the reservation is open range and there is no telling what you'll see on the roads.

 

[tRidiot]

Durango and Silverton would both we worth the trip . . . when we lived in Farmington we'd drive up there often.

If you go to the 4 corners be sure to go south of Shiprock a little and actually visit the rock the town is named after. Be ware that the reservation is open range and there is no telling what you'll see on the roads.

What does that mean? Like cattle and buffalo on the roads and such?

 

[BobbyV]

What does that mean? Like cattle and buffalo on the roads and such?

Cattle and horses mainly . . . unless things have changed in the last 20 years. You'll see lots of dead ones along the roadways. And the stray dogs are doing great because of it . . . or they were.

There were no buffalo on the Navajo when we lived out there that I was aware of . . . we actually lived on the reservation for a time in the mid 90s.

 

[golddigger14s]

Wait till October for the Balloon Fest.

 

[twotonevert]

I was going to suggest Mesa Verda but you stated you didnt like ruins, these are far different than usual places and well worth the visit. From 4 Corners, Cortez CO is not far and you could head up to Telluride and do the loop on the Million Dollar highway. Lots of place to pull off and do short hikes.
As mentioned Taos is very nice, great little town square area and good food.

 

[tRidiot]

I was going to suggest Mesa Verda but you stated you didnt like ruins, these are far different than usual places and well worth the visit. From 4 Corners, Cortez CO is not far and you could head up to Telluride and do the loop on the Million Dollar highway. Lots of place to pull off and do short hikes.
As mentioned Taos is very nice, great little town square area and good food.

Well, it's not that we don't like them... it's just we've seen a bunch at various places, and it's not necessarily something we want to go out of our way and make a special detour to spend hours combing through. If it's where we're going to do something else, in the same area, doesn't take hours to get through, sure. So in other words, they're neat, they're ok, but they aren't our focus, and they're more of a passing neat factor than something to really spend a whole day or even a half day on. Does that make sense? Again, not trying to be insensitive, but we'd be more into overlooks for natural passes, waterfalls and streams, beautiful parks and vistas, etc. We've just seen and done a lot of Native stuff and it isn't our focus anymore.