Friday March 23rd - Before going on Retreat

1) Visit to Sandia Mountain which overlook Albuquerque (these were the mountains we had such a long time to look at when we were held up with the accident on the Freeway!).
I thought it was worth-while showing you a couple of photos brought home by those who went on this optional trip the other day. It was the day I was on the cooking of 'brunch' (in a team of 3 for 40 people) so I decided prudence was better than an excursion, and did not regret my decision when I collapsed on my bed and caught up on an hour's sleep after spending the morning flat out in the kitchen preparing brunch! However, those who went, had a wonderful time with the cable train to the top (15 minutes) at over 13000 feet, then spectacular views in every direction, plenty of snow still about, and wonderful food at the restaurant there. Put this on your next trip-to-USA schedule.

2) St Patrick's Day

Don't think life is all work and excursions! We also have parties, and St Patrick's Day last Saturday was the cause of much shennakins! Below are a couple of photos, although I could have cluttered up the blog with all the possibilities. You can see we had Community singing (I am at the keyboard), lots of decorations of which the centre photo is but a sample, and much dressing up - I had nothing green but put a serviette on my chest for the photo (although it fell off after the first photo and is not to be seen when I am at the piano!) There was also dancing, eating, drinking, and much talking till late ( I cleared out about 10 pm)

3) We had another Water Colour Lesson on Tuesday. The topic was painting flowers and I was very pleased with my result, so I photographed it on 'large' and you can see it below. I will start the auction at $1000 US! The fact that all the others looked lovely too (there are about 16 in the class) is not to be considered in making your bid. Perhaps you would be better off bidding for the teacher, Brother Joe.

For the next lesson, which comes after the Retreat, we have been told to bring a picture we want to paint. We also have been given a couple of pieces of good quality art paper to do some painting during the Retreat if we wish. You never know what masterpieces you will see.

4) Santa Fe Visits to Art Galleries (perhaps Inspired by my excursions into the art world?) I visited a couple of Art Galleries on my Wednesday afternoon trip to town. The first one, the Monitu Gallery, was really enjoyable. I loved the scuptures and took lots of photos - I will treat you to a couple. Unfortunately I did not make any record of the names of the artists. There were also beautiful paintings. It is the quiet season for tourists, so it was easy to get around.

The three pictures from the Manitou Galleries above show:

i) Reclining Cougar on seat outside the Manitou Galleries (life-size)

2) Rolling Horse - a miniature sculpture upstairs inside

3) Painting of a Pueblo - beautiful colours, I think you will agree!

The next three pictures from the same galleries show:

1) Two sleeping foxes - the sculpture appeared to be done in wood (on the floor near a wall)
2) An Indian woman and her children interacting (miniature)

3) A mother bear and two cubs - close to life size. I hope that is the closest I get to these!

5) The next pictures are from the Nedra Matteucci Fine Art Galleries

The first three were all taken inside the Garden you go to at the rear of the Gallery building. The man at the desk suggested going there first if time was short. What good advice! These pictures show:

1) A group of dancing people and, in the trees near them, some deer.

2) Nearby a life-sized deer stretches to lick her/his side.

3) At the side of the beautiful pond, an elephant sculpture becomes a fountain.

As you enter the gardens, you are greeted by 1) this absolutely joyous statue of a boy. Nearby, you can see what I found to be 2) a truly beautiful statue of a woman and child on a seat talking about a book. Up the back of the garden, 3) two 'gardeners' are chatting during a break. The whole garden is enclosed by a fence which can be seen in this last photo. It is a peaceful and truly wonderful place. The young woman attendant at the Manitou Galleries actually recommended seeing this one because of this garden of sculptures.

FINALLY

I could bore you to death with photos from these galleries, but I hope this gives you a glimpse of what an enjoyable experience it was going through them. Even walking from one gallery to another was filled with interest. Look at 'Loretto Inn' (right beside the Loretto Chapel with the miraculous staircase). Presumbaly this building was originally a Convent? Not too many Inns have a Crucifix (unusual - perhaps 'resurrection') at the entrance. There also appear to be other statue/s further in along the drive. The building is typical adobe.

We start the Retreat which marks the middle of our 100 days here at Sangre de Cristo on this coming Friday evening (23rd March). Don't expect any further blog entries until a couple of days after 1st April (Sunday) when we finish. I am looking forward to this very much. We have had a lot of input and it will be good to have a quiet, uninterrupted time to process it all. I'll get out for a good walk every day too. The spring blossoms are starting to come out as also the crocuses, jonquils and daffodils. Trees are budding, and most days are sunny and mild. Tonight there was a very little rain, but it didn't last. It is still cool but the days are quite warm.

All the best to everyone from Rita.

March 16th - A Few Observations

The weather is getting noticeably warmer here. The pictures on the right and the left show the same valley about 10 days apart. Even though the views are from a different angle, you can clearly see the change in snow cover and vegetation. Even though it is an arid area, there is a much closer network of roads and settlements than in arid areas of Australia. (Reminder: click on the photos if you want a better view and they might enlarge).

The left photo below shows another view towards the area just on the Santa Fe side of where we live, and you will see what look like quite a few roads in the area. In actual fact, a couple are disused tracks on our property which no vehicle - even a 4WD - could drive on. I sometimes walk along the dirt one that seems to go straight into the distance, but it actually turns onto State Road 592 just where you see it disappearing on the photo. The main road has quite a few vehicles but those that pass as I walk along are extremely careful to give me a wide berth and the drivers usually wave. The general attitude is very friendly, which is nice. There are no 'utes' over here - only 'dump trucks' (Picture 2 - showing one such truck on State Road 592) which are very common around here. Another interesting thing is how bi-lingual the place is. As you shop in Santa Fe you hear a lot of Spanish being spoken. Our cook and handyman (husband and wife) are bi-lingual and speak Spanish to each other and English to most of the rest of us with equal ease.

March 13 Water-Colour

One of the things I am doing to 'improve' myself is watercolour painting. We have done sunsets, and then we put mountains in the background and foreground - using all the right techniques of course. Today, we put in sky, mountains and

silhouettes in either 'warm' or 'cool' colours. I tried photographing my superb efforts, but most of them are a bit dark. I will publish a couple of them here so you can be smitten with admiration! I was going to put them in a large size, so you had some hope of seeing them, but had trouble getting them to stay on the blog. Never mind, you may be able to click and enlarge them. There were better ones - as you would not find hard to imagine! Next week we do flowers.

March 9th, Albuquerque Visit

Albuquerque is about 70 miles from Sangre so we left 8.30 am and arrived right on 10 am in time to see the Indian Cultural Centre and Museum there until 11 am. It was all too little time because there was so much to see and a very interesting gift shop. There was one section devoted to 'Code Talkers' during WWII. Aparently the Indian languages were used by native speakers to communicate by code and the enemy never cracked the system. eg. The Indian soldier's word for 'dog' was used to specify 'd', the word for 'stone' 's' etc. as he spoke to another member of his tribe across the airwaves. This system was essential to victory in several major battle

Other sections of the museum were devoted to displays from the different Tribes of their lifestyle at different periods. It was very complex and advanced, and there are a lot of ways it influences life here today - eg. adobe housing, beautiful pottery from local clay, handwoven objects. I didn't get a really good impression of the Spanish imposition of Catholic religion on a very spiritual people. However, today the people are both Catholic and Traditional and practise both their Catholic faith and their original Spiritual customs. The comment was that they believe there is only one Creator God. No photos, sorry - not allowed.

We moved to 'Old Town' Albuquerque - a reminder of the past in what is a very modern and busy place with a lot of industry, major roads and heavy traffic. I'll show you a few photos I took of this:

On the left you can see a bit of St Felipe de Neri Church which has been in continuous use since 1706. The Convent on its left is named after a Sister Blandina who brought a mason from Santa Fe to rebuild it after the first one, built in 1881 collapsed. The Sisters of Charity served there.

The Old Town is very adobe-looking. Here are a couple of photos:

You can see the entry to the Old Town area has been greatly embellished. In a cafe area (where I lunched) you can see a genuine adobe wall with wooden window bars. The cafe was in a walk-through courtyard and all the tables were out of doors under shelter. Very charming.

A couple of other photos will give you a bit of an idea of the style of the area: First, the plaza itself (the church is on one side); secondly, a couple of 'Queen Anne' style buildings which also feature in the area; thirdly, part of the courtyard beside the Church (to the right - opposite the convent side). The taller building may have been the original school - the only one in the town originally.

I spent most of the afternoon at the Albuquerque Museum with another Sister. Before going in I photographed some of the multiple statues outside the very impressive building. They go in a lot of very life-like statues but there are also modern art sculptures there which you may glimpse in the background. Here's a selection: Our trip home was delayed by what a radio announcer described as a 'horrible' accident along Route 66 (Freeway with wide space between sets of two lanes). We basically sat for 2 hours! We played '20 guesses' and 'I went on a trip and I took ....' around the bus! Got home at 7.05 pm instead of 5 pm. The two lanes must have stretched for miles and miles behind us but it took us a long time to get even near the accident whieh seems to have involed at least four vehicles when one came across from the wrong side of the highway. That car was an absolutely mangled wreck, split almost in half! News reports last night suggest 6 people were injured and only two in that car were injured seriously ( it is a wonder they were alive). I had plenty of time to take photos of the Sandia Mountains which overlook Albuquerque, so here is my best photo. There is actually a very long scenic railway right to the top which about 18 of our group are going to go on next Sunday. I decided to skip that trip - save my pennies for some other delights, like the Grand Canyon which we are busily planning: That is enough about Albuqerque, but a final note. The radio announcer was also talking about how the flu has arrived here - time to get flu shots! If it takes off here, we'll all be a bit sorry for ourselve. Hope everyone is well and kept out of mischief, as you can see I am. God bless! Rita

Thursday March 8 - Desert Day Walk

Today I went on a moderate walk along the Yellow and then the Orange Trails. It was really enjoyable and I took the camera and photographed examples of the common vegetation in the area.

* On the left you have a type of 'Bear grass' that grows near streams.

*On the right you see a Banana Yucca - so named because of the fruit that develops on a stalk which grows up the middle. The little scrolls emerge from the sides of the leaves. These are common all over the place.

The grass below has a tongue twister name: Rubber Rabbitbrush! Try saying that quickly three times! On the right you can see the leaves of the Desert Holly which is very common in the area, although less common than Juniper and Pinyon.

I sometimes get a bit of a fright walking past the dry Holly leaves because when a little breeze springs up they sound like a snake moving nearby!

The photo of the rubber rabbitbrush was actaully taken last week down on the flat near Sangre when there was still plenty of snow about.

Below this again, you can see two types of Cactii found here: There is a ground-hugging type and what is known as a 'Chainfruit Cholla' because of its long chains of fruit, sometimes growing twenty fruit out of each other. I haven't tested them but no doubt they are prickly!

The last two vegetation pictures are of the main trees in the area (although I photographed only a little shrub of one!)

On the left is a small Pinyon and on the right is a Juniper which is actually beginning to flower and will no doubt release a lot of pollen which will boost hay-fever levels in the area as it is released!

As I walked along the track today, parts were muddy from melted snow and there were some interesting footprints - not all of which I was sure of. One, I am sure was of a bear, but I didn't start photographing footprints till some time after seeing it and there were not more. Some of them were possibly deer, with cloven hoofs, others were of more padded footed creatures (Mountain lion????) perhaps jackrabbits? I'll unclude a couple of photos and you can guess for yourselves.
Tomorrow we have a day in Albuquerque, so expect another barrage of photographs. Life is not dull, is it? I really enjoyed my walk today. As I left (and another Australian was also leaving on a different route) Br Joe rushed after us to warn us it was going to storm and possibly snow!! I went back and got my umbrella, but apart from climbing the first slope with an umbrella in my right hand (probably worth a photo) there was no problem with the weather and it ended up quite fine. However, I did appreciate his concern for us.