My childhood places - Bandelier National Monument, Los Alamos, Espanola, and Taos

This was a marathon day.
We started  at Camel Rock nearby and went on to Bandelier National Monument (which is below Los Alamos).  This was the place my family often went when Los Alamos had evacuation drill.  This happened once or twice a year in the early 50s.  So, my family would pack a lunch and anything else we needed and we would usually head for Bandelier Park (which I believe it was called then) in our car.

I remember Bandelier as beautifully forested, with a glorious creek flowing through it.  I would play in the creek, sending pretend leaf boats floating down the stream.  Sometimes, we would walk the short distance to the cliff dwellings nearby and marvel over who might have lived there and how they did it, although I never climbed the ladders to the upper "apartments" due to fear of heights.

However, we discovered that due to damage from a terrible flash flood a couple years ago the park is only accessible by shuttle bus every 25 minutes.  But, the creek looks the same, while the forest is thinner and shorter (unless I got bigger?).  I couldn't manage to walk the trail through the park and up to the cliff dwellings. [The toe is better, but it aches when I walk too much or bend it back on rough terrain.]   But, Steve saw them and may graciously provide me with photographs to post here.

Here's what I have:

Camel Rock used to have a longer head, but someone damaged it, I think.  Now there is a fence, no access.

Every kid's dream of a creek to splash in.

See the little holes in the cliff face - cave dwellings.

2) After we returned on the shuttle exhausted and, in my case, still dealing with altitude sickness, we stocked up on more water (must drink constantly to counteract the altitude) and set out for one more trip to Los Alamos and lunch.  This time, I got my photos of the old main gate and other sites that I missed on the first visit.

Main Gate you saw in Manhattan (the mini-series about Los Alamos).

Sniper tower at Main Gate.

Fun at the ice skating rink.

My father got a patent for the nuclear reactor in the NS Savannah and here 's the model on display.

Oppenheimer's house on Bathtub Row is still in private hands, but we sneaked a shot of it.

Ashley Pond (named after Ashely Pond) where the original Lab was located.

We toured the Bradbury Science Museum (no relation to Ray) and I have pics, but if you are like me, you might not understand the exhibits without a much more rigorous science education.  Exhibit A:

3) Yes, we tried to drive on the enthralling "Road to Espanola" - the road that felt like a little roller coaster, the only way our parents could get us to go smiling to the pediatrician.  But, alas, some pencil pushing efficiency experts decided to smooth the road out for some stupid trucks and my hopes were dashed (apparently a couple decades ago).  Darn it!  I was going to video the whole thing; so disappointed.

4) However, we continued through the still tiny town of Espanola and drove to Taos, New Mexico.  Yes, it's a Sunday and, yes, it was after 4pm, but we were hoping to see the lush, artisan mecca in all its glory.  Our hopes brought us only a few sites of interest.  Taos is pretty far off the beaten track and it was much smaller than we expected.  But, Steve was delighted to find the home of Kit Carson and the Kit Carson Museum.  Although closed, it had very interesting plaques and windows.  We loved the traditional adobe and the narrow streets which are very much like Santa Fe. But, Santa Fe does it with more panache.   Taos, which also appears to be a ski town, is more of a laid back "hippie" town, where Santa Fe is also for high rollers, politicians (being the capital of New Mexico) and diverse other groups.

One of the traditional streets in Taos.

There's Kit Carson's house and museum in Taos.

After dinner, we finished the night by driving around Santa Fe Plaza, which was lit up after dark by strings of tiny white lights wrapped around the trees in the park.  Back to the Pecos Trail Inn for a well deserved good night's sleep.

Tomorrow, we do our last exploring in Santa Fe and head out to reach Gallup, New Mexico before dark.

Los Alamos, New Mexico - familiar and so strange

Los Alamos, New Mexico, at last...
This has been a weird, wonderful, memorable day; an example of "I had no idea this is what my day would be like when I woke up this morning."  We woke up to a knock on the bedroom door.  Our hosts had made croissants with marmalade and butter and provided us with tea.  We ate our lovely repast at a sunny table out in the front garden area near a bubbling fountain inside some lovely adobe walls.

That turquoise door was our lovely separate quarters.

The fountain, of course, and now I'm planning one for my next home.

As we got in the car for our adventure in Los Alamos, we noticed a crew was digging a trench with a machine in the parking area to the left of the house, a pretty long one.  Then, as we actually drove out onto the road, there was a fire truck with its lights flashing and a utility company truck parked on the shoulder outside the adobe walls.  We figured this city must be very proactive about making sure you don't cut power or gas lines when digging and we drove off.

It turns out that the digger actually hit a gas line (no explosion, thank goodness) and there would be no hot water until that could be fixed on Monday.  So, we ended up with a free night (with no showers) and a credit for our 3rd day so we can find a closer place in Santa Fe.  This was welcome news because we realized about 30 minutes into the drive that Los Alamos is a much longer drive than we thought.  In fact, it was about 2 hours from our rooms north of Albuquerque and 2 + 2 = 4 hours on the road for a couple days in a row.   

Los Alamos was amazing, though.  As we started to ascend the additional 2000 feet to Los Alamos the excitement and, in my case, the feelings started building.  (And, of course, the altitude effects.) We passed the site of the original gate and into a city that I didn't recognize at first.  My family  lived there from approx. 1951 to 1955, almost 5 years I think.  My youngest brother was born there.

With a stop at the Visitors' Center, we got a lot of information and a great map that showed me that my elementary school was still there on the very same spot.  Aspen Elementary almost looked the same.  Well, yes, it's modernized; it has been 60+ years after all.  But, what a feeling to actually find it, especially after the debacle in Los Gatos, CA!  

This is the first NM school I've seen with a shade cover on the playground.

This end of the school is where I had Shop class as a 6 yr old, with real tools!

My teacher told Mom that, in 1st grade, I just stood and watched the other girls play jumprope for weeks.  But, when I finally joined in, I did it perfectly.  Hmmm... think I still do that, except for the perfect part.

Once we found the school, we were able to drive the route I walked home from school and there it was - the house my family lived in before we left Los Alamos for good in 1955(?).  This is the house where my father flooded the yard to make us an ice skating rink in the winter, where the root beer he made blew up in the closet while we were on vacation, where I learned to ride a bike solo going down what looks like a slight incline now but felt like a huge hill, and where my father went up on the house on Christmas Eve shaking reindeer bells and shouting Ho, Ho, Ho.

2181 35th St.  It's much smaller than I remembered and it's a duplex.  I think it had 3 bedrooms, an improvement over the quadruplex we lived in before with 2 bedrooms.  My brothers were both pretty small then, probably 3 and newborn.  It's a different color, but there is no doubt in my mind.  What a feeling of joy to have actually found it!  It's certainly in much better condition than a lot of houses in this town.  So much of the buildings are the same as they were in the 50s.

We had the one on the right. (That's a covered car in the corner.)

Here's the HUGE hill that I rode/fell down on my first bike.

We tried to find our original quadruplex, but alas I think it might have been torn down and replaced.

The Los Alamos History Museum was fascinating.  (They even have on display a boxed model of the NS Savannah, the first merchant ship to be powered by a nuclear reactor, for which my father has a patent.)  It turns out that Los Alamos was a boys' ranch for the sons of the wealthy before it was taken over by the Manhattan Project in the 40s.  The buildings and infrastructure were there and it was secluded, making it perfect for that purpose.  

Outside the museum.

I wondered about the Los Alamos High School team name and mascot.  My high school, Columbia High, was in Richland, Washington near the Hanford reactors and labs that made plutonium for nuclear warheads.  Our team was, and still is, called the Bombers and our mascot was a defused torpedo (a Bomb).  Los Alamos has the Top Hatters and their mascot is a Top Hat!  Apparently this is something to do with the top secret work done in the city.  In Richland, they just laid it out there.  Our team and cheerleaders proudly wore a green and gold mushroom cloud on their uniforms.  Go Bombers!  Somehow, Go Hatters doesn't have the same heft.  Safer, though.  I'm a Bomber, but I wouldn't want to say that in an airport.

By the way, the museum bookstore had The Green Glass Sea (great YA book) and many others that I now have to read - The Atomic Weight of Love and The Wives of Los Alamos among them.  

Eventually, the heavens cut loose and Los Alamos enjoyed a rainfall that made us feel much more at home.  Tomorrow, we will be going to Santa Fe and seeing what other trouble we can get into.