Montezuma to Vegas to Pecos...

Montezuma's Castle

On Friday we drove to Montezuma, a tiny town recommended to us by the friendly lady at the Las Vegas, New Mexico visitor center. Montezuma is home to a former resort built in the mountains by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad company for tourists to enjoy the hot springs nearby. The first two versions of the resort burned down, in 1881 and 1885. It was operated as a hotel until 1903, then it was used by various groups until Mexican Jesuits bought it to use as a seminary in 1937. They occupied the building until 1972 after which it sat empty for almost a decade (subject to vandalism and deterioration) until it and the surrounding 100 acres were purchased by the Armand Hammer Foundation for use as a school. The "Castle", as most call it, is now home to United World College, a school with 12 locations in 12 different countries offering an international baccalaureate degree to its graduates. This location is the only one in the U.S.

Dwan Light Sanctuary

We drove up to the Dwan Light Sanctuary, a non-denominational prayer space on the grounds of the school, to see this small round building filled with light and rainbows reflected inward through prism glass windows. Beautiful.

Las Vegas Visitor Center
and former train station

We returned to Las Vegas, a small town at the eastern foot of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. The town was first established in 1835 by a land grant issued by the Mexican government to 29 settlers. They settled on high ground above the Gallinas River (later called West Las Vegas). In 1879, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad company built a second town (later called the City of Las Vegas) about a mile away on the other side of the river. The railroad brought prosperity primarily to the east side, but both towns grew steadily until a local agricultural depression in the mid-1920s, followed by the Great Depression a few years later, ended Las Vegas' prosperity. The two struggling towns operated completely separately until 1970 when they finally merged governments (all except for the school systems, strangely). The town now boasts over 14,000 residents, as well as a continued focus on historic preservation of the more than 900 buildings on the National Historic Register, more than any other town in the U.S.

Las Vegas Plaza Hotel

We walked around the center plaza and stopped in for a quick tasty lunch at a local restaurant, El Encanto. The owners were charming and very hospitable.

We peeked into the windows of the shops around the plaza and then drove to several of the other historic areas of the town where we saw buildings ranging in age from the 1840s through the 1940s. Some of the businesses were closed for the Good Friday holiday, and we saw hundreds of townsfolk milling about in front of the Catholic church after the mid-day mass.

On our way to Pecos

After our tour of Las Vegas, we drove to Pecos National Historical Park in Pecos, New Mexico. On our way, we were treated to a spectacular snow-capped mountain vista for most of the trip. Cool!

Ruins of Pueblo of Pecos

The park is the site of a settlement of Pueblo Indians who began building adobe structures in the area around 1100. By 1450, the settlement had grown to over 5 stories high with more than 600 rooms and 2,000 residents!

When the Spanish conquistadors first encountered the Pueblo of Pecos in 1540, it was a bustling metropolis of its time. The Spanish aimed to convert the Puebloans to Catholic subjects of the Spanish king and so built a large mission church next to the Pueblo. By converting them to Catholicism, the Spanish hoped to erase the traditions and culture of the Indians, but found them reluctant to do so. After decades of living under Spanish rule, the Indians repelled the Spanish back to Mexico during the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. The mission church was destroyed.

Pueblo of Pecos

Pueblo of Pecos

Twelve years later the Spanish returned, welcomed back by the Puebloans whose reluctance had mellowed, and rebuilt a smaller church on the ruins of the old one. The Pueblo remained under Spanish rule until the 1780's when disease, Comanche raids and migration reduced the population to less than 300. After treaties with the Comanches, the Spanish built other towns to the east where trade competition contributed to the economic decline of Pecos. By 1821, the Pueblo of Pecos ruins had become a Santa Fe Trail tourist curiosity. The last remaining survivors of Pecos left in 1838 to join the Jemez Pueblo 80 miles west, where their descendants still live today.

In an underground kiva

On the self-guided tour, we walked all over the Pueblo grounds and ruins and could still see the impressive position from which these people could defend their way of life as well as understand the amazing feat of engineering to build such a place. The ruins sit atop a small rise in the Pecos Valley, surrounded by vast fields where they grew their crops and hunted, with the mountains beyond. There were several 'kivas', underground rooms used for prayer and as workspace with a fire pit, chimney and secondary air vent. We climbed down to see for ourselves and found a round room with heavy timbers holding up the ceiling, which was covered in small branches. We thoroughly enjoyed the park and the scenery...and what perfect weather, too.

We headed back to Santa Rosa Lake State Park, but not before first stopping for ice cream at Clines Corners, a remarkably well-advertised truck stop with literally tens of thousands of tchotchkes for sale.

What a fun day!