Maureen's Blog

 Posts Tagged ‘New Mexico’

We started our National Nurses/Healthcare conference yesterday here in ABQ and we’ve got a great turn out with lots of folks coming from far off places. Jennifer and her team from DDSD have been exceptional in assisting the Therap team with NM state policies and it’s been a wonderful opportunity for providers to get some valuable information directly from the state.

It has also been great for me to catch up with everyone I had met last summer during my travels through NM, like Lori who has recently started honey beekeeping and was very excited about capturing her first colony…Congrats Lori!

~Maureen

A great little trail along Whitewater Creek, it was originally a pipeline which was built in the 1890′s to deliver water to the gold mining town of Graham. It has since become a recreation area within Gila National Forest and a metal walkway was constructed by the forest service in the 1960′s, so you are able to walk through narrow high walled canyons without getting wet!

~Maureen

The Gila Cliff Dwellings lies deep in the mountains of the Gila National Forest, surrounded on all sides by wilderness areas and over an hour’s drive from the nearest town …accessed only through steep, winding, twisting roads going over mountains and though deep valleys. The ruins of interlinked cave dwellings were built in five sandstone cliff alcoves by the Mogollon peoples between 1275 and 1300 AD and only occupied for a short 25-30 years:

~Maureen

Along historic route 66….it’s simply mind boggling how these immense rocks rise from the earth with miles of flat terrain surrounding them :

~Maureen

A small town made popular for tourism due to it’s trading posts which traditionally trades goods with local Native populations. I’m not much of a shopper myself so I skirted around the perimeters of town and took a few snapshots:

~Maureen

OK, I may have gotten a little carried away during this photo shoot but how could I not with such an amazingly beautiful subject! The church was in the Picuris Puelblo along the High Road to Taos.

~Maureen

The Highest capital city in the United States…7,000 feet above sea level!

~Maureen

…as he has given us this glorious national treasure by having proclaimed under the Antiquities Act of 1906,  this 275 square miles of gypsum sand dune fields an officially protected park: “White Sands National Monument ”

~Maureen

My itinerary for my day off was shuffled around a bit by the White Sands Missile Range unexpectedly testing their missiles on the very morning of my photography excursion (not sure why they have to test one nearly every day, let alone 2, but then again I’m not a rocket scientist, I suppose) so I switched my afternoon plans to the morning and headed out to the Oliver Lee Memorial State Park to hike along the Dog Canyon Trail. This is a pretty rough treck up the Sacramento Mountains and I only trekked about 6 miles as I was ill prepared for even a hike of That length in this unusually Hot weather. The hike traces the footpaths of the Apaches along 1,500-foot canyon walls and steep rocky benches. Ancient people used this canyon pathway for 4,000 years and it is easy to see how these beautiful cliffs were a naturally defensive refuge for Apaches during attacks by the US Army troops as well as why they loved the canyon so much… the photographs do not do it justice!:

~Maureen

I had my day all planned out…I arrived at White Sands National Monument at 7am (when the park officially opens) motivated by my triple espresso Americano (actually 6:45 cause I’m such a geek) and had planned on spending the early morning taking photographs and getting a natural pedicure via the beautiful white sands …but my visions were shattered as the park was closed for missile testing… and this closure was 2.5 hrs, not the usual 1 hour. Totally bummed I was going to miss the best light I decided to go a mile north and pull along side the road to photograph a body of water which had caught my eye on my drive to White Sands:

I did get to White Sands that evening for the sunset… still narrowing down the top photographs of the 160 I took… Beautiful, breathtaking… Awesome!

~Maureen