“Pioneer Village” - a heritage worth preserving

This is an experience, not just a museum - authentic “Americana” heritage. It’s such a shame that it’s missed by so many people rushing by on the I-80, just 12 miles north of Minden,  The town was once on a major US Highway running east to west on Route 34 which ran for 1122 miles from Chicago through Nebraska to the Rockies in Colorado which brought hundreds of tourists weekly to visit it.  

We were astonished by the thousands of articles displayed from about the 1830’s to the 1980’s.  The second day is free of charge, and we needed two days to see it. 

Harold Warp, the founder, wrote: “In a mere 120 years....man progressed from open hearths, grease lamps and ox carts to television, super-sonic speed and atomic power.  We have endeavored to show you the actual development of this astounding progress.....”.  

He became wealthy through making plastics when he moved to Chicago. His factory produced the first plastic garbage bags and is still in business today.  He was an amazing collector and set up this wonderful village for people to remember what it was like to live through those hard times.  He dedicated it “To the Memory of our Pioneering Parents and others like them”, such as his Norwegian parents who had been true homesteaders. Harold Warp was one of 12 children born to John and his wife, Helga. 

Twelve of the 24 buildings are situated around a large circular, grassy area where families can picnic or just sit awhile. 

One of these was the General Store, stocked with some items we recognized from years ago, old butter churns, tins with familiar labels like Calumet Baking Soda, old cash registers, antique scales and a multitude of other items like animal traps and bushel baskets for fruit or corn.  Hanging from the ceiling were numerous lanterns, buckets, an old cranberry picker and other various odds and sods.  In the center was the most important item, the pot bellied stove, the only source for heating and keeping the coffee pot warm.

 We stepped inside one of the last Pony Express relay stations - a small cabin containing Buffalo Bill’s genuine, beautifully carved leather saddle. The photo shows a hand-made replica of the “mochila,” a leather cover for the saddle with four padlocked pockets for the mail at each corner, “which was left loose so it could be lifted off quickly and thrown on the saddle of a fresh horse that stood ‘rarin to go’”.

Our tour included an old white church, a livery stable, a sod house of the type that Harold and his family lived in when he was young and the one-room school house that he had attended as a boy with the original desks and books and ubiquitous wood stove in the center. We climbed on the actual steam locomotive that passed by his father’s farm as he worked on the land, never dreaming, he wrote, that one day he would own it!

But that wasn’t all! There were hundreds of antique vehicles, one being an original A Model Ford given to him by his friend, Henry Ford.  There was an amphibious car and a perfect copy of the Wright Brothers first plane and wagons, such as the Conestoga, Yellowstone (photo) and Wells Fargo Stage Coach, tractors and other farm equipment including a cotton picker, all in excellent condition and well maintained.  Most of the Yellowstone wagons had been sold, rotted or burned - the one restored and shown here was found in 1967 after a 15 year search. When the wagons were running from 1880 to 1916 according to the placard, they needed four horses to pull one and the tour of Yellowstone Park took 5 days and cost $40 including meals and lodging

The Village including the campground, Motel and restaurant entirely self supporting, a non-profit educational venture and it’s income is derived mainly from visitors. There’s little money to maintain such a vast project and keep the “oldest steam powered carousel in existence” still turning, or to see the blacksmith, glass blower or spinner at work. The one craftsman we did see was the brilliant broom-maker called Pat Haight, (photo) from whom we bought two small whisk brooms for gifts.  

The only thing that really let it down was the cafe on the green, which was really run down and had the worst food we’ve tasted in some time unless you like bratwurst that’s been cooked until the skin tastes like wood and the inside like sawdust.  The restaurant, was good although we only ate there once.

This photo shows just one of the long, empty north/south roads roads in Nebraska - they’re a joy to drive on and they’re not all flat, some are gently rolling like this on Route 10 which we drove on from the Kansas border to Minden.

A Teardrop Convention

Teardrops are the cutest little trailers we’ve seen.  They really are tiny and there they were at the Pioneer Village Campground we stayed at in Minden NE.  It was a rainy Saturday afternoon when we arrived and the teardrops all left the next morning, so I didn’t get many close-ups or talk to their owners.  

They originated in the 1930’s and are still manufactured today and can be pulled by  almost any vehicle.  Many of them have  been restored or built from scratch and seem to be well loved although the whole camper is only about 4’ high and 8’ long, so the doors are shorter than most adults who have to crawl into their beds.  The backs of them open to expose a little, well-planned kitchen area.

One we saw, owned by an older couple, had an extra trailer to pull their own porta-potty hut!  Another even had it’s own air conditioner.  For people who love camping but don’t want to set up a tent, they’re ideal and the camaraderie of the campers was evident.  As they pulled out, one of the best bumper stickers we’ve seen, said “I go where I’m towed”.

An Opera House in Red Cloud, NE

Opera and play houses in small town America are found throughout the country, many of them built in the 1800’s - this one from 1885. Not just for staging operas or plays by traveling companies, they were used much like the town halls of today, for the social and cultural life of the town. The one in Red Cloud was restored in 2003 mainly through the vision and fund raising efforts of a doctor’s wife, Mildred Bennett, and other volunteers.

The ground floor (known as the first floor in the U.S., which always bothers me when I’m going down in a lift (elevator) because I’m always looking for a G instead of 1st) This building was once a large hardware store. On the upper level is the opera house, still much in use today. In the restrooms (where we don’t go to rest) are two evacuation signs, one for fire and the other which outlines a plan of how to reach safety in the event of a tornado!

This unique building and several others in the town, belong to the Willa Cather Foundation, an institution set up to commemorate the life and works of the author. The ground floor of the opera house contains a bookstore dedicated to this world famous author, who is also a Pulitzer prize winner. She is regarded as one of America’s best known classical authors. I’d never heard of her until we reached Nebraska, and read a historic roadside marker set amongst the beautiful prairie grasses of the country she frequently wrote about. It was at the same place I heard the unusual bird song of the meadowlark, Nebraska’s state bird.

Howard and I toured several of

the buildings that she was associated with apart from the Opera House; her childhood home and the ornate Garber Bank (photos), with a wonderful tour guide called Dorothy, who was a very young looking 84 year old and a volunteer at the Foundation. Having read one of Cather’s books, she wrote vivid, detailed descriptions of the rooms and people and affairs during the time that she lived there. She must have had a wonderful memory, because she was just nine when her family moved to Red Cloud, which was the setting of many of her books. It was an amazing experience for me to have stood in her attic bedroom with the furnishings exactly as she described it in one of her books, “The Song of the Lark”.

We so enjoy stopping by these small towns and have visited a number of them during the past two years. Many of them still have trolley buses (this town used to have one) such as those in Guthrie in Oklahoma, Jacksonville in Oregon and Eureka Springs in Arkansas. It’s a great way to tour the towns and learn about the history, usually from well-informed tour guides.

All you can eat for only $6.65 each! (About £4.00)

Where’s this possible? Well in historic Red Cloud, Nebraska, less than 20 miles from the Kansas border. At Cutters’ Café next to an old Hotel, we chose from an array of main dishes apart from the soup, bread and desserts and even iced tea or coffee which were included! It was obviously a favorite place for many customers who were well known to the owner.

Red Cloud is another of those lovely old towns with wide, red brick roads, flat roofed buildings lining the main street, and old lamp posts. Although it was named after Chief Red Cloud, the famous Sioux chief, it was thought that he never came through this area.

The train depot was one of it’s most important assets and during its heyday, about 8 trains per day passed through Red Cloud. It once brought settlers to the town and the building now belongs to the NE State Historical Society as do many other structures in the town including the Opera House.

Friendship at the Excel Service Center, KS - 14th June

We feel so lucky to have any problems fixed under warranty, when so many RV manufacturers have gone out of business this past year.

The service center is extraordinary, with two good sized lounges, both with a TV and large, comfy chairs, several tables, a computer with free wi-fi plus card games or puzzles for their customers.  Not only that but they have two very clean bathrooms each with a shower and one with a washer and dryer.  Howard and I feel that it must be one of the best RV centers around the country. 

During the day, our RV was pulled into one of the 8 service bays, at 06:30 (not usually a time we’re awake and certainly not up and about) and if it was pushed out for the night, we were able to stay there.  If for some reason, a 5th wheel has to stay in the shop for extensive work then the customers are put up for one or more nights at the quaintly furnished B and B nearby and Excel pay for it!  Where does one receive service like that nowadays? 

Making friends in unusual places

You’d think that a parking lot is not the ideal place to meet people, but we’ve met some interesting people at the Service Center.  Of course, we all have one thing in common, an Excel 5th wheel.

On a Sunday afternoon, we met several other couples.  Jerry and Judy, from North Carolina were both enthusiastic photographers and took some great photos of the grasslands and countryside and the old wooden cabin where the poem “Home, Home on the Range” was written and which is now the official State Song.  This is one of their photos and if you look closely at the sign, you'll see a buffalo and deer etched on the top.

Jerry and Judy kindly copied all their photos onto our computer, so we have some excellent pics of the cabin and prairie lands. We had such good conversations with them and now correspond via email.

Bill and Myra from Roanoke, Virginia, have two pet cats and needed to find a boarding place for them, so headed out to the country to find the nearest Veterinary office.  

Unfortunately, we’d had a lot of rain some days before and the country roads were covered in white limestone dust and mud and their truck was coated with it, but Bill wouldn’t return to us until he’d had the truck washed.  However, Myra had taken several photos of the evidence before it disappeared. We were all greatly amused by the story, especially when we heard that the vet’s office didn’t take animals for boarding and they then found a cattery a few yards down the road from us.

The following Monday, after spending almost a week in Nebraska, we met a fun English couple, Kate and David Pilgrim, who were touring the States during summer for six months, all that their Visas would allow.  We enjoyed visiting with them immensely - they had both been Police Officers in London and at one time spent 6 years living on a boat and taken it on a trip through France. They don’t write a blog but pen a newsletter from them both for family and friends, which is very amusing and we’re now followers too after requesting one.  Although this was not their first long term trip to the US, it was so interesting for me to get a newer perspective of how the English perceive the American way of life because I’ve been here for a few years and don’t have that fresh viewpoint anymore.

At one time or another, we had breakfast at the “Second Cup Café” with each of the couples we met.  You can just see it on the left side of the photo of the town.  This café is quite a hub in Smith Center.  In the early morning, the older men meet first and after they leave, the women arrive for a various function or other, but it's always busy for breakfast. 

We went there for Sunday lunch and it was packed. The Americans rarely sit with strangers at a table, but it was so busy, we joined another couple, a pastor and his wife and had most of our meal with them.  The pastor held hands with his wife and said grace before they ate - a custom, which seems to be common here when people eat out. Because it’s a small town, most people know each other and another couple joined us after they left. This particular lady had just retired from teaching for over thirty years.  She invited us to “hang out” on their porch even if they weren’t there, as a change from sitting in our RV.  This is typical of many of the strangers we’ve met in the US, inviting us over shortly after we’ve met.  She also had relatives in England and so was interested in talking to us.

Being an agricultural community, auctions of farm and other equipment are held sometimes every two weeks.  It was a shame we missed one; if you’ve ever seen an American auction on the telly, you’ll know that they speak so fast it’s hard to keep up.  They had tractors, old cars, very old tools, saddles and tack, squirrel cages, cob forks and dump rakes!   See what I mean? Another thing that intrigued us was the music we heard on the streets.  It was the local radio station broadcasting music through the loud speakers attached to lamp posts along the main street - it probably warns of tornados too.

Prairie Dogs and Burrowing Owls

That night, 9th June, we stayed near Norton, at the Prairie Dog State Park, an attractive and very well used park especially on weekends when the locals gather for family get-togethers.  The fishing is apparently wonderful on the huge reservoir located there - do they eat the “crappie” and “saugeye” or throw them back?  I think the names would put me off even trying them but then some people like squid. The children have a great time cycling around the paths and walking along the 1.4 mile nature trail too.

We’d never seen burrowing owls before and they were quite small, about 8 ½ - 11 inches in height and often use abandoned holes of the prairie dogs.  They like to sit above their territory to watch for predators or their next meal.  

The prairie dog colony was extremely large and active. They’re cute little critters, only 1-3 lbs in weight and sit up very straight on top of their mounds with their little front paws touching each other just like we would if we clasped our hands together. We watched them rushing from one dirt mound to the other and hi-tailing it back down into their holes if they felt threatened. The French called them “little dogs” because of theirbark to let the others know of any danger.  I could have been in danger too, walking through the mixed grasses, because rattlesnakes and black widow spiders inhabit the prairie lands, but all I saw was the ugliest buzzard eating some remnant of an animal by the side of the road who was too busy to fly off when I got close.

A dog traveling to Alaska -Tuesday, 9th June

Hoping to arrive in Oakley, KS, before the “chance of severe thunderstorms” hit us, we parked late afternoon after a run of 159 miles, at the very pleasant “High Plains Camping” just south of Interstate 70.  The owner Mary, who has a large home above the office, keeps it open from 8 a.m. to 9:30 in the evening - long hours.  It has a well-stocked shop, a large pet exercise area, playground and mini golf course, not forgetting the "Colonial Steakhouse” a few paces from the entrance where many truck drivers stop. 

We noticed another 5th wheel trailer parked near us with Arkansas license plates and had to investigate, as you may remember, Howard was born in Arkansas.  The owner had a lovely dog called Lester, an Australian Shepherd.  Lester and Warren, were traveling by themselves to Alaska for the summer and he expected the journey to take about 10 days.   He’d lived and worked on the famous pipeline there for some years and often went back.  Just outside the pet run were two posts, one a small fire hydrant signed for “city dogs” and the other, a tower of limestone slabs for “country dogs”.  Howard asked Warren which one Lester used and he answered, “well, he uses both - he’s a sophisticated country dog”!

Lester though, was not nearly as handsome as Hamish, Elisia and Kevin’s dog and the most obedient and gentle dog we’ve ever known even though he had a fierce bark, especially when the postman came.  Hamish recently had to be put down and is so sorely missed by all who knew and loved him.  You can see how gentle he is with Tobin, when Tobin was just over a year old.

That night, the heavens opened, thunder cracked, lightning lit the sky and the winds were ferocious.  Suddenly awake, I was really concerned for the little tent camper two sites away which was occupied by a single lady and two children and wondering how on earth they were coping with the wind gusts, which we learned in the morning had reached 65 mph at 5:00 a.m. The tent camper and a few others had already left very early and many remaining had massive puddles by their doors.  The sun later on dried them up pretty quick.  Another couple who had driven up about 50 miles from the south, told us that around 02:00 the night before they’d had a knock at their door by the police and been told to leave immediately due to a tornado watch in their area!

Sand Dunes in Texas & High Winds in Kansas

Sand dunes, we thought, were only in the deserts or by the sea side (shores).  No, we’ve seen them inland in several States, the most beautiful so far being the Coral Pink sand dunes in Utah, (photo) but there were a few we passed on the roadside in Texas, more in Nevada and amazingly as far north as Colorado and Washington.  Driving north, clumps of low pink flowers lined many of the verges and here and there were isolated wind mills pumping water for the small waterholes for cattle. 

Habitation was few and far between and seemingly, the only presentable looking building in the small town of Nara Visa, NM was a Post Office; most of the small homes dotted along the highway were otherwise in a state of dereliction.  

What amazed us most were the ginormous stockyards stretching for miles along the highway, or so we thought, but they were actually cattle feed lots.  We learned this from the ranch owner of the “Western Star” campground who told us that the cattle are trucked there to be fattened up for three months before slaughtering.  They receive a special mix of feed and live in practically all mud enclosures during that time - it made me almost want to become a vegetarian, almost. 

We do see sheep but rarely is lamb offered in restaurants and not much in grocery stores either.  So along Route 54, we rolled by huge grain silos and fields of crops,  alfalfa mostly in the south but mainly thousands upon thousands of acres of field corn for the cattle stretching for miles on end and irrigated by long sprinkler systems.  Nearly every home has grain silos on the grounds.

It’s a funny thing, but Kansas is truly the one State where we’ve experienced the worst weather.  This particular campground in Liberal was fairly new and situated about 5 miles away and high above the town.  There were no trees to block the wind and that evening with gusts reaching 45 mph and catching us broadside, our camper shook so severely that we thought about leaving for the safety of the nearest building.  Shortly afterwards, the winds calmed down and we stayed.  No wonder it’s so well known for tornados and the famous “Wizard of Oz”.

Dorothy’s House Museum from “The Wizard of Oz”

Dorothy’s House is one of the main attractions in Liberal and delights both children and  adults alike. The young girl who presented the tour was dressed in the blue gingham pinafore with red shoes, just like Dorothy Gale in the movie.  The actual home on this site was a 1907 farmhouse that was furnished and restored to represent, as faithfully as possible, the one in the film, made so many years ago in 1939.

Outside the house the yellow bricks we walked upon had been “bought” to help provide profits and were named and dated for the donors although the price of one was way beyond our means.  Inside the huge barn, we followed another yellow brick road to find appealing displays, especially for children, of the three main characters along with talking Munchkins, Glenda, the Good Witch and a frightening, cackling bad witch set amongst vast amounts of colorful plastic flowers and trees.  

The tiny museum holds the original model of the house (photo) that was used in the film as well as memorabilia from the Munchkin actors of that time.  After our visit, I very much wanted to see the film again.

The town also celebrates an Ozfest during October, which, we read, has been attended in the past by various actors who played the Munchkins in the film, as well as the great -grandson of Frank L. Baum, who wrote the book “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”.   

 

Shrove Tuesday in Liberal, Kansas

Pancakes are the connection between Liberal and Olney, Buckinghamshire, in England, the home of the traditional annual Pancake race. It’s origin appears to have begun in 1445.  The festival here begins several days before the races and now lasts four days with the International competition held on Tuesday and ends with a parade in the afternoon. The main street is even named Pancake Boulevard. The two towns have a special 60 year ongoing friendship.

The people we met in Kansas and overall in the mid western States seem to be naturally friendly towards strangers and, sitting at the “Cattleman’s Cafe” waiting to order, we were asked whether we’d like to hear a joke from a man at the table next to us.  Without waiting for a reply, he told us a joke that he thought was very funny!  

For a town the size of Liberal, with an estimated population now of around 20,368,  it has a lot going for it, about 5 banks, 18 assortments of motels or Inns, several restaurants, one called “The Salty Dog”, an arts center, pheasant hunting on many public and private acres, the “Mid America Air Museum”, several festivals and fairs throughout the year and not forgetting 8 churches.  

In even the smallest towns in America there are often more churches than you’d ever find in a small English town.  That’s not unusual in this country where, it seems, that anyone who becomes a pastor can set up his/her own church and call it whatever they want.  However, it also seems that many more people in America attend church services both on Sundays and mid-week, judging by the number of cars we see as we pass by.

Dinosaurs at Tucumcari - Friday, 5th June

I’ve always wanted to visit Tucumcari, New Mexico, because I love the name. Apparently it’s loosely named after the Comanche word for “lookout”, which is highly possible considering the large mesa of the same name which overlooks the town.  Not that I knew anything about it and it’s fairly small but home to the only Dinosaur Museum that we’ve ever visited.

We found a well-kept, low cost campground called “Cactus RV Park”

en route to Kansas and are sure that we had the best site - 90’ long grassed pull-through with trees on either side.  Most sites were mostly gravel without shade but the owner and his son had planted more young trees and tended them carefully.  They like overnighters and don’t have showers or bathrooms, unusual for many RV Parks, but they also don’t have permanent or seasonal homes there, as many campgrounds do.  We also liked the location within walking distance of Del’s Family Restaurant (tasty home-cooking).

The Park is also home to the old Cactus Motor Lodge, once very attractive in its heyday and probably one of the first Motels along the old “Mother Road”, aka Route 66. The Lodge is listed on America’s National Register of Historic Buildings rather like the Listed Buildings in the UK, which means that it can be restored but not pulled down or altered and is unfortunately deteriorating slowly due to lack of funds. 

 

Affiliated with the Mesalands Community College is the Dinosaur Museum.  Many of the fossils and dinosaur bones have been found within 28 miles of Tucumcari.  Within the museum the laboratory has a glass frontage for us to peer at the students or for them to check out the visitors. Bronze skeletons of the prehistoric creatures were created in the College foundry and are major works that took thousands of hours to complete. Poor Howard, looks as though he almost got chomped by one! We were very impressed with the whole display of replica dinosaurs, fossilized dinosaur eggs found in China and artwork. With less funding than many museums in large cities

it had very professional exhibits; neatly organized with a digging pit for kids and a well-stocked shop for all ages. 

It also displays one of the world’s only “Torvosaurus” skeletons, a huge creature, this one about 40’ long with sharp, savage looking teeth and is somewhat related to the well known Tyrannosaurus rex. It was too big for me to photograph but just look at the height of another dinosaur leg in the photo. This certainly brought back memories of “Jurassic Park” and glad they’re not roaming around now.

Before we left Tucumcari, we stopped to talk to an old man who sat, would you believe, in a rolling office chair  near the front yard (garden) gate.  He  had worked in large scale construction and was in charge of all the hot crushed mix that was used to lay many of the roads and much of newest Albuquerque Airport terminal. Around the yard roamed 7 small, yappy dogs (one laying across his shoulder) three old cats and rabbits, he said, in the back.  Many years ago he owned cows and a 900 lb hog that he butchered and then had to use a “come along” to haul it up for gutting.  I had to ask Howard what this was and he explained that it was a pulley used for raising large objects.  He would have talked a lot longer but was due to leave for an annual reunion with his family;  how many, I asked “oh, about 75 altogether”, unsure whether that was small or large for the USA.

Then, the next morning as we were due to leave we met a Charles McCollum, who also wanted to stay and chat.  He had a home in Tennessee and a ranch in Colorado and bred Arabian horses.  He was proud to tell us that he owned a business employing 24 women - presumably because his customers preferred the sound of women’s voices over the phone but I thought it was because he thought of himself as a bit of a stud.  An hour later, we managed to hitch up and head diagonally east, passing as quickly as possible through the panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas. We reached the border of Kansas in late afternoon, reaching Liberal, 213 miles later, crossing yet another time zone into central time, now only 2 hours away from the east coast.

Early June '09

You’re right if it seems to you like we’re usually having a great time visiting different parts of this vast country and going where we may not have a chance to go to if we lived in one place?  Well,  we are very fortunate that we have both the time (being retired) and the opportunity to enjoy these years together and fortunately to be in good health.

In the past two years we’ve been awed by wonderful scenery in National Parks like Zion, took numerous photos of rock formations in Arches in southern Utah, ascended the world’s highest cog train to the top of Pike’s Peak (14,115’), in Colorado Springs, rode a jet boat up the Rogue river in Oregon and toured several fascinating museums, mostly small ones.  Some of our favorite times were enjoying simple pleasures like picking raspberries, watching a fledgling swallow being pushed off the top of a slide-out by one of its parents to learn how to fly (which it did), taking trolley rides through old historic towns and reading books in the evenings, which we rarely did before we began our trip.  

Some of our good friends, like Chris and Dave, our ex neighbours from Banbury, might wonder what we do when we’re not out and about.  Well, we do the same mundane things one normally does in any home such as maintenance, cleaning, cooking, banking, shopping etc., (not that I like shopping) but it would bore you to read about our daily doings.  What we do spend time on is keeping touch with our family spending many hours on the phone,  working at the computer, reading news on the internet and figuring out where to stay next and which route to take. Our lifestyle has changed completely from previous years. If you really want to know any more unimportant details or may have any questions, feel free to contact us. 

BBQ Train Ride, Sat. 30th May, continued

In the late afternoon, we took a train ride on the Santa Fe Southern Railway for a Saturday night Campfire BBQ supper.  About 100 people boarded the two old 1920 vintage railroad cars with a flatbed in between for passengers to stand and sip drinks from the cash bar, for the journey to Lamy. Here we stopped for a meal of barbecued beef brisket and chicken, coleslaw, beans and cornbread along with iced tea and a dessert. We even had live music from a local country singer.  Our table was shared with a young Japanese couple who were living and studying medicine in Boston, and who generously invited us to visit them in Japan when they returned. 

As the train passed by this unusual rock house on the sandstone cliffs near Lamy, I took this photo because it was unique and we thought it looked rather unnatural. I found out in an article from the New York Times, that “The Flintstone House”, as it’s known, was designed by the owner, a Ms. Pierson, to resemble the surrounding area. 

Although a normal house beneath the rocky disguise, the exterior is actually a polyurethane foam such as that used in insulation and toughens to a strong shell. It took about two years to cover and was very expensive. The more I look at it, the more it looks like a face with two eyes and an enormous lopsided grin - even if it was an  ingenious concept.

Saturday, 30th May - Smudge Sticks and Spinning

This is Becky Thorp from SunStar Herbs in Cerrilos, NM.  She grows most of her own herbs and some berries for edible or medicinal purposes with such names as horehound, sweet Anne, anise, mugwort, chaste berry, artemisia, et al.  

You can see the smudge sticks, which she makes, in the lower right side of the photo.  Traditionally they are burned by the native indians and religious groups for spiritual purification in differing rituals but Howard bought a sage stick to ward off the mosquitoes, which we hope will work, as I always get welts when bitten. They also apparently ward off “no-see-ums”, (nasty, tiny insects, which of course you can’t see), but the bites are supposedly worse than those of mosquitoes, also female bloodsuckers.

Having a second Saturday in Santa Fe, we dropped by the Farmers’ Market again and bought some odd items like the smudge stick, two beautiful pink and white peonies at $3.00 each with a few buds that would open later, three lavender bags, which we were told to add to the dryer to make the clothes smell nice, a pound of snow peas and some red corn-cob jelly from the same organic farm as before for our family to try.  

We wouldn’t like to try it but years ago, corn cobs (with kernels already removed) were used in the outhouse when nothing else was available and they were plentiful - ouch, just the thought......  They were also used for fuel for heating at one time rather like peat from the peat bogs in Ireland centuries ago and during the famine.

We met a man concentrating heavily on spinning yarns with mohair from his angora goats and wool from his beloved Corriedale sheep. Before we started chatting, he gave me one of his cards and the first thing I saw was the  name "Oasis Fiber” - I thought it was unusual and began to ask where his name originated from when he told me it was Frank - duh, what a pillock!   Then I realized that it was the name of his company.

His animals are all pets and after they’re shorn, he cleans the fibers, dyes them using commercial dyes and then hand knits or crochets items to sell at the market or online.  It is such a time consuming business but he loves it. He feels that the market for hand made items is actually growing  because, he said, people in a recession tend to revert to buying less commercially produced products.

The Plaza in Taos

Returning to the central Plaza that evening, we were entertained for a couple of hours with a live performance by musicians on the bandstand.  Listening to the singing in Spanish, we almost felt we were in another country.  It was a beautiful sunshiny evening with a huge audience, some families, some with dogs, sitting under the old cottonwood trees (photo) enjoying the ambience. 

According to the sign in the Plaza, it was established in the 1790’s by Spanish settlers and became the northernmost trading center of NM.  It has an old Hotel called “La Fonda” and shops such as “Taos Cowboy” for leather goods, Taos Trading Center, a goldsmith, “Nature’s Emporium Soap Co”, and other fancifully named shops. Passing by one of the galleries with some rather expensive items outside, a sign announced: “Unattended children will be given an espresso and a FREE puppy” - excellent idea!  Not that we don’t like children - we adore our two grandsons and are on our way northeast to see them in summer.