An Albuquerque Church and Breaking Bad

Posted on February 11, 2014 by pearlsandprose

Back to the plaza in Old Town Albuquerque.

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The original church of San Felipe de Neri was started in 1706 under the direction of Fray Manuel Moreno, a Franciscan priest. During the very rainy summer of 1792, the old church collapsed. The church that now stands on the Old Town Plaza was constructed the following year.

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The interior. Sorry about the blurry photo–the light was really poor in the back of the church and I’m loath to use flash in old places.

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You can see the lovely colors a little better here. The church still offers daily and weekend mass.

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The school next door.

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Behind the church, an interesting sculpture within an old tree trunk. I was surprised to learn it’s the Virgin Mary.

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A closer look.

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Across the plaza, more adobe . . .

and t-shirts like this one:

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Breaking Bad stuff was everywhere, and I did something I’ve never done before.

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I visited a site used in a TV show, namely Walter White’s house from Breaking Bad. It was actually near the same neighborhood as my husband’s relatives, so I couldn’t resist. Would it be kind of weird to live there?

We also found Jesse’s place on the way to the airport:

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I love the colors. Hard to believe it was the site of such mayhem.

Hope your week’s going well so far. We are going away for 10 days, so I’ll be back Feb. 25.

{carole}

P.S. Welcome, new subscribers!

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Old Town Albuquerque

Posted on February 6, 2014 by pearlsandprose

I didn’t know what to expect when we flew into Albuquerque, as I’d never been there and had only brief glimpses from the show Breaking Bad. I ended up liking the city a lot, especially the Old Town area.

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Old Town dates back to the founding of the city by the Spanish in 1706.

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There’s a nice plaza with a gazebo,

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Cool shops with a retro vibe and unusual stuff to buy:

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I especially liked this place, Vintage Cowgirl. The displays were far from run-of-the-mill:

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An interesting name.

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There were flowers and art galleries too.

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Even the benches were artistic.

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It was cool in October, so quite a few places had fires going. I loved that.

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Lots of adobe.

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This may be my new favorite color combo.
More on Tuesday.

Great weekend, everyone!

{carole}

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Choices and “Wonder”

Posted on February 4, 2014 by pearlsandprose

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Getty Images has invited me to join their new program Moment, where they ask photographers to submit photos for certain themes via smartphones. I submitted the above shot and some others for the theme “Visualize Choice.” It’s fitting, because I spent quite a bit of time trying to decide which planter to buy for a camellia. These definitely caught my eye, but I ended up buying something with a softer hue.

A book I just finished made me think about a different kind of choice. Wonder, by R.J. Palacio, is about a young boy with severe facial abnormalities and it is heartbreaking and uplifting at the same time. One of the main themes is kindness, and this quote really spoke to me:

“When given the choice between being right or being kind, choose kind.” ~ Dr Wayne W. Dyer

If only more people would choose kind.

Hope your week’s going well so far. Was anyone else surprised at the blowout that was the Super Bowl? Yikes.

{carole}

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Taos Pueblo

Posted on January 30, 2014 by pearlsandprose

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Taos Pueblo is approximately 1000 years old and considered to be the oldest continuously inhabited community in the U.S. The native language, Tiwa, is unrecorded and unwritten and the traditional values are guarded as sacred.

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The buildings are made of adobe, a mixture of earth, straw and water made into bricks, then plastered with the same adobe mix. Before the introduction of doorways, the only entry was by ladder through an opening in the roof. In case of attack, the ladders were pulled up to the roofs.

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This version of San Geronimo Church was built in 1850 and is a registered National Historic Landmark and World Heritage Site. The original church was built in 1620, but natives opposed to the Spanish presence destroyed it. The same thing happened again in 1680.

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Here you can see the church in relation to the pueblo.

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I love the blues here.

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I believe these windows were in the visitor’s center where I had to register as a photographer. No photos of the Pueblo are to be sold.

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The Pueblo maintains the restrictions of no electricity and no running water in the sacred village. Wood stoves and fireplaces are used for cooking.

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The Red Willow Creek flowing through the Pueblo is the sole source of drinking water for the members.

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Up in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the water flows from a sacred source known as Blue Lake. Since these areas are sacred, non-tribal members are not allowed there. I had to stand behind a fence to take this photo. There’s also a rule against photographing the residents.

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When New Mexico became a territory of the United States in 1847, there was a revolt in Taos Pueblo. Mexicans and Indians killed Governor Charles Bent and others and marched on Santa Fe, but were subdued after taking refuge in the San Geronimo Church. American troops destroyed the church, leaving only this bell tower.

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I was happy to see the sun come out just as we were leaving so I could get this shot.

Great weekend, everyone!

{carole}

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The High Road from Taos

Posted on January 27, 2014 by pearlsandprose

Hi there . . . back in New Mexico. As I posted before, we took the Low Road to Taos because it was faster. One guidebook stated that it could take up to seven hours to do the High Road, so we started out from Taos in the morning.

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Since it was October, the roads were pretty empty.

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Las Trampas is a small, unincorporated town founded in 1751 and is known for the San José de Gracia Church, seen above. I was stuck by the simplicity of the adobe architecture.

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The skies were even bluer than in California.

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This seemed incongruous to me, but I liked the colors.

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Another adobe church, Old Truchas Mission of Holy Rosary, built in 1764. Truchas, a community started by a land grant in 1754, sits at an elevation of 8000 feet (2438 m.)and offers gorgeous views of the Truchas Peaks:

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The settlement was mentioned in Willa Cather’s Death Comes for the Archbishop, and The Milagro Beanfield War was filmed here. At one time the area became quite the artist’s colony, but sadly many of the galleries were shuttered. We were told the bad economy really hit this area hard. I imagine if all the galleries and shops had been open, the trip would have taken many more hours. It went pretty quickly for us.

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This reminded me of the Alps so much.

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The landscape was pretty varied.

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I loved this old ramshackle building with the golden trees and blue sky.

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Mountains everywhere.

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More cottonwoods.

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This is the church at Chimayó, the last surviving Spanish fortified plaza. Some believe the dirt from a back room of the church can heal physical and spiritual ills, and the site has become known as the “Lourdes of America.”

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According to Wikipedia, up to 30,000 people visit the site during Holy Week.

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The door to the gift shop and cafe where you can buy their famous heirloom chiles.

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The Santuario de Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas, commonly known as El Santuario de Chimayó, was built in 1816. It was turned over to the Archdiocese of Santa Fe in 1929.

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Near the town of Espanola there was a beautiful grove of cottonwoods.

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I call this one “Golden Arches.”

Hope your week’s going well so far . . . .

{carole}

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Travel Scan: Arc Sunset in Paris

Posted on January 24, 2014 by pearlsandprose

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I took this shot one summer evening in Paris, just as the sun was going down. I was teetering on a narrow curb with cars coming at me, but I didn’t care. I wanted a shot of the sun setting through l’Arc de Triomphe. It was kind of scary and exhilarating at the same time.

Great weekend, everyone!

{carole}

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Winter Sunset

Posted on January 21, 2014 by pearlsandprose

My stepson was visiting from the East Coast recently and we went to the beach one evening to catch the sunset. The actual setting wasn’t spectacular, but the afterglow was pretty sweet:

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The light on the ocean was so unusual–I thought it made the water look like frosting or cream cheese.

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My stepson and his sister scrambled down the cliffs and I took this from up above. They look so tiny against the Pacific, don’t they?

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I still have lots of New Mexico photos to post, but am having a little trouble getting back in the groove after the holidays and our little getaway. Hoping to do that very soon.

{carole}

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Cactus and Bananas and More

Posted on January 17, 2014 by pearlsandprose

While the rest of the country was in a deep freeze a couple weeks ago, I was lucky enough to be in a garden taking these shots:

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I don’t know the name of this particular cactus, but it reminds me of a spider.

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Bananas growing outside in January. Baffling to me, still.

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The fronds on this Sago Palm seem to be reaching for the light, don’t they?

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Yes, we have autumn leaves in January here. All the leaves are just now dropping from the tree in our front yard.

Great weekend, everyone!

{carole}

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Want a Break From the Cold?

Posted on January 10, 2014 by pearlsandprose

If you’re in the middle of the deep freeze that’s affecting large parts of the world, here are some shots taken recently at Torrey Pines Reserve overlooking the Pacific. Enjoy. . . .

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Great weekend, everyone! We’re going away for a few days, but I’ll be back next Friday.

{carole}

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One Great Afternoon

Posted on January 6, 2014 by pearlsandprose

Every now and then, things align just right and a wonderful time is had. One of my closest friends and I had lunch over the holidays at a lovely restaurant and it was warm enough to eat outside. After we ordered, a guy started singing and playing guitar. He was really good and played a lot of songs we both liked. We opened gifts and talked for more than two hours. (We had a lot of catching up to do.) At one point we looked at each other and marveled at how lucky we were to be eating outside in December and listening to beautiful music.

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The individual brie and pear pizzas we ordered were perfect too.

Happy 2014, everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful holiday. I really enjoyed the time off…always good to recharge those batteries.

{carole}

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