R. Doug Wicker — Author

The next morning we departed Santa Fe for a quick road trip to Taos.  Alas, we didn’t make it.

Note to the business owners, police department, city council, and mayor of Taos, New Mexico:

There is one main thoroughfare through your fair city.  That thoroughfare is, for all intents and purposes, the only way to get from Santa Fe to points north, via New Mexico Highway 68 where it joins up with U.S. Highway 64.  It is never a good idea to shut off your main street (and a major state highway leading to a major U.S. highway) for a street festival.  It is an even worse idea to do so without posting directions for an alternate route around the blockage.  Setting up a police roadblock, having an officer direct you to turn off the main drag, and having no directions as to what follows is a sure way to get us, a dozen or so cars, and a motorcycle tour group (from what I saw in the 20 minutes we got tied up in this fiasco) to make a U-turn and head back toward more visitor-friendly venues.  Shame on you, Taos.  What the hell were you thinking?  You didn’t have another street you could close?  Really dumb, guys.

But it wasn’t a total loss.  Cresting the mountains and descending into Taos grants to you a grand view of the Taos Gorge.  Running through that gorge is the Rio Grande . . . the same Rio Grande that eventually makes its way down to El Paso and forms the border between Texas and Mexico.

Ursula and I have on two occasions gone river rafting on the Rio Grande river just southwest of Taos.  We didn’t do so this trip, as the water was too low to have much fun.  But we did stop and take pictures of those who were out on the river that day.

These scenes alone were almost worth the aggravation of dealing with the stupidity that ran rampant through Taos that day: