Full Day in Santa Fe on Wednesday, April 2nd

We decided to make this a relaxed morning and used the time to get caught up on our blog and got ourselves organized after our long trip yesterday. We also started feeling the effects of our spicy dinner yesterday. Nuf said. 

Undaunted, we had lunch at another great New Mexican restaurant while we charged our car. We tried Maria's New Mexican Kitchen. Last night's restaurant had been in business for 50 years, but Maria's had recently celebrated their 75th anniversary! The food was great, so it was easy to see why they have been in business so long.

Leon tried the special, Frito Pie.

The obligatory sopapillas - seriously so good! They are served hot and are really great with the honey that is on every table.

I had the chiles rellenos - also excellent.

We also discovered our favorite thing about New Mexican food: sopapillas. They are served with the entrees but we mostly saved ours for after the meal and had them as dessert with the only condiment on the table: honey. They were awesome. This needs to be a thing at every Mexican restaurant.

After lunch, I went to the Georgia O'Keefe Museum; I had toured it back in 2007, which I remembered as a great experience. This time, I used the audio tour, which was pretty good, but overall I was disappointed that they seemed to have far fewer of her paintings on display than I remembered. For instance, they had only 1 of her major flower paintings showing, and only 1 of her bone/animal skull paintings. 

While I toured the museum, Leon walked around downtown for a bit. Afterward, we did some window shopping in the downtown area. They really have some beautiful things for sale, none of which we have room for in our car! Still, it was interesting to see the local culture reflected in the many beautiful things we saw.

The pueblo style is everywhere here - this is a bank! It is easy to see why they built using these materials. There are very few trees, and we also found that the thick walls insulate/retain the temperature inside very efficiently. We really had a hard time getting our room at the inn cool enough at night because it retained the heat so well.

This the Museum of Art. In retrospect, I wish I had spent my time here instead of the Georgia O'Keefe Museum.

There were countless beautifully crafted pieces of jewelry using turquoise, silver and other locally sourced materials. 

For dinner, we sought something other than New Mexican cuisine, opting for woodfired pizza and Caesar salads at Il Vicino. We took this picture out front - you can see that the weather had turned chilly from our clothing.

We continued to catch up on our blog in the evening while we relaxed in our room. Tomorrow - the long drive to Louisville CO on what should be the prettiest - and most harrowing - drive of our trip so far.