March 19th--Santa Fe

Moved north to Santa Fe on Monday--a bit chilly at night--in fact it was -6 (21f) this morning!!  But the sky remains blue and the sun warms things up nicely.  The last 2 days we have walked around the old town in Santa Fe--all adobe type buildings.  We've toured the old churches-- some built around 1610--but the best of all was the Loretto Chapel built in 1873 and the 'miraculous' staircase.   The story goes that there was no way up to the choir loft so after making a novena to St Joseph, an older grey haired man came along on a donkey and offered to make a staircase.  Using only a hammer, handsaw, and a square he built a spiral staircase that makes 2 complete 360 degree turns--with no supporting pole in the center--not a nail in it--just wooden pegs. The entire weight is on the base.  The architects of today have said that by all the laws of gravity, it should have crashed to the floor the minute that anyone stepped on it--but it was used daily for nearly 100 years.  How this was done in the 1870's by a single man in and out-of -the way place with only the most primitive

tools has never been explained. It was truly amazing to see.  I'm sure there is a big write up on it on the net.  The story continues--when the mother superior went to pay the man he had disappeared, and when she went to the lumber yard to at least pay for that--they didn't know anything about it.   So--put that in your pipe and smoke it!!!!  We also toured the State Capitol Building--viewing the Senate and House chambers, but what was great was the $600,000 of art work through out the public areas--all by artists who live and work in New Mexico.