20 May An Unhurried Day Along the Turquoise Traill
Santa Fe has a perfectly good greatest hits list: Ten Thousand Waves, The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, Canyon Road, Meow Wolf, and Museum Hill to name just a few. All of them are worth your time, but if you’re a repeat visitor who’s already done this circuit, the traveler whose idea of a good time involves a ghost town and a buffalo named Harley, or anyone looking for that serendipitous discovery, this series is for you.
We’re starting with the Turquoise Trail, which runs south from Santa Fe toward Albuquerque. A designated scenic byway, the drive itself is worth the trip. Framed by the Ortiz and Sandia Mountains, the Turquoise Trail winds through open grasslands, volcanic hills, and historic mining towns. It can feel like an Old West movie set. In truth, some of it is.
First Stop: San Marcos Cafe
About ten miles south of Santa Fe is San Marcos Cafe, sitting back from the road on your right. Attached to a working feed store, roosters peck along the parking area and miniature horses poke their noses up over the fence across the way. The ambiance is artfully rustic and homey.
The menu is exactly what you want for a morning high desert outing: Huevos Rancheros, the signature San Marcos Crêpe, strong coffee, and cinnamon rolls that mean business (serious business). The food is affordable, the coffee is strong, and the whole place feels like a neighborhood hangout.
3877 State Rd 14, Santa Fe, NM 87508
Four Sixes Ranch
A short jog west off NM-14 on Bonanza Creek Road brings you to one of the more unexpected finds on this corridor.
The Four Sixes is a working ranch and horseback trail operation where the horses have been in actual movies. Some of the better known ones include Yellowstone, Magnificent Seven, and Lonesome Dove. The rides take you through a small Western town where filming still happens. The guide Jason is described by visitors as “a super cool cowboy and horse trainer.” Mark, who tends the Western town, is described as “a character taken straight out of a John Wayne movie.”
Don’t forget Harley, the buffalo, who expects homage paid in treats.
With no riding experience necessary, they’ll get you comfortable before you head out. For anyone who wants to extend the stay, there’s an Airbnb on the property with the horse stables nearby.
Also in the area: Broken Saddle Riding Company in Cerrillos and Turquoise Hills Riding (26 Vicksville Rd., Cerrillos) are both well-regarded alternatives if Four Sixes is booked.
Cerrillos and Cerrillos Hills State Park
Just before Madrid is the village of Los Cerrillos. Small, quiet, and largely unchanged, it’s a place that never got around to reinventing itself.
Cerrillos Hills State Park sits just outside town and contains some of the oldest turquoise mines in North America. The terrain is classic high desert scrub, with interpretive signs that reward anyone interested in geology. The views open up quickly, and if you’re still adjusting to New Mexico altitude, it’s a forgiving place to stretch your legs.
https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/cerrillos-hills-state-park/
44 Camino Turquesa, Los Cerrillos, NM 87010
Madrid: An Eclectic, Artsy Enclave
Madrid was a coal mining town that began emptying out in the 1950s when natural gas replaced coal. For a couple of decades it was a genuine ghost town until artists began moving in and shaping it into the funky hub it is today.
It’s a walkable strip of galleries, studios, vintage shops, and cafés, with enough unexpected finds to fill an afternoon. Madrid’s art scene is quirky and surprisingly wide-ranging — crystal shops, funky folk art, and serious painters and sculptors whose work could easily hold its own in New Mexico’s better-known art districts.
For the historically inclined, check out The Old Coal Mine Museum. If you get hungry, there’s the nearby Mine Shaft Tavern, which has been operating in some form or another since 1947. Next door is the Engine House Theater, featuring melodramas and live music performances.
Connie’s Photo Park is exactly what it sounds like and like nothing you’d expect. It features various hand-painted face-cutout boards ranging from Easy Rider homage to Victorian wedding portraits to UFO landings. It may be the closest you ever come to riding a buffalo into the sunset.
Tinkertown Museum
Tucked into the woods off NM-536 is one of New Mexico’s more extraordinary roadside attractions. Ross Ward spent 40 years carving a miniature world from wood: a circus, a Western town, an animated sea scene, more than 50,000 pieces of folk art housed inside walls built from 50,000 glass bottles. He built it all himself over the decades, carving the following motto into the wall: “I did all this while you were watching TV.”
As far as museums go, and I’m not sure that’s the right word for Tinkertown, it’s sui generis. It’s one person’s quirky, madcap inner world rendered in exquisite, minute detail. The admission is modest and it’s definitely worth giving yourself plenty of time. It’s practically impossible to take it all in over one visit.
121 Sandia Crest Rd, Tijeras | tinkertownmuseum.org
Sandia Park Tramway
If you continue along NM-536 past Tinkertown, the road eventually delivers you to the base of the Sandia Mountains and one of the more unexpected endings to a day that’s already had a few. The Sandia Peak Tramway departs from the base of the Sandia Mountains and climbs 2.7 miles to the 10,378-foot summit, making it the longest aerial tramway in the United States. The views from the top take in the entire Rio Grande valley, with Albuquerque spread out below. On a clear day, a horizon that stretches into four states.
A few things worth knowing before you go: tickets sell out, so book in advance. And pack a layer. The summit tends to run 25 to 30 degrees cooler than the valley floor, even on a warm afternoon.
A Few Notes Before You Go
The Mortenson/Eaves Movie Ranch is a working film location along the corridor – not a drop-in visitor stop, but worth knowing about if you notice the signage. It’s been a backdrop for Westerns since the 1960s and the landscape around it has that particular quality of New Mexico light that keeps cinematographers coming back.
The Turquoise Trail Association maintains maps, listings, and event information for the full corridor: turquoisetrail.org
Silver & Saddles rounds out the area for anyone interested in Western gear and regional craftsmanship: silverandsaddles.com
Timing: The corridor is manageable as a half-day if you pick two or three stops. As a full day – breakfast at San Marcos, a ride at Four Sixes, a wander through Madrid, and Tinkertown at the end – it can truly take a full day.
Next in this series: Los Alamos and the Jemez Mountains: the birthplace of the atomic bomb, the remains of an ancient volcanic caldera, slot canyons, hot springs, and one of the stranger landscapes in the American Southwest.
