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The New Mexico section contains pages on Plaza Blanca and Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu
(made famous by the 20th century artist Georgia O’Keeffe), the Taos area (including images
selected from the Taos Pueblo page), the Los Alamos area (including scenic areas in the Jemez
Mountains), Mountain Wildflowers from the Jemez Mountains, and Sunrise and Sunset Scenics
from Bosque del Apache and Ladd Gordon Wildlife Refuges and the Very Large Array (VLA).
This page is an overview of the five section pages, with a few selected
images from each page and a display composite which links to the page.
Click a preview image for a larger version.
Use your back button to return to this page.
Click a Display Composite to visit the page.
New Mexico Index
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Abiquiu: Plaza Blanca and Ghost Ranch
Taos Area Scenic
Los Alamos Area
Mountain Wildflowers
Bosque Scenic: Sunrise and Sunset
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New Mexico Indian Lands and Anasazi Sites
Chaco Culture National Historical Park
Bandelier National Monument
Taos Pueblo
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Images in this section are in a number of different Galleries on the Photoshelter website.
The Banner below leads to the New Mexico Scenic Collection where a Gallery can be selected.
Direct Links to the New Mexico images:
Abiquiu NM
Taos Area Scenic
Taos Pueblo
Los Alamos Area
New Mexico Pueblos & Bandelier
Bosque Scenics Sunrise & Sunset
Mountain Wildflowers
Mountain Flowers
(Garden Section, includes other areas)
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Abiquiu
The Abiquiu area in Northern New Mexico was made famous by the 20th century artist
Georgia O’Keeffe, who made her home at Ghost Ranch, displayed in some images on
this page. She called the Plaza Blanca area near her home “The White Place”, and
made several paintings of the surreal volcanic cliffs and badlands. This page also
contains several shots of Apache Cicada, which emerged from its overlapping
three year underground growth period to be captured in images for this page.
Plaza Blanca Abiquiu X5596
(492 KB)
The first view of Plaza Blanca from the base of the trail entering the valley.
The Plaza Blanca formations are made of volcanic tuff, a compacted volcanic ash
which was laid down when the pyroclastic flows from the Valles Caldera eruptions
blanketed the area over a million years ago. Later, erosion created the hoodoos,
spires, pinnacles and cliffs in the silica-rich alabaster tuff of The White Place.
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Apache Cicada X5536
(334 KB)
One of several Apache Cicadas encountered in Abiquiu, New Mexico.
Male Cicadas make a very loud clicking sound by contracting and expanding the tymbals,
which are ribbed sections of the exoskeleton with membranes between ribs. Contracting
the tymbals causes a click, and another click is caused by the expansion. The tymbals
are contracted and expanded rapidly, and its body serves as a resonance chamber,
amplifying the sound to as much as 120 dB (among the loudest of insect sounds).
Cicadas have separate mating and distress calls, as well as a courtship sound.
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City Slickers Cabin Pedernal Mountain X5657
(495 KB)
The City Slickers Cabin at Ghost Ranch, with Abiquiu Lake in the distance and
the distinctive shape of Cerro Pedernal (Pedernal Mountain) above the cabin roof.
Cerro Pedernal is Spanish for “Flint Hill”. The flat-topped shape of Pedernal was
present in many of the paintings of Georgia O’Keeffe, and it was the distinctive
landmark in her favored “Faraway”. Her ashes were scattered atop Pedernal.
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Click the Display Composite above to visit the Abiquiu page
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Taos Area
Taos was established in 1615 after the Spanish conquest of the Pueblo villages, including Taos Pueblo,
which was built between 1000 and 1450, the oldest continuously inhabited community in North America.
The Taos Area page contains images of Santuario de Chimayo near Santa Fe, the Rio Grande Gorge
Bridge near Taos, adobe ruins and San Francisco de Asis Mission Church in Ranchos de Taos Plaza,
selected images from the Taos Pueblo page, and a unique Fridgehenge construction above Santa Fe.
Santuario de Chimayo HS6456
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Santuario de Chimayo is in the Sangre de Cristos Mountains between Taos and Santa Fe.
The current church was built in 1816 to replace a small chapel built on the site by the land owner
Don Bernardo Abeyta after miraculous healings were reported at the site where a wooden crucifix
was unearthed. Known as the Lourdes of America, nearly 300,000 people per year travel to the
shrine, some walking from Santa Fe, Taos, Albuquerque, and a few from as far as Mexico.
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Ranchos de Taos Plaza Ruins HS6478
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Dilapidated ruins of old adobe buildings on the Plaza at Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico.
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San Francisco de Asis Taos HS6489
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The front entrance to San Francisco de Asis Mission Church.
This church was the subject of four paintings by Georgia O’Keeffe
and numerous photographs by Ansel Adams and others, and along
with Taos Pueblo (located a few miles north), it is one of the most
often reproduced structures in the USA. It is considered to be
one of the most beautiful of the Spanish Mission Churches.
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Taos Pueblo North House and Plaza HS6556
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A Summer Shelter at the south edge of the Plaza, North House is in the distance at right.
Under a tarpaulin inside the Summer Shelter is a horno (a beehive-shaped adobe oven).
North House (Hlauuma) is the largest multi-storied Pueblo structure still in existence,
and one of the most photographed and painted buildings in the Western Hemisphere.
Taos Pueblo is the largest surviving multi-storied Pueblo in the United States. It is the
oldest continually-inhabited community in North America, changing little in over 500 years.
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Click the Display Composite above to visit the Taos Area Scenic page
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Los Alamos Area
The Los Alamos area was first settled by Ancestral Pueblo Indians, then by Hispanic homesteaders.
In the early 20th century, the Alamos Ranch was turned into the Los Alamos Ranch School for Boys,
and Fuller Lodge was built from nearly 800 massive pine logs. During World War II, the entire area
of the Pajarito Plateau was appropriated for the Manhattan Project, and the Los Alamos National
Laboratory was built to conduct research into atomic energy and develop the first atomic bomb.
The Los Alamos Area page contains images of Fuller Lodge and the area around it, including
the Demonstration Gardens and Memorial Rose Garden. It also includes images of Jemez Falls,
the East Fork of the Jemez River, and Valles Caldera in the Jemez Mountains above Los Alamos.
East Fork Jemez River X5130
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The East Fork of the Jemez River, cutting through a meadow in the Santa Fe National Forest.
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Jemez Falls X5171
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Jemez Falls on the the East Fork of the Jemez River is the largest waterfall in the Jemez Mountains.
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Colonnade Fuller Lodge X5311
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The colonnade of Fuller Lodge, built in 1928 for the Los Alamos Ranch School for Boys.
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Emerging Rosebud Fuller Lodge X5343
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An Emerging Rosebud in the Memorial Rose Garden,
created in 1956 to honor those who had died in Los Alamos.
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Click the Display Composite above to visit the Los Alamos Area page
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Mountain Wildflowers
The mountains above Los Alamos have many hiking trails, including the ski area
around Pajarito Mountain and the trail beside the East Fork of the Jemez River. In
spring and early summer, the area is blanketed with brightly colored wildflowers.
Shrubby Cinquefoil Potentilla X5500
(261 KB)
Detail of a flower of Shrubby Cinquefoil (Dasiphora fruticosa floribunda), formerly
known as Shrubby Potentilla. Each plant usually produces ten or more flowers, each
flower with up to 25 stamens, and flowers throughout the summer. A tundra, alpine and
subalpine shrub which grows low to the ground (rarely growing more than three feet tall),
its hardy and long-flowering characteristics have made it a popular ornamental plant.
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Richardson Geranium Jemez River X5137c
(1500 x 1290, 531 KB)
A detail crop of a Richardson Geranium, showing the purple-veined flower petals and
detail of the hairs, stamens, pollen and the anthers which have fallen from the stamens.
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Wyoming Indian Paintbrush X5509
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Wyoming Indian Paintbrush, or Narrow-leaf Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja liniariifolia) is the state flower of Wyoming.
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Rocky Mountain Iris X5484
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The Rocky Mountain Iris resembles a miniature domesticated iris. They grow one to two feet tall, with 3” diameter flowers.
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Rocky Mountain Clematis X5109
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Rocky Mountain Clematis (Clematis columbiana), on the Camp May Trail, Pajarito Mountain.
A vine in the Buttercup family, it is also known as Rock Clematis and Blue Virgin’s Bower. It
grows low to the ground, generally in shaded, moist forested areas at the base of mountains.
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Click the Display Composite above to visit the Mountain Wildflowers page
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Bosque Scenic
New Mexico is well known for its spectacular sunrises and sunsets. The Bosque Scenic
page displays a number of images taken at sunrise and sunset at the Bosque del Apache
National Wildlife Refuge, plus some shots from the nearby Ladd Gordon Waterfowl Complex.
These include some striking scenes of the Dawn Flyout of the Snow Geese from both locations,
when as many as 50,000 Snow Geese blast off en-masse (a truly spectacular sight). There
are also several images of the Very Large Array near Soccoro, taken just after sunrise.
Bosque del Apache Dawn Flyout 2232
(478 KB)
Dawn breaks over the large pool near the Flight Deck at Bosque del Apache on a
cold winter morning, painting the cloud cover, the pool, and a group of Snow Geese.
Two minutes later, the sky is filled with thousands of Snow Geese flying out to the fields.
The morning flyout of the Snow Geese is one of Nature’s most spectacular scenes.
Tens of thousands of Snow Geese fill the sky in an instantaneous burst of flight. A group
of geese take off at nearly the same moment, flying within inches of each other, and as the
madly honking gaggle of geese fly over each pool, they set off the group of geese below.
This shot captures a gaggle of geese flying over a group of geese in the pool below,
just before that group breaks into flight to join them in their trip to the corn fields.
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Bosque del Apache Sandhills at Sunrise HS1061
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Sandhill Cranes are frozen into the icy pond next to the Coyote Deck on
a crisp January morning, as Bosque Cottonwoods reflect the rising sun.
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Bosque Crane Pool at Sunrise 6372
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Snow Geese and Sandhill Cranes are painted by the soft light reflecting from the
Chupadera Mountains onto the Crane Pool at sunrise on a cold morning in January.
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Sandhill Crane Sunset Landing 5791c
(387 KB)
A Sandhill Crane floats in for a landing at sunset. The timing of this shot was
just right, capturing the bird scooping air to lose speed just before touchdown.
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Ladd Gordon Snow Geese at Sunset HS8379
(237 KB)
A formation of Snow Geese in front of a pink cloud at sunset over Ladd Gordon Waterfowl Complex.
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Click the Display Composite above to visit the Bosque Scenic page
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Images in this section are in a number of different Galleries on the Photoshelter website.
The Banner below leads to the New Mexico Scenic Collection where a Gallery can be selected.
Direct Links to the New Mexico images:
Abiquiu NM
Taos Area Scenic
Taos Pueblo
Los Alamos Area
New Mexico Pueblos & Bandelier
Bosque Scenics Sunrise & Sunset
Mountain Wildflowers
Mountain Flowers
(Garden Section, includes other areas)
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Click the Display Composite above to return to the Southwest Index page
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