Santa Fe/Albuquerque: C/D or S/D

(which, to be fair, ain't THAT fake: it's just been overrun with the extremely wealthy)

http://department.monm.edu/chaplain/Adobe%20Church%20-%20Lamy%20NM.jpg

an old postcard from lamy:

http://cache.tias.com/stores/katpostcards/pictures/k04113a.jpg

my aunt lives there. her opinion of it doesn't differ too greatly from mine.

all of that's only on a two day visit, so it might be crap over the long term, but i don't think so, at least compared to your Aspens and Jackson Holes.

AND DO NOT, WHATEVER YOU DO, MOVE TO YUMA.

x-post jill schoelen...: First and foremost: work and the cost of living. Aspen is BASICALLY as expensive as NYC (tiny 1br studios in "downtown" Aspen run from 1500-2500/mo. I live in shitty employee housing and pay $511 for a 200-300sq ft. 2br apartment. I'm supremely over-qualified for all the jobs I can get--the town is almost entirely service industry, save for architecture, construction, real estates and professionals (lawyers, docs et al). Beyond that, I'd like to get back to something that doesn't have a population of 5,000 locals & a bazillion tourists. I grew up and went to college in small towns; I don't need to spend my 20s in one. Also: sausage fest. 99% of ski bums are "bros."

Kicker: a few of my best friends from college are moving there.

just barely outside the city, there's lots of stuff to do, too. the petroglyphs, for example. other drives to national and state parks ('rents live like two seconds from coronado state monument - chop off that right foot!). sandia peak and tramway - skiing if you want it (i skiied sandia last january, it was kind of weak but the week after i left they got a foot of new snow). santa fe is close (we had dinner there after spending the day at ojo caliente), and looks great. taos is not much further. chaco canyon, los alamos, truth or consequences, four corners, the trinity site (only open to the public on 2 days per year but still) - hell even arizona (which i DON'T RECOMMEND, see climate below) isn't far. you can make a trip to the grand canyon or flagstaff (sorry, but i don't like phoenix - which is way more generic and sprawling than albuquerque - or tucson - which seems dead and was FUCKING HOTTTT in a way that you only get in the desert in new mexico, not in the higher elevations).

albuquerque is booming, yes, but there's still a lot of physical beauty. my dad and stepmom can walk right out their door and not only see the sandia peaks looming over everything, they can also walk about a 100 yards and be on the bosque of the rio grande (it's high right now, lots of snow and rain this winter/spring). they take the dog out walking and watch the geese land in the water. they watch for bald eagles. that shit's cool, imo. i live in a nice bucolic part of brooklyn where i hear cute birdies out my window in the spring and my neighbors have beautiful gardens, yes, but i can't look right out the window and see a fucking MOUNTAIN.

and booming ain't all that bad, either. within 2 weeks of moving there, my dad had like 5 job interviews. intel's largest factory is in rio rancho. stuff is going on. politically, i think bill richardson is a cool dude. my parents are very happy with the service they've gotten from the democratic state and local governments (and they're republicans!). so yeah, the va hospital is down by the airport, but hey no biggie.

there are some bad things - way too much drunken driving, crystal meth, cocaine and a fair amount of general crime (supposedly on the south side, mostly), but it didn't seem that bag (altho funnily enough one of the local movers helping with their stuff had a baggie fall out of his uni pocket - good thing my stepmom didn't know what it was until i told her). but everywhere has that, when i drove thru nebraska in november i saw anti-crystal meth billboards on the highway.

i think culturally albuquerque has a lot going for it. native, mexican, gringo cultures all kinda mix. great food, and not just tex-mex, even in some of the smaller burbs like bernalillo. NEW MEXICO LOBOS BASKETBALL + the ncaa often holds regionals at "the pit," the lobos stadium near the airport. i get the impression (tho i don't know for sure) that the schools aren't all that bad. like a lot of the west, there is a greater consciousness about water conservation and environmental issues in general, than the east. the museums looked pretty good. when i was there on tour i found a great used book store on central, and the launchpad was a fun bar/venue (120 people on a monday night in the summer ain't bad for b!ll c@ll@h@n).

now i don't wanna get offensive here, but the only people i've ever met that have moved to new mexico and didn't like it are jbr and my friend tony (who is from new jersey). they have their reasons, and jbr can elaborate, and i can totally dig on why people raised in the new york metropolitan area wouldn't like it - but i think it's more laid back, the weather's nicer, and the people seem friendlier (if not obsessed with "cool" (tho there's nothing wrong with that!)) than nyc. yeah, you probably need a car. but with so much HISTORY and PRE-HISTORIC and GEOLOGICAL and BOTANICAL sights to see within at most a 3-4 hour drive, you would want one! if you hate the outdoors, well then it's probably not for you.

my dad is going to some big huge international indian conference/pow-wow going on soon. in the east, our indians are either dead, up in the adirondacks (tho actually yeah there is a tribe out on long island), or mohegan sunnin' it (actually i like indian casinos! and there's plenty in nm too! and strip joints if that's your thing).

in short, i think albuquerque, santa fe, and the whole dern state rulez. i will probably live there at some point. i don't see any reason not to. prolly living in a small town (not a burb) is even cooler! i'm jealous, have fun!

Then what jody said about Santa Fe being a tourist trap should have some influence on your decision. Albuquerque is cheaper and has a more diverse economy. Sante Fe would only be an hour or so away, and I think it'd make a better getaway from Albq than vice versa.

*runs*

Tucumcari is just this truck stop town miles west of the New Mexico/Texas border on I-40... I just remember the truck stop convenience store had a vat the size of several humans filled with fried chicken. And one of the guys gave me a weird compliment about some cheap artificial Minute Maid soft drink I chose from the drink dispenser. "Best drink I ever had! Been livin on it. Will die with it!"

Although maybe the Tucumcari posse on ilx can hop out of lurk mode and defend and reprezent!

(And again, tt's also where Route 666 starts!)

i never moved there. my aunt did. i am spending this summer in tucson tho.

also i can't help but note that it seems strange to me for new yorkers to call albuquerque "suburban" considering the suburbs of new york stretch into three states.

it IS suburban! and i may be a new yorker but i have lived in small towns/suburbs so i'm not exactly a stereotypical xenophobic new yorker.

it is suburban, i'm not denying that. my dad and stepmom live in a suburb, as i noted in my first post. it would be pretty difficult to find a major american city (juneau doesn't count!) that doesn't have suburbs. i don't think albuquerque is, proportionally or otherwise, on par with the 3 generations (or more) of suburban growth cities (nyc, chicago, la) or cities with a shorter history of suburban growth but huge rates of growth (atlanta, dallas, houston, las vegas).

I was there a couple months ago and it's basically a Barstow-sized wide spot on the road. Keep moving to Flagstaff or Albuquerque depending upon which way your going.

On my road trip three years ago, the only reason I initially went up to I-40 was to be able to visit Santa Fe and Albuquerque.. I'm REALLY glad I did, because this forced me to stay in northern Arizona, stay in Flagstaff, see the meteor crater, see the Grand Canyon, and see the Painted Desert on my way to southern Utah/Zion National Forest... all places I would have never planned to visit, Grand Canyon aside, had I taken I-20 or I-10 instead.

Visiting Santa Fe for first time. Gonna be one of those tourists some of you were sick of , above!