We had breakfast at McDonald’s in Ruidoso and then headed over to the Hubbard Museum of the American West. What a terrific museum this is! It is owned and operated by the city of Ruidoso Downs, and is affiliated with the Smithsonian.
Perhaps the most spectacular exhibit of the museum is located outside, on the beautifully landscaped strip of land that runs alongside the highway. This artistic creation is called “Free Spirits at Noisy Water.” It is a string of eight larger-than-life horses, bounding down a hillside. Each horse weighs between three- and five thousand pounds, and five of them have only one hoof touching the ground, making this as much an engineering marvel as it is an artistic one. My pictures don’t begin to show the scope of this piece of art, created by Sculptor Dave McGary.
Inside the museum, the highlight of the exhibits is a collection of carriages, wagons and horse drawn vehicles that spans hundreds of years. Some of the interesting ones were a horse-drawn hearse, a horse-drawn pumper (fire engine), the chuck wagon and the doctor’s carriage.
In the museum's gift shop I found the cutest little pony-purse, that I just had to buy for Sweetpea. I hope she loves it.
After viewing the museum, we went back into Ruidoso for lunch, then drove to the little, historic town of Lincoln. Most of the original buildings in Lincoln are built in the Territorial Style of adobe architecture of the American Southwest, and six of them are open to the public. We only went into two of them, as we were both running out of steam by this time. In the first museum we watched a video on Billy the Kid. It was in Lincoln, at the courthouse (still standing and open to the public) where Billy the Kid shot his way out of custody and escaped. Sheriff Pat Garret, also from Lincoln, chased him down and finally killed him, in Fort Sumner. We also went into the old Tunstall Store, which contains displays of the original 19th-century merchandise in the original shelving and cases.
Back at the Inn that evening, we didn’t want much to eat for dinner. We asked, at the dining room, if there was anywhere to get a light meal, like a sandwich or soup. We were directed to the Lounge (read “Bar”). We were two very funny fish out of water at the Lounge. I think we were the only people in there ordering anything non-liquid! The lounge had easy chairs and sofas, and only little tables suitable for drinks and mixed nuts. Although we did each order a hamburger, we had to balance everything on our laps. We kept giggling at how out of place we felt, and we couldn’t wait to finish eating and escape that dark, smoky, moody Lounge!
After dinner, we spent the evening in our room on one of Mom’s favorite pastimes -- solving a very difficult crossword puzzle. It took both of our brains and a little bit of Internet research, but we finally completed every block in that puzzle.
This was our second (and last) night at the Inn, but tomorrow I will report on our Saturday trip back to Carlsbad.
No comments:
Post a Comment