After Dan toured the New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum in Las Cruces, NM, we finally hit the road to Silver City, NM. We have visited Silver City twice before while staying in Deming, NM (see below BLOG links). We have found Silver City an interesting place & had wanted to stay in a RV park near the city to explore if further. As we have noted before, the city is a unique mixture of cowboys & farmers, aging hippies, many artists, new-agers, etc. Upon arrival we learned that today, 01APR, was a “First Fridays Downtown” in Silver City; which apparently consists of a street dance, costume contest, stores open late, street performers, etc. So we decided to check it out & find a place for dinner. While window shopping on the main boulevard we discovered the Shevek & Co Restaurant. The Chef apparently learned cooking from his Jewish Grandmother in a multi ethnic neighborhood in New York City, followed by working in restaurants all around the Mediterranean, before graduating from the Culinary Institute. Needless to say the food was excellent, & best of all every item on the menu could be ordered in one of three sizes – tapa, mezze & entrée. We stuck to the tapa size & sampled eight different items & two desserts. We caught the end of the First Fridays Downtown & were not impressed, especially when it wrapped-up at 8PM.
Saturday morning we headed to the Catwalk Trail in Whitewater Canyon in the Gila National Forest five miles east of Glenwood, NM. This is a great hike through a very narrow canyon with some portions on cantilevered catwalks; very similar to the Johnston Canyon hike we took in Canada’s Banff National Park back in September 09. The trail follows the route of a four inch pipeline built around 1893 that brought water to an ore mill located at the mouth of the canyon. The pipeline had to be raised above the canyon floor & cantilevered to protect it from flash floods. Eventually the CCC was tasked with turning the remnants of the pipeline structure into a trail.
We were going to hit the road on Sunday, 03APR, but the weather service predicted high winds gusty to over 70 mph (equivalent to a category 1 hurricane). So we decided to stay one more day & not risk being on the road.
Late Sunday afternoon Dan went on a driving tour of Fort Bayard in spite of the gusting winds. The fort started in 1866 as a typical Army post used to suppress the Indians. Buffalo Soldiers were also stationed here, several of whom received the Medal of Honor. One Buffalo Soldier was Will Cathay (aka Cathy Williams), the only known female Buffalo Soldier. Rather than being abandoned in the late 1890s like many others, Fort Bayard became the first Army tuberculosis sanatorium. In 1922 the complex was transferred to the Veterans Bureau & continued to treat tuberculosis, as well as Veterans of WWI & WWII. In 1965 the Fort complex was transferred to the state of New Mexico which operated it as long term health care facility until 2010. In 1974 the Fort’s cemetery was designated as a National Cemetery. Unfortunately, almost all of the buildings are visibly deteriorating while the state tries to find funds to stabilize it & eventually restore it.
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