STREET SMART IN SANTA FE A STROLL THROUGH THE CITY REVEALS THE CHARMS THAT INSPIRED ARTISTS AND OTHER DREAMERS.

Byline: Story and photos by Eric Noland Travel Editor

SANTA FE, N.M. - The route to the soul of Santa Fe is well-marked. But you'd better be on foot.

Wander the narrow, curving streets - laid out for burro carts when this was an 1800s trading center - and savor perhaps the best window shopping in the West: blankets, baskets, pottery, paintings, sculpture, historic photos.

Hike to the Cross of the Martyrs, a promontory that affords an overlook of the town's low-rise, mud-brown skyline and the stunning desert vistas that have proven so irresistible to artists.

Stroll along shady Canyon Road to contemplate the art of 90 galleries, exploring a woodsy world of brightly painted doors and gates, and walls festooned with flower vines.

If you make your way into a cafe in this town, you might happen upon a charming interior patio, washed by the sun and thickly overgrown. In fact, you might wonder if the hollyhock is the official flower of Santa Fe, since it grows to great heights in these courtyards, in blossoms of pink, red and white.

From time to time on any of these walks, you might catch a husky whiff of pinyon smoke from a chimney, hear the resonant chime of a church bell or flinch at a distant flash of lightning.

The images and impressions are so varied, it can be a challenge to process them all.

But, then, Santa Fe has always been about convergence - of cultures and styles and peoples. Its governance has changed hands seven times, with the reins of power alternately held by Colonial Spain, Pueblo Indians, a neophyte Mexican Republic, the American Confederacy and, of course, the United States. As the terminus of the famed Santa Fe Trail, it was the regional clearinghouse for goods as diverse as Yankee cooking pots, Spanish saddles and Indian rugs.

Half the fun of an aimless walk through this city is the unexpected.

Maybe it'll be a salsa band, like the one we found in the Plaza on a Sunday afternoon. Couples and children danced as old folks sat on benches and tapped their feet.

Maybe a working artist. We happened upon Guilloume Perez-Zapata, a Colombian sculptor working at his clay in a sidewalk art show held by the Santa Fe Society of Artists. His finished works stood silently by, testifying to his talent in the abstract.

Being afoot in Santa Fe is essential for other reasons. It has found favor with legions of tourists, yet the historic nature of the city core is not particularly suitable to the automobile. To avoid the frustration of getting caught in a weekend traffic jam around the Plaza, park your car at the edge of town (just off Interstate 25, there is a large lot at Paseo de Peralta and Old Santa Fe Trail) and hoof it.

Once you're making your way along the sidewalks, you'll better appreciate the Santa Fe convergence that endures to this day - a heady mingling of art, history, crafts and fusion cuisine.

A good way to get oriented with this town is through a Historic Walks of Santa Fe walking tour. Our guide, Lisa Valdez-Bonney, traced Santa Fe's history from a crude Spanish outpost in 1607 to the tony art enclave of today.

We were amused to learn that in addition to a height restriction on buildings, city codes confine owners to the use of 15 specified earth tones for exterior colors. This is what gives the rounded contours of Santa Fe's architecture a signature muddy hue.

Along the way, we called at Trujillo Plaza, a one-time land-grant hacienda that later served as administrative offices for the Manhattan Project in its development of the atomic bomb. We also stepped into the robust inner garden of the Sena Plaza, a hacienda where 29 related families lived together in the 1800s (if you can imagine such a thing).

The tour also included stops at Santa Fe's three best-known churches.

The imposing St. Francis Cathedral stands atop a slight rise just east of the Plaza, towering over the town's stunted brown buildings. It's important to respect the privacy of worshippers at the cathedral, but a hushed pilgrimage should be made to the chapel at the left of the altar, which houses a Madonna statue carried to Santa Fe in 1625.

A block away is the Loretto Chapel, which is no longer an active church but attracts visitors because of its mystifying spiral staircase to the choir loft. The staircase makes two 360-degree turns in 33 steps, yet with no evident support, either in the center or at the sides. The story of its construction is a lively tidbit of local mythology.

Finally, along Old Spanish Trail, is photogenic San Miguel Mission, which traces its origins to 1610. Franciscan padres and Tlaxcalan Indians set the original adobe blocks, but that didn't last long - the building was leveled when the Pueblos revolted against the Spanish in 1690. The current building stands atop the original wall remnants (some of which are visible), and the mission purports to be the oldest active church in the United States.

In the gift shop, a plastic mallet lies next to a bell that once hung in the tower - an inscription identifies it as being cast in Seville, Spain, in 1356 - and visitors are encouraged to give it a whack to hear the deep gong.

A tour such as this gives you an overview of the city. Then you can return at your leisure to sites you found intriguing.

We spent quite a while at the Palace of the Governors, which dates nearly to Santa Fe's founding. Just inside the entrance, a portion of 18th-century adobe construction is exhibited, protected behind glass. It is multicolored from the various materials at hand that were slathered on to protect it from the elements: gypsum, red clay, lime plaster, yellow calcimine.

Oh, if that wall could talk. Before being converted to a museum, this building housed government offices and apartments. Spanish colonists huddled behind its fortress walls during the Pueblo revolt, and during the Civil War the Confederate flag briefly flew overhead.

The front portal of the Palace of the Governors now serves as a marketplace for Indian artisans, who sell jewelry and other handmade crafts. Some 41 New Mexico tribes, pueblos, villages and chapters are represented here, and a Vendors Committee oversees the market to ensure authenticity and the use of traditional materials.

On the edge of town, the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture also exhibits some superb native craft work - if you're content to look but not buy. The museum's pottery gallery offers a veritable tour of the Southwest, with historic and contemporary pieces displayed together. Information is presented in a concise, well-organized manner, not overwhelming you with detail. This is the place to learn what distinguishes Zuni pottery from that of San Ildefonso, for example.

Historic Indian crafts, though elaborately adorned in many cases, were at their root utilitarian - a tightly woven basket that would carry flour, a clay pot that would hold water.

Subsequent artists who gravitated to Santa Fe had the luxury of exulting entirely in the beauty of the setting - stark landscapes, impossibly blue skies, puffy white thunderheads, the soft light and long shadows of winter.

Georgia O'Keeffe is the most celebrated of the Anglo artists who found their way here in the 1920s, and the museum devoted to her reveals how she was beguiled by the colors and contours of northern New Mexico, and interpreted them in dramatic abstractions of shape and bright color.

The museum wasn't established until 1997, and by then many of her most important works were already the property of museums all over the country, so you might be disappointed by the quality of this collection. But it is a repository of 132 of her creations, any 50 of which might be on display at one time, and the paintings certainly capture O'Keeffe's fascination with the region.

You can probably dispense with the $5 audio program - we found it droning and ponderous. Also, be advised that the guards here are some of the fussiest you'll find at any art museum, anywhere.

The exhibits of the 88-year-old Museum of Fine Arts, meanwhile, are exceptional, notably the early-1900s paintings of the Taos Society of Artists. Their depictions of desert scenes and Pueblo Indian religious rites are the treasures of the collection.

Santa Fe's astonishing wealth of art transcends its museums, though. Along Canyon Road, on the eastern edge of town, dozens of galleries line up shoulder to shoulder. Many of the art shops are housed in former dwellings that can be as pleasant to peruse as the art itself.

Even if you're not in the market to buy - and many of the works are listed as ``price on request'' - browsers are welcome.

We lingered over the pastel and watercolor regional scenes at the Gerald Peters Gallery (1011 Paseo de Peralta), wandered among the imaginative wind sculptures displayed outdoors at Wiford & Vogt Fine Art (403 Canyon Road) and marveled at the intricacy of early 20th-century Navajo rugs at the Michael Smith Gallery (526 Canyon Road).

The narrow road, one way for a stretch, winds this way and that as it makes its way up the canyon. The sidewalks are dirt in some places, nonexistent in others, but persistence pays off.

One pleasant surprise was El Zaguan, not an art gallery but simply a hacienda that dates to the late 1880s, with museum exhibits and a lovely garden. We stepped off a side porch, made our way through a rickety gate and were soon strolling beneath a venerable black walnut tree and among fragrant lavender and wild roses.

It was a memorable moment we might have missed had we been regarding Santa Fe through the windshield of a car.

Eric Noland, [phone]

eric.noland(at)dailynews.com

IF YOU GO

CROSS OF THE MARTYRS: A brick-paved path to an overlook of the city has plaques that recount the history of New Mexico from A.D. 500 forward, and the cross at the top commemorates 21 Franciscan priests killed in the Pueblo revolt. The summit often catches a nice breeze, and the view across the city toward the Jemez Mountains is impressive, particularly at sunset - though it would be even nicer if there weren't a massive cell phone tower in the foreground. The arched entry to the trail is on Paseo de Peralta just east of the city center, between Washington and Palace avenues.

EL ZAGUAN: 545 Canyon Road. Exhibit area open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to noon and 1:30 to 5 p.m.; garden open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Garden tours held Thursday at 1 p.m.; reservations required. [phone].

GALLERIES: For a guide and map, contact the Santa Fe Gallery Association: www.santafegalleryassociation.org; [phone].

GUIDEBOOKS: Two good ones for Santa Fe are ``Hidden New Mexico'' (Ulysses Press; $15.95) and the Fodor's ``New Mexico'' guide (Fodor's Travel Publications; $17).

GEORGIA O'KEEFFE MUSEUM: 217 Johnson St. Currently open Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. At some point in the late spring it will be open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (staying open till 8 p.m. on Fridays). Admission is $8 for adults, $7 for seniors (age 60 and up), children and students with ID free. Audio tours are an additional $5. www.okeeffemuseum.org; [phone].

HISTORIC WALKS OF SANTA FE: Tours convene daily at 9:45 a.m. and 1:15 p.m. in the lobby of La Fonda Hotel (the tour then collects more guests at the Plaza Galeria). Cost is $10 per person. Reservations required. Children under 12 free with parent. Senior discount. www.historicwalksofsantafe.com; [phone].

LORETTO CHAPEL: 207 Old Santa Fe Trail. During the summer, open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sunday from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. (shorter weekday hours in winter). May close without notice for weddings or special events. Admission is $2.50. www.lorettochapel.com; [phone].

MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS: 107 W. Palace Ave. Open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free on Fridays from 5 to 8 p.m. Admission is $7, free for kids age 16 and under. www.mfasantafe.org; [phone].

MUSEUM OF INDIAN ARTS & CULTURE: On Mission Hill, 710 Camino Lejo (off Old Santa Fe Trail). Open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. www.miaclab.org; [phone].

MUSEUM PASS: A five-museum pass can be had for $15, granting admission to the Palace of the Governors, the Museum of Fine Arts, the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture, the Museum of International Folk Art and the Museum of Spanish Colonial Art. Good for four days, it can be purchased at any of the institutions.

PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS: The museum has an impressive collection of archival photographs and artifacts, as well as the Segesser Hide Paintings - scenes of early Spanish Colonial life painted on bison hides in the early 1700s. Open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., free on Friday from 5 to 8 p.m. Admission is $7 for adults. www.palaceofthegovernors.org; [phone].

SAN MIGUEL MISSION: 401 Old Santa Fe Trail. Open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Donation requested. [phone].

SANTA FE SOCIETY OF ARTISTS: Between Palace Avenue and East San Francisco Street, an open-air art market is held Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., May through October. The nonprofit group emphasizes development and education. www.santafesocietyofartists.com; [phone].

ST. FRANCIS CATHEDRAL: 131 Cathedral Place. Visitors asked not to enter when Mass is being held. Donation requested. [phone].

CAPTION(S):

4 photos, box, map

Photo:

(1 -- color) Brightly painted doors, rustic bells and colorful tiles are some of the distinctive design touches found among the art galleries and homes of Santa Fe's Canyon Road.

(2 -- 3 -- color) San Miguel Mission in Santa Fe, top, stands on the remains of the original 1610 building, and purports to be the oldest active church in the United States. The city is rich both in history and art, the latter embodied by sculptors like Guilloume Perez-Zapata, working at a sidewalk show conducted regularly by the Santa Fe Society of Artists.

(4) In Santa Fe, the portal of the Palace of the Governors holds a market where the crafts of indigenous artisans are exhibited for sale;.

Eric Noland/Travel Editor

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IF YOU GO (see text)

Map:

SANTA FE

Jorge Irribarren/Staff Artist