PURSUING THE PURPLE AND GOLD
For all that, nature is never spent; there lives the dearest freshness deep down things... —Gerard Manley Hopkins, God’s Grandeur”
Like everything in New Mexico, even color depends on the altitude. The other day I noted that wondrous slope of aspens at the top of the Sandias was turning gold. I thought I’d better go check it out. We don’t have aspens naturally happening in Placitas. We do have a few cottonwoods that are showing signs of yellow. It’s early yet. The Village has a touch more gold than the Rio Grande Valley right now. In a few weeks it will be the other way around. Nevertheless most of our 5300-6200 foot world is very much in shades of yellow and gold with some blue and purple contrasts—chamisa, gold or just about ready to change from silver green to full blooming gold; snake weed, that’s been full gold for a month now; golden, black-eyed sunflowers—they are a magnificent roadside wonder, and luckily the guys paving the road left a few—and purple-blue asters, frost flowers we call them where I come from, and the Russian sage which graces most of our doorsteps. Purple and gold. Could anything be more beautiful?
Well last Sunday Dilly-Dog and I drive to the top of the Sandias via the back road and Las Huertas Creek Dilly rides with her two front feet on the armrest and nose in the crack of the open window. We stopped in one place where we weren’t supposed to. Sad, as there are so many delightful spots to investigate, but one of the dominant themes of our tour was the plethora of No Parking signs we noted. I remember holiday weekends when the road was lined on either side with parked cars, and there was barely room for a single car to get through the middle. I couldn’t help but think about all the issues regarding access to public spaces— the difficulty of establishing policy for a national forest that finds itself surrounded by urban area. And, of course, how lucky the urban area is to have it. Having been a hiker most of my life, at least until real estate took over, I can always fall back on the position that one should hike, not drive, and see things way better than through the car window. But then the conundrum. Here I was with my little Welsh Terrier wanting to check out the aspens, sunflowers, chamisa, asters, and see a little water in the stream. Just sniff around a bit. Dilly’s too old to climb the mountain, and I’m out of shape. But you understand, I had to follow the trail of the purple and gold. I just had to—by car. And we stopped where we weren’t supposed to and padded right into the trickle of water coming down the mountain. Dilly just walked right on in taking me with her. She sniffed and drank her way over rocks and fallen branches with me at the other end of her leash. Then we sat a while and dried off, luxuriating in the little meadow, the bugs, bees, birds and butterflies with a fall-feeling sun filtered through the leaves over our heads. It was blissfully peaceful.
We pursued the purple and gold all the way to the crest of the Sandias, parked and did the nature trail with young children and their parents who had checklists of various plants and other phenomenon they had to note for school. Dilly and I stayed mostly in spruce and ponderosa and sometimes plopped ourselves on a boulder hovering on the rim of the Crest where I think we could see the Pacific Ocean if it hadn’t been blocked by Mt.Taylor 85 or so miles away. We looked straight down on the La Luz Trail, which I have walked so many times. We were in a green-blue world and close to the clouds. Old wind woman and the thunder gods were resting this mid-September day, worn out from their spring and summer workload no doubt. I soon found that other less ancient powers dwelling in this lofty spot, that is, the multiple antennae stalking the crest, had, in their wisdom, decided that Dilly and I should never leave the Crest. Our remote car door opener, and also the key—which apparently is also electronic—didn’t work It didn’t really help that we read the small sign warning of this possible problem after we had been struggling with it for a half hour or so. Then suddenly, and inexplicably, the key worked, and the door opened. I prefer to think that Wankwijo woke up and blew some of those microwaves in the other direction just long enough so we could drive back down to chamisa and aster country.
We descended, frequently pulling off the road to examine various yellow and purple roadside meadows. Once back in Placitas we checked up on the fruit in the Village; we harvested apples (and later made an apple pie) from some apple trees along Camino de San Francisco; we visited friends here and there. We checked out Agua Sarca Arroyo, which will soon have the most magnificent display of golden chamisa imaginable. We then returned home to our own jungle of color. Apricots, every other leaf is yellow; cornflowers and gaillardia; sunflowers all over the place; and the last roses of summer. Above it all, Sandia Peak and the aspens. We sure enjoyed the glorious golden and purple world we live in that will be yet more colorful in a week or two. Enjoy it. I’m going to.
Lucy Noyes, CRS,
Broker Associate & Co-owner
La Puerta Real Estate Services, LLC
01 Ridge Court, Placitas, NM
Office Phone: 505 867-3388
Mobile Phone: 505 280-8352