Sightseeing Around Taos

 

Ginny and I had a busy day sightseeing today. First, we went to Taos Pueblo and walked around visiting the few open shops. Taos Pueblo's most prominent architectural feature is a multi-storied residential complex built over 1000 years ago by the Taos-speaking Native American tribe of Puebloan people. The pueblo is considered one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United States.

After visiting the pueblo, I took Ginny out to Rio Grande del Norte National Monument. She never realized she was afraid of heights until we started walking across the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge. At 650 feet above the river, The Rio Grande Gorge Bridge is the second-highest bridge on the U.S. Highway System and the fifth-highest bridge in the United States.

 

After visiting the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, we drove out to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Angel Fire. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a national memorial established in honor of Vietnam War veterans in Angel Fire, New Mexico. Until 2017, it was a New Mexico state park, and it is now under the Department of Veteran Services. Dedicated on May 22, 1971, the memorial was originally known as the Vietnam Veterans Peace and Brotherhood Chapel and had its origins in a battle near Con Thien, South Vietnam, on May 22, 1968, in which 17 men lost their lives. It was the first major memorial created to honor the veterans of the Vietnam War, and inspired the establishment of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C., which was completed over ten years later, in 1982.