We pointed the RV south to Santa Fe for four days before the Grand Canyon, and it turned out to be one of those stops we didn’t want to leave. Ancient cliff dwellings, a plaza full of chile ristras (those long hanging strings of dried red chile peppers you see all over New Mexico), Georgia O’Keeffe’s paintings and museum, and some of the best blue-hour light we’ve chased in a while. Here’s what wowed us, what’s worth your time, and the one drive you can skip.
Home Base: Santa Fe Skies RV Park
We loved Santa Fe Skies. Trees/greenery on every RV site for some shade, and the whole place is dotted with art, everything from sculptures made of old engine parts to a “tree” whose limbs are made of glass bottles. It’s the kind of quirky, creative setting that makes you want to wander the grounds with a coffee. A peaceful, characterful base for exploring both the city and the cliff dwellings in Bandelier park.
One thing to brace for if you’re not used to it: the desert dryness is real. The humidity dropped to 5% one day, and my skin and face felt so tight I ended up running the kettle inside the RV just to put some moisture back in the air. Pack the good moisturizer and lip balm, and be ready to drink lots of water!
Day One: Arrive Late, Beat the Crowds
We rolled in around 3 in the afternoon and headed straight for the Plaza in front of the Palace of the Governors. This low, 1610-built, adobe building is the oldest continuously occupied public building in the United States. Over four centuries, it’s been the seat of government under Spain, the Pueblo people, Mexico, and the U.S., a genuine time capsule of the Southwest. Along its long shaded portal, Native American artisans from New Mexico’s pueblos have sold their handmade jewelry and pottery for more than sixty years, each piece made by the person you’re buying it from. Pro tip we stumbled into by accident: arriving after most shops had closed meant we got the Plaza without the daytime crush of people. Quieter, cooler, and a lot more pleasant for wandering.
We caught the sunset up at Fort Marcy, by the big white cross overlooking town. The whole city glows gold from up there as the sun drops behind the mountains. Then it was back down to the Plaza for sorbet and live music as the evening cooled off. Not a bad way to say hello to a new place.
Day Two: A Hike, Two Churches, and Georgia O’Keeffe
We started with a morning hike on the Dale Ball Trails, a nearly 25-mile network of interconnected paths right on the edge of town, in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. It’s the fastest way to get from downtown into the mountains, and you can tailor it to whatever you’re up for. We did an easy loop to stretch out and acclimate to the 7,000-foot elevation before a day in the museums. (Heads up: the altitude and dry air will get you if you’re not used to it, so bring water.)
Loretto Chapel was first in town, home of the famous “Miraculous Staircase.” It’s a spiral staircase built with no central support and (as the story goes) no nails, wrapped in a local legend about the mysterious carpenter who built it and vanished. Small chapel but beautiful. When we got home, I was rewatching Roswell: New Mexico on Netflix, and they show this church in the show!
From there, we walked to the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi. The honey-colored stone facade is beautiful in daylight, with the bronze statue of St. Francis out front and a stunning rose window above the entrance. If you can, circle back at blue hour, we did, and it was beautifully bathed in a southwestern sunset.
One of the highlights was the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum. What we loved most about the small museum is that it stays focused on her art. We learned her whole painting trajectory, how her work evolved over the decades, without the exhibit getting bogged down in her love life, the way so many accounts of her do. There’s real respect for her as an artist first. They even display some of her clothing, including how she came to favor more androgynous, pared-down attire over time.
In the O’Keeffe gift shop, I picked up a new fountain pen and a bottle of ink in a color that reminded me exactly of those southwestern sunsets we’d been chasing. A small, perfect souvenir.
When we were out on the trail, we came across one of the exact flowers she painted in the wild, the white sacred datura. Seeing it framed on a museum wall and then blooming in the dirt in front of us was pretty cool.
We had dinner at Bumble Bee’s Baja Grill, and we have to talk about the chile. Out of this world. Their vegan green chile is the real deal, the kind of thing you think about for days afterward. If you like plant-based food and you’re anywhere near Santa Fe, go.
Day Three: Bandelier Cliff Dwellings (and the Drive to Skip)
Bandelier National Monument was worth every mile (it was about a 45-min drive from Santa Fe.) We learned so much about the Ancestral Pueblo people who lived here, and the cliff dwellings and cavates, little rooms carved right into the soft volcanic tuff, are the kind of place that stops you in your tracks. The Main Loop is easy and packed with things to explore.
Don’t skip the rope and wooden ladders up into the cliff dwellings. Climbing up into the rock face to see how people actually lived is the highlight of the whole visit. We highly recommend it.
One plant we saw absolutely everywhere across the high desert: the tree cholla (Cylindropuntia imbricata). It’s the branching, tree-like cactus with spiny segmented arms and brilliant magenta flowers that seem to glow against the dusty greens and adobe browns. In late June they were in full bloom, and they became one of my favorite things to photograph, a little jolt of hot-pink color everywhere we looked.
đźš« What to skip: We tacked on Los Alamos and the Manhattan Project National Historical Park since it’s right next door, and honestly, it wasn’t worth the drive. Because it’s a relatively new national park (and because the genuinely interesting sites are still on the grounds of a working, restricted national lab), what’s actually open to the public is fairly thin: a small introductory museum by Ashley Pond and a walking tour that mostly shows the exteriors of the houses where the scientists lived. If you’re a serious history buff it might land differently, but for us the town didn’t live up to its legendary reputation. Spend that time at Bandelier instead.
Day Four: The Art Museum & a Yarn Rescue
On our last morning, before pointing the rig toward the Grand Canyon, we spent time at the New Mexico Museum of Art. It was a lovely surprise, the thing that stood out was the sheer diversity: of subjects, of artists, of mediums.
We also stopped at Miriam’s Well for some local yarn. I’m knitting my first sweater, and I’d hit a spot that had me stumped, the very nice owner talked me through it and got me unstuck. (Bonus for Monday travelers: Miriam’s stays open when a lot of the other fiber shops close.)
A Note for Art Lovers
If you love art, Santa Fe should be near the top of your list. It’s the third-largest art market in the United States, behind only New York and Los Angeles, with over 200 galleries and nearly two dozen museums, and it has the highest concentration of galleries of any city its size. The best part for wandering: most of them are packed into about a two-square-mile stretch, so you can take in an astonishing range of work, Native American, Spanish Colonial, contemporary, and folk art, on foot. Between the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, the New Mexico Museum of Art, and simply strolling the Plaza and Canyon Road, we barely scratched the surface.
And here’s the thing we didn’t expect: the hiking is just as accessible as the art. The Dale Ball system alone is nearly 25 miles of trails on the edge of downtown, and it connects to Atalaya Mountain, the Santa Fe Canyon Preserve, and beyond, plus the Santa Fe National Forest adds over a hundred more miles of trails nearby. You could hike a different route every day for two weeks. Come for the galleries, stay for the trails.
All of that, plus adobe charm, blue-hour light, and easy RV access, makes Santa Fe an easy place to recommend. It’s walkable, welcoming, and quietly one of the most creative small cities in the country.
TL;DR – Santa Fe by RV
- Santa Fe Skies RV Park = lovely + reasonably shaded. Quirky art displays everywhere.
- Bring moisture. 5% humidity is no joke, lotion, lip balm, and a kettle indoors.
- Arrive late day one. The Plaza after the shops close beats the midday crush.
- Fort Marcy at sunset = do it. Best view of the city glowing gold.
- Loretto Chapel + St. Francis Cathedral = both worth it. See the cathedral at blue hour.
- Georgia O’Keeffe Museum = MUST DO. All about the art, and beautifully so.
- Bumble Bee’s Baja Grill = incredible vegan green chile.
- Bandelier = MUST DO. Pueblo history and the cliff-dwelling ladders.
- Los Alamos / Manhattan Project = skip. New park, thin public site, not worth the drive.
- New Mexico Museum of Art = worth a morning. Diverse and surprising.
- Art lovers, take note. 3rd-largest art market in the US, 200+ galleries, ~2 dozen museums, all walkable.
- Hikers too. Dale Ball Trails (~25 mi) right off downtown, plus 100+ more forest miles nearby.
- Great for RVing. Charming, easy to get around, and a relaxed base for the whole region.