Parks & Recreation - Santa Fe, New Mexico



Parks & Recreation - Parks And Recreation

From birding to white-water rafting, baseball to volleyball, disc golf to Ultimate Frisbee, Santa Fe either has it or is close to it. Santa Fe city and county are veritable playgrounds for the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the active and the sedentary. You’ll find an abundance of city parks here, many with athletic fields, some just for sitting back and taking in the sunshine. We have mountains and a national forest in our backyard with dozens of hiking trails, ranging from easy to strenuous. And there’s biking galore, each hairpin turn yielding magnificent vistas. Santa Fe is a gateway to world-class hunting and trout-filled streams in pristine high country. If hot-air ballooning is your passion, you’re just an hour away from one of the best places in the world to do it—Albuquerque, home of the International Balloon Fiesta.

From A to Z—well, okay, B to W—we’ve included in this chapter a good-sized sampling of what Santa Fe and environs have to offer in the way of public lands as well as indoor and outdoor recreation. A mere glance through this chapter ought to convince even the most die-hard couch potatoes to put down the television remote and explore Santa Fe’s recreational bounty.

Parks & Recreation - Winter Sports

For some, the idea of “winter” in Santa Fe may stir images of short-sleeved golfing and tennis. After all, this is the Southwest isn’t it? Well, yes—but we’re not Phoenix. Santa Fe is at 7,000 feet in elevation and gets a real winter, complete with snow and frigid temperatures. Winter usually begins in late October, settles in to stay in January—the coldest month of the year here—and disappears sometime in March or April. In good snow years, you can still see patches of snow on the Sangre de Cristo Mountains above Santa Fe on the Fourth of July. Thanks to our elevation and the surrounding mountains, snow on Memorial Day is not unheard of. And due to our relatively southerly location, neither is sweatshirt weather in March. Even in winter, some 70 percent of the days here are sunny. A normal winter brings nightly temperatures averaging in the 20s (°F), sometimes plummeting into the single digits, even as low as 0°. Days are often bright and sunny but very cold, frequently below freezing. Beware: “sunny” doesn’t necessarily mean “warm.”

Ski Apache, in the Sacramento Mountains near Cloudcroft in southern New Mexico, is one of the southernmost ski resorts in the country, with terrific skiing on the Apache reservation. But, since it has more snow and mountains, northern New Mexico boasts the lion’s share of the state’s ski areas. Old-timers say that running a ski area is like running a farm. In the end, your success depends on the weather. After several winters of drought conditions and little snow, Santa Fe hit the jackpot in the winter of 2006-07, with record-breaking snowstorms over the winter holidays dumping many feet of snow on the mountains, paralyzing the town for days but creating exceptional conditions for skiing. Subsequent winters have seen above-average snowfalls, with adequate snowpack in the mountains to recharge reservoirs and please ski bunnies on the slopes.

Within a three-hour drive from Santa Fe, you have access to the Santa Fe Ski Area, Taos Ski Valley, Angel Fire Ski Resort, Red River Ski Area, Sipapu Ski Area, and Sandía Peak Ski Area. You’ll also find The Enchanted Forest cross-country ski area and many places to head off on your own for Nordic skiing, snowshoeing, or winter hiking.

You can bring your sled or inner tubes up to Hyde State Park, just outside Santa Fe on Highway 475. If you don’t want the drive on a snowy road, try city parks such as Patrick Smith Park at 1001 Canyon Rd., or Herb Martinez Park, 2240 Camino Carlos Rey, which have hills that make good tubing runs. Note that ski areas in the region often offer warm-weather activities, such as chairlift rides, mountain biking, and disc golf.

1. Bicentennial Pool

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Telephone: 1121 Alto St., (505) 955-2650


2. Atalaya Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 717 Camino Cabra

3. Chamisa Tennis Courts

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation

4. Galisteo Tennis Courts

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 2721 Galisteo St.

5. Larragoite Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation

6. Known World Guides

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation

7. Fort Marcy Complex

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Telephone: (505) 955-2500
Address: 490 Washington Ave.

Description: Among the most heavily frequented parks in Santa Fe, after the Plaza Park, is Fort Marcy Complex. Located in downtown Santa Fe just a few blocks north of the Plaza, Fort Marcy features a large indoor/outdoor recreation center with a ballpark and other outdoor fields, an indoor heated pool, a gym and weight room, racquetball courts, and a jogging/walking path. It also offers a variety of classes from swimming and aerobics to dancing and martial arts. The complex is open weekdays from 6 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, and noon to 5:30 p.m. on Sunday. Fort Marcy is also the site of the burning of Zozobra—“Old Man Gloom”—at the end of fiestas in September. (See our Annual Events and Festivals chapter for details.)

8. Franklin E. Miles Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 1027 Camino Carlos Rey at Siringo Rd.

Description: The city’s largest park, General Franklin E. Miles Park offers a variety of facilities, including softball fields, soccer fields, basketball and volleyball courts, an enormous playground, barbecue grills, picnic tables, good lighting at night, and even a skateboard park.

9. Herb Martínez Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 2240 Camino Carlos Rey

Description: Herb Martínez is another well-used park with good sports facilities. Its soccer fields serve school and youth leagues from March through November. The park also features a ball field, four lighted tennis courts, six lighted basketball courts, a small playground, barbecue grills, and picnic tables.

10. Plaza Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 63 Lincoln Ave.

Description: With the historic Palace of the Governors on its north side, the Plaza is the heart of downtown Santa Fe. Without a doubt, it’s the most popular of all city parks. Adult readers of the Santa Fe Reporter have consistently voted the Plaza the best place to bring visitors, walk dogs, people-watch, spot celebrities, or simply “hang out.” It’s also the choice spot to begin and/or end parades, make speeches, hold community festivals and dances, play Hacky Sack, or take a noontime snooze, if you can wrangle one of the white-painted wrought-iron benches for yourself.

11. Ragle Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation

Description: Ragle Park, in a residential area near Santa Fe High School, has the largest adult softball complex in Santa Fe. The park also contains a decent lighted playground, perfect for softball players with little ones in tow.

12. Salvador Pórez Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Telephone: (505) 955-2604
Address: 601 Alta Vista St.

Description: Kids have voted Salvador Pérez their favorite city park in the Santa Fe Reporter’s annual “Best of Santa Fe” survey. Maybe it’s the imposing, authentic locomotive car on the centrally located property. Perhaps it’s the recently renovated indoor heated pool and new gym equipment. Or it could be the park’s cool new playground with equipment made from recyclables. There’s also a Little League field with tons of room to run and jump—enough even for grown-ups, who borrow the field in summer for mushball. With tennis courts, volleyball courts, barbecue grills, and lots of picnic tables, Salvador Pérez is an ideal spot for a family outing.

13. Amelia E. White Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 981 Old Santa Fe Trail

Description: Sitting prettily at the crossroads of Camino Corrales and Old Santa Fe Trail—mere blocks from the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, and the Museum of International Folk Art—three-acre Amelia E. White Park is an ideal spot for a picnic lunch or simply to relax and enjoy its featured native plants. You might even catch a painter in action as you sit under a grape arbor admiring the sky.

14. Cornell Park/Rose Garden

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 1203 Galisteo Parkway

Description: While you can find an appropriate spot in any park to celebrate a quiet moment, some are more conducive than others to meditation and aloneness. Among them is Cornell Park, a lovely refuge from the world located a couple of miles south of downtown Santa Fe. A small park—it’s about as wide and as long as a city block—in a residential neighborhood, the Rose Garden is aptly named for the rose bushes that come to life in spring and summer, scenting the air with their fragrant blossoms. The promenade is lined with old trees, making it a favorite among dogs and their owners. Volunteer gardeners maintain the rose bushes, irises, and spring bulb display.

15. East Santa Fe River Park

City: Santa Fe, NM
Category: Parks & Recreation
Address: 726 East Alameda St.

Description: Located only a few blocks south of the Plaza, East Santa Fe River Park is a lovely, narrow stretch of land that begins in front of the Supreme Court Building at Don Gaspar Avenue and continues for about a mile to East Palace Avenue. The park offers shaded, tree-lined walkways and picnic tables along the banks of the Santa Fe River, attracting brown-bag diners when the weather permits. The 19-acre park also continues west over St. Francis Drive along Alameda.
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