Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument
New Mexico guided bus tour March 28 – April 1
The Southwest New Mexico Tour sponsored by the Friends of the SaddleBrooke Libraries will explore the unique character of southern New Mexico. The five day, four night bus tour will be from Saturday, March 28 through Wednesday, April 1, 2015.
Day 1: SaddleBrooke to Silver City
The first destination is Silver City by luxury motor coach. Silver City was founded to support local mining, originally silver and gold and now copper. It is also an important arts community. After lunch we will tour the Silver City Museum and the historic downtown. There will be ample free time to browse the many galleries and unique shops. Dinner will be at the Bear Mountain Lodge before retiring to the Holiday Inn Express.
Day 2: Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument
We travel the Trail of the Mountain Spirits National Scenic Byway to Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument. The history of the Mimbres Valley will be described by an expert guide. A ranger will lead a one mile loop to ancient ruins built by the Mogollon people in the fifteenth century along the Gila River.
Day 3: Silver City to Las Cruces
The tour will drive to Las Cruces, stopping at the City of Rocks State Park where a Park Ranger will explain the origin of the rock formations and the Chihuahuan Desert. Then on to Mesilla on the Rio Grande River and a very special tour of the J. Paul Taylor Home before dining at the Double Eagle Restaurant. We’ll stay at Hotel Encanto de Las Cruces
Day 4: Tularosa Basin and White Sands National Monument
The tour will visit two museums and a national monument highlighting Apache history, space exploration, Billy the Kid, and Tularosa ecology. We’ll visit the New Mexico Museum of Space History.
Lunch will be at Rebecca’s in Cloudcroft followed by White Sands National Monument. Dinner will be at De La Vega’s Pecan Grill back in Las Cruces.
Day 5: Las Cruces to SaddleBrooke
The tour will conclude on the fifth day at the Las Cruces Museum of Art and the Museum of Nature and Science in downtown Las Cruces. Our final stop will be at the amazing Adobe Deli in Deming for lunch.
You won’t want to miss this exciting tour of southwest New Mexico. You will be immersed in the history and culture of the region from prehistoric Indians to Spanish exploration and the development of modern day space exploration. The scenery varies from the stark Chihuahuan Desert to pine covered mountains and the white gypsum dunes of the Tularosa basin. All of this will be interpreted by local expert guides to give you a richer understanding of the region.
The transportation for the tour is a 56 passenger luxury motor coach equipped with a restroom. The price of the tour is $950 per person, double occupancy. All meals are included. Make reservations by contacting Barry Swartzberg at 520-825-0463 or by email [email protected]. Please visit Friends of the Libraries (FSL) website.
Library volunteers get a big surprise; photo by Bob Koblewski.
Library Volunteers Appreciation Luncheon
The annual SaddleBrooke Library Volunteers Appreciation Luncheon was held in the Lounge at HOA 1 on Tuesday, February 10. A surprise was awaiting the volunteers to greet them on their arrival. The surprise was a horse from the stable of Jerry and Vonnie Kauffman of Casa de Caballo. The Kauffmans are neighbors of SaddleBrooke and were kind to bring one of their favorite horses, Cotton, to the front drive of the clubhouse. This was a live reminder of the upcoming Friends of SaddleBrooke Libraries Author Luncheon on March 16 featuring Alan Day and his book, The Horse Lover.
Chef David provided a delicious lunch for everyone’s enjoyment. The volunteers were pleased to learn some interesting statistics regarding their work. The circulation number for the three libraries, HOA 1, DesertView, and MountainView has grown to 65,883 for the year of 2014. And Friends of SaddleBrooke Libraries raised and contributed $27,821 for the books, audio books, videos, large print books and magazines and other supplies. Jobs well done, volunteers! And thanks to Bob Koblewski for the fine photo.
Learn about FSL upcoming events at our informative website, www.FriendsSBLib.org
FSL money fills SaddleBrooke Library shelves. Thank you for joining.
Co-authors H. Alan Day and Lynn Wiese Snyde
The Horse Lover: A Cowboy’s Qwest to Save the Wild Mustangs
Mary Kopp
The Friends of SaddleBrooke Libraries’ next author luncheon is Monday, March 16. Tickets are on sale now at the HOA 2 Administration Annex for $29. Storyteller and rancher H. Alan Day and writing expert co-author Lynn Wiese Sneyd will be the featured speakers. Together they co-authored The Horse Lover: A Cowboy’s Quest to Save the Wild Mustangs.
Author luncheon co-chairs Elaine Kienitz and Judy Kany attended an Oro Valley Library presentation by the co-authors and were delighted. Day has great stories to tell with his experiences running three large ranches and growing up on the 200,000 acre Lazy B Ranch that straddles the Arizona-New Mexico border. Earlier in his writing career, he and his sister, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, co-authored Lazy B about their upbringing on the remote cattle ranch.
The Horse Lover was published just last March and tells the intimate story of H. Alan Day’s experiences buying a 35,000 acre ranch in South Dakota to serve as a sanctuary for 1,500 wild horses deemed unadoptable. He called it Mustang Meadow Ranch and persuaded the government to stop warehousing the mustangs and let him attempt his horse whisperer’s dream of successfully using a herd modification program to improve the life and behavioral health of the mustangs. This became the first government sponsored wild horse sanctuary in the United States. This is a heartfelt memoir of a lifelong cowboy who deeply cares about all horses and relates some of his adventures. You will enjoy his description of the joys and frustrations of balancing government requirements with the needs of wild mustangs.
The book recently won first place in the Arizona Authors’ Association literary contest and also in the New Mexico-Arizona book contest.
The author luncheon will be held at HOA 2 MountainView Ballroom Monday, March 16; doors open at 11:30 a.m. Early purchasers get the best tables. Tickets to the author luncheon priced at $29 per person are on sale at the MountainView Administrative Building next to the MountainView Clubhouse. The luncheon will feature beef stroganoff or a vegetarian plate. Please indicate meal preference when purchasing ticket.
Learn about FSL upcoming events at our informative website, www.FriendsSBLib.org
FSL money fills SaddleBrooke Library shelves. Thank you for joining.