NM2007 - Attractions - Pushing the Boundaries

Ancient Visitors

The first tourists in New Mexico arrived between 225 and 66 million years ago. They must have enjoyed themselves, because they stayed through the Late Triassic and the entire Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. When they became extinct, the party was over, but the dinosaurs were kind enough to leave fossils behind throughout the state, except for the southeastern corner.

For dinophiles with a sense of adventure, head for Clayton Lake State Park — one of the nation's few dino tracksites open to the public. It will take your breath away when you reach the spillway of the dam, where you'll see approximately 300 dinosaur tracks from the Early Cretaceous age. Signs near the footprints interpret the scene for you.

In New Mexico, there is a passion for preserving ancient fossil fields. At the Mesaland Dinosaur Museum in Tucumcari, the bones of the Big Ones have been cast in bronze. You'll encounter life-size skeleton casts and models of the meat-chomping Torvosaurus and Acrocanthosaurus, and gaze at the skulls of two T's — Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops.

At the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science in Albuquerque, there are halls devoted to dinos. Visitors gaze and gawk at the duck-billed Parasaurolophus and bronze models of Albertosaurus and Pentaceratops by famed sculptor David Thomas. If your thirst for dino data can't be sated by the exhibits, the museum’s Web site has extensive information and more names that twist the tongues of young and old alike.

At Ghost Ranch Conference Center, just north of Española, art aficionados flock to see the place where Georgia O’Keeffe lived and painted, and dino devotees head for the Ruth Hall Museum of Paleontology, where a block contains the stunning skeleton of Coelophysis, the New Mexico state fossil. The Ghost Ranch dinosaur quarry is world-famous, and a walk in the hills will undoubtedly evoke images of the huge, ancient beasts feeding, breeding, and yawning in the sunshine many eons ago.

To choose the path less traveled, grab a Scenic Byways Route map to the Mesalands Scenic Byway, and head for Quay County, where the dinosaurs roamed. The inland seas where the Allosaurus once fed now form the edges of the scenic mesas in northeastern New Mexico.

Walk in Dino Tracks

Clayton Lake State Park near the Colorado border has a huge swath of dinosaur tracks. The tracks are thought to be around 100 million years old, and are some of the best preserved in the U.S. They were discovered in the early 1980s during construction of a dam. The tracks were made in mud on the shores of a vast ancient inland seaway, and include footprints from at least eight different types of dinosaur, including a baby dinosaur and a Pterodactyl. Explore the land where the dinosaurs roamed with modern activities like hiking, camping, fishing, and sailing. Today's wildlife at the park includes antelopes, bears, and birds.
Information: (505) 374-8808

Dino Sculptures

New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science features several halls of dinosaurs from the major geological periods. Most of the fossils and bones here were found in New Mexico. See the Jurassic giant Seismosaurus, the "earthquake lizard," which was 110 feet long and weighed about 30 tons. This plant eater was found by hikers in 1979 and it took seven years to collect the huge fossil bones, now on display with other giants of the Jurassic. The halls contain films, interactive exhibits, films, and dioramas.
Information: 1801 Mountain Rd., N.W., open daily 9 a.m.-5 p.m., except for Christmas and non-holiday Mondays in January and September, (505) 841-2800.

The Future of Tourism?

In case you think New Mexico is only mired in the past, point your car in the direction of Upham (45 miles northeast of Las Cruces and 25 miles southeast of Truth or Consequences) for a glimpse into the galactic future. Sir Richard Branson, the wealthy British entrepreneur and adventurer who helms Virgin Galactic, and Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico, inked a deal to build a spaceport to carry commuters to the edge of space. The age of Star Trekking is upon us. Richardson is working with the state legislature to secure the state's commitment of $100 million out of a $225 million construction package. Building is slated to begin in 2007, and will be completed by 2009 or 2010.

Upham will host the world headquarters and mission control for Branson's daring and exciting personal spaceflight business. If Virgin Galactic's guestimates are right, 50,000 space travelers will be strapped in and ready to explore outer space in the first 10 years of operation.

"By the year 2013, spaceships will be taking off three to four times a day," says Rick Homans, cabinet secretary for Economic Development and chairman of the New Mexico Spaceport Authority. "Passengers will go into sub-orbit — a zero-gravity environment where you experience the blackness of space and see the curvature of the Earth and you are truly weightless. They’ll go up to 400,000 feet high — that’s over 100 kilometers. The flight will be about two and a half hours, and there will be approximately six minutes of weightlessness."

The visionary project began as Branson was growing up, like many of his generation, watching TV as the first men landed on the moon. He believed that, in his lifetime, he and millions of others would be taking that same stroll. "To this day, I still believe that. What I can't quite believe, and have to pinch myself about sometimes, is that it is one of my companies is building the spaceships that hopefully one day will take us all there!"

If you want to be among the first to go into orbit, Branson explains how to do it. "I would encourage people who want to be astronauts to visit our Web site, www.virgingalactic.com, see our videos and make a reservation online. The cost per person for the entire adventure is $200,000. I would expect that cost to come down somewhat by 2013, but it's hard to forecast exactly what that price will be. Our goal, however, is to make a trip to space affordable to as many people as possible."

For mission control, the space mogul's company chose a remote, sandy landscape surrounded by dramatic mountain ridges and committed to respecting the natural environment of our state. One day, in the not-so-distant future, the eyes of the world will be focused on this desolate New Mexican area as science fiction becomes reality.

So whether you are earth-bound or space-bound, seeing New Mexico from your car or from a spaceship, bon voyage!