Santa Rosa tourist information
Santa Rosa is a delightful discovery of bountiful cuisine, elegant hotels, enchanting bed and breakfast inns, cultural arts, history and challenging golf courses. Within minutes you will find Sonoma Coast vistas and the redwood forests.
Santa Rosa, the largest city in Sonoma County is nestled in the center of famous Sonoma Wine Country. This warm and friendly city, an urban blend of art and culture, food, wine and recreation, is the perfect location for families and all travelers to stay for a relaxing and adventurous vacation. It is also a fabulous location for meetings and conventions.
by City of Santa Rosa California
Here in Northeast New Mexico, where the Great Plains rise up to meet the Rockies, lies a startling oasis. Amid the red mesas is an unusual array of spring-fed lakes, from clear mineral springs to the Blue Hole, famous for scuba diving, to the man-made Santa Rosa Lake. This ranching area on the banks of the Pecos River is full of surprises, from its legacy of railroading to cowboying and wild beauty. Halfway between Albuquerque and Amarillo, travelers stop off in Santa Rosa, some for a few days, and some forever.
Though Billy the Kid's shots no longer ring out and Route 66 has given way to I-40, some things haven't changed. Whether you stay for a few days or settle in permanently, you'll love the down-home friendliness of the little city on the banks of the Pecos.
We welcome you to enjoy the best of Santa Rosa, from its native New Mexican and American restaurants to its collection of lakes and its unsurpassed Southwestern hospitality.
Water lovers have other choices, besides scuba diving. Head for any one of 13 watering holes including Park Lake, the Southwest's largest swimming pool featuring a free waterslide. Or rent pedal boats or canoes, hike down El Rito Creek, swim, picnic, and fish. Kids and seniors can fish in two specially-stocked ponds nearby.
Santa Rosa Lake is the largest of several area lakes, and was created to tame the wild Pecos River. Though the Pecos floods no more, it once gave cowboys a tough day trying to "git their little dogies" across it. These days Santa Rosa Lake gives urban cowboys and locals alike some exciting days of waterskiing, fishing, windsurfing, or jet skiing. Another option is to just kick back at the lake's New Mexico State Parks campsites, either with bare-bones camping or RV spots in the surrounding piñon and juniper-covered hills.
The grand dream of moving people by car westward was realized in 1927 with the opening of Route 66. Motorists flocked onto the massive new highway system known as America's "New Main Street." Within eight years, the Santa Rosa section was open. Besides offering a delightful watering hole to weary travelers, Santa Rosa provided additional comforts in an era of tough traveling. Families heading west in hopes of a better life, sightseers, truckers hauling goods from coast to coast, all found respite in Santa Rosa's motels and cafés which lined the highway through town. Fortunately, reliving the golden era of Route 66 is not too hard. Look for signs of the good ol' days at the Comet Drive In, Silver Moon, Sun and Sand, and in the still-grinning faces of Fat Man billboards outside of town. Be warned: You can experience the flavor of Route 66 by eating your way across town, starting with good 'n greasy Heritage Fries to Cherry Dump Cake-but it'll take a few days. Loosen your belt and open your eyes-great neon still lights up the night. And don't miss Bozo and Anna's car collection and memorabilia at the Route 66 Auto Museum.
Santa Rosa's stretch of Route 66 is part of film history. When Steinbeck's epic novel, Grapes of Wrath, was made into a movie, director John Ford used Santa Rosa for the memorable train scene. Tom Joad (Henry Fonda) watches a freight train steam over the Pecos River railroad bridge, into the sunset. Other Route 66 landmarks still visible today include "billboards" painted on huge roadside boulders. This part of the highway was decommissioned in 1937 and later became part of the Santa Rosa airport runway. A particularly scenic stretch of Route 66 parallels Interstate 40 and can be accessed from the three exits east of town. See picturesque stone ruins in Cuervo and the ghost service stations of Newkirk and Montoya. If you have a couple of hours, drive on to Tucumcari where more 66-era relics can be found.
An ancient adobe village in a hauntingly beautiful landscape, Puerto de Luna (10 miles south of Santa Rosa) was once the most thriving village in the area. According to one legend, Coronado's conquistadores built a bridge across the Pecos here and watched the moon come up behind rock outcroppings. The area was not permanently settled until Civil War times, relatively late by Southwestern standards. Early settlers found a beautiful, fertile valley with soft sweet drinking water from nearby springs and sufficient acequia water to irrigate their fields.
The coming of the railroad signaled the beginning of the end for Puerto de Luna when it was bypassed. Instead, the citizens of Santa Rosa were the ones to cheer the first train steaming into their town on Christmas Day of 1901.
Special sites in "PDL," as the locals call it, include the Nuestro Señora del Refugio Church, the original County Courthouse, and the nearby Grzelachowski House, home to one of the town's most colorful entrepreneurs. "Grezla," as the retired Civil War chaplain was nicknamed, was a business partner to Charles Ilfeld, pioneer merchant, and also friend to outlaw Billy the Kid. Billy is said to have eaten his last Christmas dinner in Grezla's home in PDL.
Puerto de Luna is also famous for "PDL Chile" a unique strain of chile that has been cultivated here for over 100 years. Look for specials on local restaurant marquees or menus boasting PDL Chile.
In Santa Rosa, head for the railroad-era Fourth Street Business District and the Ilfeld Warehouse. Check out the old storefronts! The remains of Saint Rose Chapel, erected in 1879 by builder Don Celso Baca, are right across from his hacienda about a mile from the town center on Highway 91.
Santa Rosa aerial map
Please click on any icon on the Santa Rosa aerial tourist map, to find close by places, offering hotels and tourist information. You can zoom in and zoom out our touristical map as well as switch between satelite and map view of Santa Rosa.
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