Cliché’s become clichés because they start as truths. Last weekend, Santa Fe was on fire!
Watching Zozobra burn!
Zo-zo’-bra is a 50 foot tall marionette fondly known as Old Man Gloom. People fill his skirts with all the gloomy stuff they want to get rid of from the past year – divorce papers, deeds, debts, and symbolically, disease. Not to mention bad grades, sad thoughts, and mad feelings. Burning Zozobra is, as much as anything, a Santa-Fe-New-Year reason to party. The tradition started 85 years ago, has been going strong ever since, with 20-30,000 +/- Santa Fe’ans and tourists gathering at Ft Marcy Park during the course of the day to picnic and wait for dark, when the sparks fly—literally. At dusk, an official mounts the steps to the hem of the giant character and officiously carries out sentence on the boogeyman, calling out the fire dancer and the little 
ghosts. In this video, the gloomy Zozobra is sentenced with the jury screaming, “Burn Him!” Then, put the party on pause for 20 minutes while the fire dancer and supporting cast run up and down stairs, twirl lights, swirl scarves and generally annoy several thousand people. If I still smoked, I would have a lighter in my pocket. If I had a lighter in my pocket, I would have run up the stairs and set the boogeyman on fire. The whole time, Old Man Gloom groans and moans, growling loud displeasure when roman candles shoot off around his head. Finally, someone takes pity on the doomed red-head and shoot him with a fire bolt, which set him to full blaze.
Watching Zozobra burn!
Zo-zo’-bra is a 50 foot tall marionette fondly known as Old Man Gloom. People fill his skirts with all the gloomy stuff they want to get rid of from the past year – divorce papers, deeds, debts, and symbolically, disease. Not to mention bad grades, sad thoughts, and mad feelings. Burning Zozobra is, as much as anything, a Santa-Fe-New-Year reason to party. The tradition started 85 years ago, has been going strong ever since, with 20-30,000 +/- Santa Fe’ans and tourists gathering at Ft Marcy Park during the course of the day to picnic and wait for dark, when the sparks fly—literally. At dusk, an official mounts the steps to the hem of the giant character and officiously carries out sentence on the boogeyman, calling out the fire dancer and the little 
ghosts. In this video, the gloomy Zozobra is sentenced with the jury screaming, “Burn Him!” Then, put the party on pause for 20 minutes while the fire dancer and supporting cast run up and down stairs, twirl lights, swirl scarves and generally annoy several thousand people. If I still smoked, I would have a lighter in my pocket. If I had a lighter in my pocket, I would have run up the stairs and set the boogeyman on fire. The whole time, Old Man Gloom groans and moans, growling loud displeasure when roman candles shoot off around his head. Finally, someone takes pity on the doomed red-head and shoot him with a fire bolt, which set him to full blaze. Our nephew captured Zozobra’s fire-y end and posted it on YouTube, accompanied by the frenzied chant of the crowd, “BURN HIM!!” As the year’s glooms went up in flames and finally collapsed to a final ember, we were treated to one of the most wonderful fireworks show – real July-4th-fireworks – that I’ve ever seen, not even excepting Washington DC on Independence Day.
The Old Town celebrated: Viva La Fiesta
Santa Fe is 400 years old this year. It has reason to celebrate! There are few American cities that can claim so long a presence. And it appears to be a city that embraces all influences of its history and culture. The center of life is the main Plaza. Facing the Plaza is the Cathedral, hotels, luxury-item boutiques, the Palace of the Governors which is the oldest continuously used public building in the US, and most importantly to the 4 of us hungry fiesta-goers, the Plaza Diner. Santa Fe is known for many wonderful restaurants, often with as many $$$$ on their menu as little red chiles. But the Plaza Diner is perfect for breakfast, lunch or dinner; we tried it for each. Red or Green – the leading question at every meal. Did you know they can put chile in pancakes? My taste buds rebelled at even the idea of green chile pancakes – what would they flavor the syrup with? Chipotle? I settled instead for blue corn and pinons on pancakes…mmmm.
But it was so crowded in town. I definitely appreciate the absence of traffic in Silver City. Remembering what traffic is like and maneuvering in traffic when you don’t know the town are two different things. Our hotel was just off the Plaza, so very much in the heart of congestion. When we arrived on Thursday and it took 15 minutes to go around a small block to get to the hotel’s parking area, I’m afraid I was ready to leave the “big city” right then. Fortunately, downtown Santa Fe is a very walkable city—and we did. Didn’t use a car except to go out to the edge of town and when we went up into the mountains.
So here were the highlights: wonderful music that had me dancing in the street; dancing that was fun to watch as the girls and women tossed and fanned their full, ruffled skirts; a 2 ½ mile walk at 9,500 feet through aspen and pine forests, where the 4 of us had the trail largely to ourselves; and time spent with our nephew and his wife. I had so much fun, I forgot to take many pictures. But what I took, you’ll find here.
And you can’t leave Fiesta weekend without Zozobra’s rendition of “I’m on Fire”
The Old Town celebrated: Viva La Fiesta
Santa Fe is 400 years old this year. It has reason to celebrate! There are few American cities that can claim so long a presence. And it appears to be a city that embraces all influences of its history and culture. The center of life is the main Plaza. Facing the Plaza is the Cathedral, hotels, luxury-item boutiques, the Palace of the Governors which is the oldest continuously used public building in the US, and most importantly to the 4 of us hungry fiesta-goers, the Plaza Diner. Santa Fe is known for many wonderful restaurants, often with as many $$$$ on their menu as little red chiles. But the Plaza Diner is perfect for breakfast, lunch or dinner; we tried it for each. Red or Green – the leading question at every meal. Did you know they can put chile in pancakes? My taste buds rebelled at even the idea of green chile pancakes – what would they flavor the syrup with? Chipotle? I settled instead for blue corn and pinons on pancakes…mmmm.
But it was so crowded in town. I definitely appreciate the absence of traffic in Silver City. Remembering what traffic is like and maneuvering in traffic when you don’t know the town are two different things. Our hotel was just off the Plaza, so very much in the heart of congestion. When we arrived on Thursday and it took 15 minutes to go around a small block to get to the hotel’s parking area, I’m afraid I was ready to leave the “big city” right then. Fortunately, downtown Santa Fe is a very walkable city—and we did. Didn’t use a car except to go out to the edge of town and when we went up into the mountains.
So here were the highlights: wonderful music that had me dancing in the street; dancing that was fun to watch as the girls and women tossed and fanned their full, ruffled skirts; a 2 ½ mile walk at 9,500 feet through aspen and pine forests, where the 4 of us had the trail largely to ourselves; and time spent with our nephew and his wife. I had so much fun, I forgot to take many pictures. But what I took, you’ll find here.
And you can’t leave Fiesta weekend without Zozobra’s rendition of “I’m on Fire”
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