Kay Adshead Marriage  Sat 17Jun2012

To Peter Carr in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA


KayAdsheadMarrCert   A New Mexico Certificate

[See Marriage Licence and Photos at End]

Peter Carr sent this account saying:-

Kay and I would be delighted for you to give all the details to the group. Here is the story:
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Kay and I have a home in Houston, Texas, as well as in London. We wanted to
be married somewhere beautiful. Having considered Italy, Greece, the
Carribean, California, we settled on New Mexico as being conveniently close
to our Houston home and United Airlines was doing a special offer last
weekend on flights from Houston to Hobbs, New Mexico.

 

Our marriage was almost an elopement. We did not tell anyone about it in
advance other than our (adult) children. There were no guests; just the two
of us. After booking the flight, we booked a wedding ceremony at Hacienda
Dona Andrea de Santa Fe.

We arrived at Hobbs around noon on Friday, June 15, and picked up a rental
car. We drove to the county seat of Lovington, walked into the courthouse,
found the county clerk's office, showed picture ID, and were given a
marriage license. The county clerk and her staff made a big fuss of us. We
then drove to Santa Fe, about 6 hours drive away.

The Hobbs/Lovington area is full of oil wells. From there, we then drove
across the Llano Estacado (Spanish for palisaded plains), an uninhabited,
geologically distinct area of grasslands where the buffalo used to roam
until they were exterminated circa 1870. Reportedly, porcupines and mountain
lions have now moved into the Llano. We passed through Roswell, a small town
known to the world only on account of a UFO myth. Just before we arrived at
Santa Fe, the grasslands gave way to mountains and the country seemed much
more verdant despite the higher altitude.

We stayed at La Fonda hotel on the plaza in Santa Fe, the oldest hotel in
the town. Our room had a window looking out onto the Santa Fe Trail, along
which the cattle drives used to take place from Missouri to Santa Fe.

On Saturday morning, our first priority was to arrange flowers. The hotel
concierge put us in touch with Marisa, the lady who does the flowers for the
hotel weddings, and it was arranged she would deliver them to us on Sunday
at 1pm. We then jumped on an open bus that was just about to depart outside
the hotel and we had a tour of the town. Santa Fe is full of galleries and
craft shops. One of the highlights is Canyon Road, on the outskirts of town,
a narrow road that winds up the mountainside and which consists almost
entirely of artist studios plus a few high end restaurants, and the
occasional film star's mansion.

We spent the rest of Saturday walking around the plaza area, going into many
galleries, and we had lunch and dinner in lovely restaurants.

Sunday was devoted to the wedding. Kay needed shoes; we managed to find a
designer shoe shop that was open on Sunday morning; they had just one pair
of shoes that were suitable, but thankfully that pair was just perfect. The
flowers were delivered promptly by Marisa at 1pm. We then got ready. We left
around 5pm to drive to Hacienda Dona Andrea de Santa Fe and arrived just in
time at 6:30pm.

The Hacienda was a little difficult to find. It is miles along a dirt road
that winds up a mountainside. Our GPS was totally confused and kept giving
us misguided directions that we ignored and we just kept going on the same
dirt road till eventually we arrived at the Hacienda.

We had thought that we might be in a line of people being married at the
Hacienda but it was just us. No one was present except the officiant, Dr.
Maximiliano Contreras, his wife Anne, and an employee, Beverley. The two
ladies were our witnesses.

The ceremony was outdoors on the roof top. We could see 125 miles across the
mountains of Northern New Mexico to the mountains of Colorado.

The ceremony was non-religious and 30 minutes after arriving we were driving
out as husband and wife.

The address of the Hacienda was "Cerrillos" so on our return to Santa Fe we
attempted to find Cerrillos. It turned out to be more or less a ghost town.
It was an ancient Spanish settlement and then a boom mining town in the late
19th century. Now only a handful of people live there and it is used as a
film set for cowboy films.

Arriving back in Santa Fe after being married, we drove along Canyon Road
looking for a restaurant. Since it was Sunday, many places were closed.
Geronimo's was open and this is one of Santa Fe's top restaurants. We sat on
the patio and watched the sun go down as we drank delicious cocktails
followed by a wonderful meal. The staff were super friendly. We find that
Americans in the country areas and small towns (and Santa Fe is a very small
town) are consistently very warm.

On Monday, we checked out in leisurely fashion and drove North up through
the gorge of the Rio Grande to the pueblo of Taos, high in the mountains. We
saw people swimming in the Rio Grande at various place. At Taos, a girl of
the Red Willow tribe gave us a tour of the pueblo where her tribe has lived
for more than 1000 years. Our visit to the pueblo is a story in itself.

We then headed back to Hobbs airport, staying Monday night in a motel in
Roswell. On Tuesday morning, we went via Lovington to register the marriage
since that was where we picked up the license. The ladies in the County
Clerk's office once again made a big fuss of us. People in small town
America are so delightful.

In summary, our spontaneous last-minute choice of wedding destination turned
out to be absolutely perfect for us. It could not have been more beautiful
or more simple.
________________________


KayAdsheadMarrLic   A New Mexico Marriage Licence


KayAdsheadMarrLic2   New Mexico Paperwork


KayAdshead & Peter Carr


What a Place to Marry! - With the New Mexico mountains on the horizon