- Albuquerque Museum of Art and History (2000 Mountain Rd. NW, Albuquerque; tel. 505/243-7255): Take a journey down into the caverns of New Mexico's past in this museum, which owns the largest U.S. collection of Spanish colonial artifacts. Displays include Don Quixote-style helmets, swords, and even horse armor. You can wander through an 18th-century house compound with adobe floors and walls, and see gear used by vaqueros, the original cowboys who came to the area in the 16th century.
- Museum of Fine Arts (107 W. Palace Ave., Santa Fe; tel. 505/476-5072): This museum's permanent collection of more than 8,000 works emphasizes regional art and includes landscapes and portraits by all the Taos masters as well as contemporary artists, including R. C. Gorman, Amado Pe?a, Jr., and Georgia O'Keeffe. The museum also has a collection of photographic works by such masters as Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, and Elliot Porter.
- Museum of International Folk Art (706 Camino Lejo, Santa Fe; tel. 505/476-1200): Santa Fe's perpetually expanding collection of folk art is the largest in the world, with thousands of objects from more than 100 countries. You'll find an amazing array of imaginative works, ranging from Hispanic folk art santos (carved saints) to Indonesian textiles and African sculptures.
- Taos Historic Museums (Taos; tel. 505/758-0505): What's nice about Taos is that you can see historic homes inside and out. You can wander through Taos Society artist Ernest Blumenschein's home, which is a museum. Built in 1797 and restored by Blumenschein in 1919, it represents another New Mexico architectural phenomenon: homes that were added on to year after year. Doorways are typically low, and floors rise and fall at the whim of the earth beneath them. The Martinez Hacienda is an example of a hacienda stronghold. Built without windows facing outward, it originally had 20 small rooms, many with doors opening out to the courtyard. The hacienda has been developed into a living museum featuring weavers, blacksmiths, and woodcarvers.
- Millicent Rogers Museum of Northern New Mexico (Millicent Rogers Rd., Taos; tel. 505/758-2462): This museum is small enough to offer a glimpse of some of the finest Southwestern arts and crafts you'll see, without being overwhelming. It was founded in 1953 by family members after the death of Millicent Rogers, a wealthy Taos emigre who, in 1947, began acquiring a magnificent collection of beautiful Native American arts and crafts. Included are jewelry, textiles, pottery, kachina dolls, paintings, and basketry from a wide variety of Southwestern tribes.
- El Camino Real International Heritage Center (30 miles south of Socorro off I-25, exit 115; tel. 505/854-3600): This new museum traces the 1,500-mile historic route between Mexico City and the Espa?ola Valley north of Santa Fe. On view are artifacts, art, and devotional items used along the trail, along with state-of-the-art exhibits offering first-person stories of the trail.
- The Hubbard Museum of the American West (841 W. US 70, Ruidoso Downs; tel. 505/378-4142): This museum holds a collection of more than 10,000 horse-related items, including saddles, sleighs, a horse-drawn fire engine, a stagecoach, and paintings by artists such as Frederic Remington, Charles Russell, and Frank Tenney Johnson.
