Cheap flights to Santa Fe from C$ 219

Nestling in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains is the beautiful city of Santa Fe. This noted arts and cultural centre is North America’s oldest state capital but bears little resemblance to other seats of government. This is no city of steel and glass. A 1958 ordinance calls for new buildings to be in a Pueblo or Spanish Territorial style, which blends in marvelously with the sun-baked surrounds. Few houses are higher than two storeys which means that the mountain peaks and rolling hills appear to frame the city.

Santa Fe was, for millennia, home to the Native American Pueblos. The coming of the Spanish in the 16th century ushered in centuries of turmoil, which culminated in 1846 with the Mexican-American War and New Mexico becoming a U.S. territory. It finally became the 47th state in 1912. Today, visitors arriving on cheap flights to Santa Fe can expect a city of contrasting influences. The Pueblo, Spanish and Anglo cultures have blended over time to form a rich mosaic that informs the arts, culture and cuisine.

In the central plaza, visitors have the chance to soak up the 400-year-old atmosphere and perhaps pick up some authentic Santa Fe souvenirs. Southwestern furnishings and cowboy hats, Navajo silver and turquoise jewellery are on sale in the high-end boutiques. Testament to Santa Fe’s rich artistic heritage are its more than 200 galleries that exhibit and sell museum-quality art. The city’s art market is the third largest in the U.S. after New York and Los Angeles. Perhaps most famously, it’s the home of the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, said to be the only museum in the world dedicated to an internationally known female artist.

Santa Fe climate

The sun shines in Santa Fe about 300 days a year, but the city’s altitude (more than 2,000 metres above sea level) moderates temperatures. Travellers intending to take cheap flights to Santa Fe are advised to give themselves a couple of days to acclimatize to the altitude.The climate is mild, but the weather can change in a flash. Watch out for summertime thunderstorms and wintertime snowstorms. During the summer months the days can see highs of 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) and the nights experience lows of 15 degrees (56F). Winter months, January for example, can see temperatures of between 5 degrees (42F) and -7 (19F).

Getting around Santa Fe

The downtown and historic areas of Santa Fe are pretty compact and easy to get around on foot. The Santa Fe Trails buses travel over seven routes from the city’s centre to outlying sights. The buses run from 6am to 10pm during the week, from 8am to 8pm on Saturday, with limited service on Sundays. Route 10 is a convenient path for tourists who can stop at the museums on the Old Santa Fe Trail. Bikes are another great way to get around, but for longer distances you can take a taxi, charter van or rental car.      

What is good to know if travelling to Santa Fe?

• Bandelier National Park is set among the cliffs and canyons of the Pajarito Plateau. Between the 12th and 16th centuries different communities carved homes out of the soft volcanic rock, while later on, pueblos were constructed from rock debris. Great for a day trip, the trails are all around the park.
• The Santa Fe International Folk Art Market is the largest market of its kind in the world. So successful is it that Santa Fe has been designated as a Unesco City of Folk Art, the first city in the U.S. named to Unesco’s Creative Cities Network. Held in July, more than 100 folk artists from more than 40 countries gather in Santa Fe where visitors admire and purchase the folk art items that express the different world cultures on display.
• The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum welcomes more than two million visitors a year. There are more than 3,000 works comprising paintings, drawings, and sculptures that date between 1901 to 1984, the year of O’Keeffe’s retirement.
• The Santa Fe Trail opened in 1821 when William Becknell, a trader from Missouri, used it to haul goods by mule train to Santa Fe. Today, there’s a ride-by-the-seat-of-your-pants 828km horse race that starts in Wagon Mount, New Mexico, and ends in Council Grove, Kansas. The race is run over a 14-day period and spectators turn out to cheer on the riders in selected race villages where they’ll spend the night before saddling up the following morning.
• The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi is named for St. Francis, the patron saint of Santa Fe. Built by the Franciscan Friars who accompanied Spanish colonists, the cathedral is in beautiful Romanesque style, all-honeyed stone and also features stained-glass windows. The cathedral houses the oldest statue of a Madonna in the U.S. It dates from 1692.