D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
May
2009
You MAY want to plan on these events.
What goes around. . . May blows in with the Tour of the Gila's
final stages, including the colorfully clad cyclists' whirr around downtown
Silver City on May 2 and the grueling Gila Monster Road Race on May
3.
Feeling festive: The sound of departing wheels and spokes signals the start of festival season in Southwest New Mexico. You can read all about T or C's 60th Annual Fiesta, May 1-3, elsewhere in this section. That same weekend, May 2-3, the plaza in Mesilla is home to the Cinco de Mayo Fiesta. The following Saturday, May 9, drive on down to Pancho Villa State Park near Columbus for the 4th Annual Cactus Carnival, featuring music by Loretta's Barbed Wire Band, a guided desert cactus stroll (look but don't touch!) and cactus plants for sale. Or head for Hurley and the 4th Annual Hurley Festival, also on May 9, as this plucky town shows its pride with a pancake breakfast, "Show and Shine" event and of course food and fun.
The festivals keep coming all month long, with May 16 bringing the Hillsboro
Heritage Music Festival. Head over the Black Range for live music by
seven different bands and performers including Bill Barwick, plus a silent
auction and a western-swing dance with Los Radiators.
Then it's Memorial Day weekend — yes, it's early this year — which means the 14th Annual Silver City Blues Festival, May 22-24. Headliners this year are Coco Montoya and Ruthie Foster. Billboard says of Saturday's star performer, "In a world of blues guitar pretenders, Coco Montoya is the real McCoy. Be prepared to get scorched." And about Sunday's headliner, the Montreal Gazette says, "Whether singing blues or gospel, Ruthie Foster is a singer with a powerful, soul-stirring delivery that is easy to give yourself over to." Plan on giving yourself over to the blues at Gough Park, with Friday night and Saturday late-night extras at the Buffalo Dance Hall.
If bluegrass is more your thing, the Third Annual Bluegrass Festival will
be twanging and picking in Rockhound State Park, near Deming, May 22-24.
And if you'd like a little wine with your music, the Southern New Mexico
Wine Festival returns to the fairgrounds off I-10 near Las Cruces, May
23-25. Don't miss Las Cruces' own up-and-coming star Josh Grider on Sunday
at 4 p.m., fresh off his performance at South by Southwest's Americana Showcase.
A sense of history: There's more to May than music and festivals, of
course. Train buffs will want to make tracks to Las Cruces' 2nd Annual Railroad
Days at the Railroad Museum, May 7-9. From model trains to the real
thing — a Rail Runner Express commuter train and a modern Burlington
Northern Santa Fe diesel engine — it's an event that will, well, transport
you.
A different sort of history is spotlighted in the new exhibit opening at the Silver City Museum, also on May 9: It's entitled "Something Borrowed, Something Blue: A Southwestern New Mexico Wedding Album", and the cake gets cut, at least metaphorically, with an opening reception from 1-4 p.m.
The museum also invites you to spend Mother's Day at the Mimbres on May
10, from 1-4 p.m. at the Mimbres Culture Heritage Site. The site includes
a large Mimbres pithouse/pueblo ruin dating from the Mimbres Late Pithouse
period (6th to 10th century) through the Mimbres Classic period (11th to
mid-12th century). Also preserved here are two adobe houses, among the last
remaining buildings from the New Mexico territorial era in the Mimbres Valley — the
early 1880s Wood House and the 1890s Gooch House. The day will feature refreshments,
storytelling and tours of the archeological site and the Gooch House.
Up the down curtain: Most of the multiple theatrical offerings from last month are winding down, but if you hurry you can still catch She Stoops to Conquer, the Oliver Goldsmith classic, at NMSU's Hershel Zohn Theatre and the Black Box Theatre's Enchanted April. Both run through May 3, in Las Cruces. And in Deming, Theatre For Today presents the final weekend of You Can't Take It With You by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, also May 1-3, at the old depot.
Happily, one new play pops up this month to fill the void: The Virus Theater stages an original production of Wheelhouse, at the Wherehouse (corner of Texas and San Vicente near downtown Silver City), May 14-June 6. And Theatre Group New Mexico will have auditions and signup on May 9 for its summer theater program for ages 5 to 18, which will culminate in a production of Disney's Aladdin Jr..
Growing things: Spring having thoroughly sprung at last, May also brings the opening of the Silver City Farmer's Market, celebrating its 20th season on May 2. You'll find the market once again between 7th and 8th, next to the "Big Ditch." New market manager Regina Vinson has already lined up a bounty of special events: Brandon Perrault performs May 9; home economist Judy O'Laughlin demonstrates herb butters on May 16; and Hosanna Eilert demonstrates natural dyes on May 23.
And spring means garden-tour time, with Las Cruces' 14th Annual Tour of Gardens on May 16 and the Evergreen Garden Club's annual tour of Silver City gardens on May 31. Read all about both tours in this issue's Southwest Gardener column.
Spurring you on: If the month rode in on bicycles, it goes on out bucking broncos and bulls, May 27-30, with the Wild Wild West Pro Rodeo at the Southwest Horsemen's Association rodeo ground, just off Hwy. 180 East in Silver City. Tickets are $10 in advance (before 5 p.m.) and $15 at the gate, with action beginning at 7:30 nightly. At press time, details were harder to pin down than an ornery steer, so check with the Horsemen's Association once the dust settles.