Santa Fe: The City Different

Georgia O'Keeffe, a child of Wisconsin's gray winters, stepped down from the train in 1929 and into a landscape drawn in several extra dimensions. New Mexico's juniper-covered hills leapt forward in air so clear and sunlight so pure that sandstone miles away felt so close she could touch its rough face. The landscape seemed to pulse with light originating from within as much as from above. "The sky is different. The stars are different. The wind is different," O'Keeffe wrote to a friend. "It's so beautiful, it's ridiculous."

After that first glimpse, O'Keeffe set her paintbrush to capturing the land around Santa Fe, making it her signature subject and launching an arts community that has grown to more than 200 galleries and a dozen museums. There's rarely a bad day for painting--or anything else, really--in Santa Fe, which sees 300-plus sunny days a year and enjoys the crystalline atmosphere of a 7,000-foot elevation. And fortunately for winter-weary Midwesterners, that forecast includes winter, when high temps average only around 50 degrees, but dry air and sunshine make for relaxed strolling in a historic downtown.

Click ahead for more information on a getaway to Santa Fe. A suggested two-day itinerary is on slides 6 and 7. Pictured: Desert landscapes rise just outside Santa Fe.

Santa Fe Convention and Visitors Bureau