July 9th - Albuquerque - Tinkertown, New Mexico

We set out to visit Tinkertown on the other side of the Sandia Mountains from Albuquerque, and found it with my brother’s directions—no signs indicated where it was off the main highway. Tinkertown itself is the elaborate miniature town produced by a woodcarver over several decades. The buildings and figurines are housed in several winding, ramshackle sheds built in a totally idiosyncratic fashion by a guy with a rather broad sense of humor.

That humor was particularly evident in the depictions of folks in the western town section, which contained many not-so-subtle jokes on politicians, businessmen, and so forth. Other vignettes of carved figures included a shotgun wedding scene with all parties faithfully depicted. The recreation of a 3-ring circus under the big top was a tour de force and we just stared at the carved figures in motion for quite some time. Other exhibits like a replica of a stern-wheel river steamboat, were not named or explained so all I could do was admire the fine craftsmanship in faithfully recreating such a vessel. We also plugged some money into “Oscar”, a 1-machine band operated by a perforated paper roll and compressed air, and enjoyed the resulting performance.

All in all we had a grand old time but finally had to break off for lunch back in Albuquerque, after which we spent the afternoon browsing the antique shops along Central Avenue, which is on the old Route 66 corridor. Monika found some crystal salt and pepper shakers and a covered serving plate that has a gold trim line similar to our good china, and I found a book I wanted. We had dinner at the Blue Dragon coffee house and chatted for a while at Terry’s before driving back to our motel room for the night.