Famous for its location in the heart of Albuquerque on historic Route 66 and for having served as home to Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen in the mid-1970s, the Sundowner Motel is no longer what it used to be; the property was transformed into a residential complex with commercial space for small businesses by NewLife Homes.

Since New York conductor John Crosby founded the company in 1956 and presented to the public its first performance of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly a year later, The Santa Fe Opera has built up its influence becoming one of the world’s most highly regarded summer opera festivals. A major piece of real estate with a splendid fusion of nature through its dramatic adobe theater, it calls home a 200-acre facility with its own waste water treatment plant, features that no other opera company in the world can claim.

For 18 years the Beach Waterpark has been a staple of the summer for Albuquerque’s children. Unfortunately, it was shut down in 2005 after it received an “unsatisfactory” rating from the Environmental Health Department; a year later everything on site was auctioned off and ever since the land remained empty.