Black Mesa, OK
|
| Objective: |
|
||||
| Date: |
March 30, 2002 |
||||
| Photogallery: | |||||
| Party: |
Mouser Williams (solo) |
||||
| Summary: |
A long day with 14 hours in the car, but
well worth it. An easy 13.5 km (8.4 mi) mostly-flat hike with great views.
Arrived too late at Capulin to do the hikes there, but still worth the drive up for the view!
The drive back through the mountains to Taos around sunset was fantastic.
|
||||
| Route: |
Los Alamos to Santa Fe via state road 504.
I-25 north to Springer, NM. 412/56 east to Boise, OK. Take 325 west and follow the signs for
Black Mesa summit. Back the way you came as far as Clayton, NM. Take ??? north to Capulin, follow
the signs for the National Monument. Then continue on ??? north to Raton.
Next get on 64 south to Taos, 68 south to Espanola, and follow the signs for Los Alamos.
|
||||
| Noteworthy: |
My second state highpoint and my sixth county highpoint.
|
||||
| Lessons Learned: |
I'm not as fast a hiker as
Erik Shores; the 13.5 km took him about 2.5 hours, it took me
3.25.
I'm also not nearly as good a road navigator. He made it from Black Mesa to Capulin in 1.5 hours, it took me nearly three hours. There must be a better route than going back to Clayton and then cutting north. Bring a map of Oklahoma, even if your destination is only ~400m over the border. It is almost impossible to find a good gas station in Taos with working bathroom facilities. |
I had a rental car with unlimited milage for my spring break trip to Los Alamos, and I had
a day left before my flight out with nothing to do. Earlier in the week I had found the website
of another nuclear engineer doctoral student at the lab who had written about several trips
on his website that I wanted to take. In discussion with
Erik,
he mentioned that the trip to Black Mesa and Capulin was a good beginner trip for people who
weren't yet acclimated to the high altitude yet.
It was a long trip for one day, and required getting up hideously early in the morning, but I wanted to do something other than work during my spring break and this was it. I didn't have an alarm clock with me so getting up at 4:00am might have been tricky, but I somehow managed to wake up without an alarm at exactly the right time.
I decided to eat breakfast in Las Vegas along I-25. I arrived there at about 6:00am and promptly got lost looking for early-morning dining options. By the time I found a place, it was 6:30am and it happened to be the same place that Erik had eaten on his trip - Charlie's Spic & Span Diner. A good small-town diner; the service was good and the food was great. Note: they open at 6:30, so there's no point leaving Los Alamos any earlier than 4:45 or so if you want to eat there.
Back on the road at 7:15am, it was a long drive to Oklahoma. The drive got significantly less interesting after the turn off of the interstate. The eastern-most portion of New Mexico is rather flat. The vast majority of the drive through Oklahoma was also devoid of geographic points of interest, except in the last 20 miles or so where it suddenly became beautiful again.
The road around the Black Mesa State Park is well signed, though it seems that the mesa itself is not actually in the park. Getting to the trailhead involves not turning onto any of the roads that indicate they go to Black Mesa State Park. When I arrived at the trailhead parking lot, I was the only car. The time was 10:20am.
I packed 1.5 liters of water, my camera, some granola bars, a bananna, and some dried apricots into my bike courier bag and hiked off with no special gear. It was windy and I'm glad I had my sweatshirt, but regular tennis shoes were adequate as were my jeans.
The hike starts with a long flat journey along the base of the mesa through some wonderful desert. It seemed to be more dry that usual, as most of the cholla were looking pretty dead. I didn't see too much wildlife, except right at the beginning I scared a very large deer-like animal and it went bounding away. Not sure what it was. Definitely not a mule deer, looked more like an antelope or something. There were numerous songbirds as well. Most were very far away and too difficult to identify. Some were vaguely yellowish, others had black wings with white bands.
After about 4 km, the trail turns and makes its way up the escarpment. The rise is only about 230 m, and it was easy even for my out-of-shape lungs. Once on top the trail is once again flat and continues for another kilometer or so to the highpoint obelisk, which is somewhat anticlimatic. The obelisk is a 3m tall piece of granite with some tidbits of trivia carved into the sides about the highpoint and the surrounding area. It sits in the middle of the mesa top, surrounded by flat desert in all directions. The closest mesa edge is due south (conveneitly indicated on the obelisk), and the view from this overlook is a good one, but there is no trail leading there.
I signed in on the register located at the base of the obelisk and noted that it had gotten about 20 visitors in the last two weeks. I did not see a single other person the entire time I hiked.
The hike back was remarkably quick and easy, and I was back at the car by 1:00pm. The drive back to Clayton was shortened significantly by my taking a shortcut. Just after 325 turns east and heads toward Boise, there is a turnoff to the right with a sign indicating a route to Felt, OK. This road will take you to 56 and cut many kilometers from the trip. Plus it is very straight, flat, and cop-less. I put my poor three-cylinder, three-speed Geo Metro rental car through its paces. The rev-limiter seems to kick in at about 90mph.
At Clayton, I refilled my gastank at the same gas station for the second time that day. The drive north to Capulin takes you past Sierra Grande - 2,658m (8,720') - the highpoint of Union County, NM. Capulin Volcano National Monument is just on the far side of this. Unfortunately, I arrived at the volcano at 3:45pm, just as the visitors center was closing. The ranger told me I coudld drive up to the top and take some pictures but wouldn't have time for either of the hikes.
The views from the top are great! It was rather hazy, but the sfumato effect on the distant cinder cones was great. There is a short trail that goes down the center of the Capulin cone and anothe that runs around the rim of the volcano. Both looked trivial, but I didn't have the chance to try them.
I grabbed some subway in Raton, NM, and headed southwest towards Taos. Highway 64 through the Sangre de Cristo mountains is gorgeous. I had never been this way and it was great to drive through it none expecting it to be as exquisite as it was. When I rounded a corner and Eagle's Nest lake popped out of nowhere in all its enormity, it elicited several profound comments such as, "wow!"
It just so happens that if you leave Capulin at about 4:00pm, you will reach Eagle's Nest just around sunset (given non daylight-savings time in mid-spring/mid-fall). The sun sets over the Wheeler Peak group and over the lake, and it is amazing. There were clouds when I was there, but they lit up brilliant orange and yellow and I loved it. The combination of the lake, the mountains, the strangley numerous mule deer, and the burning sky made for the best sunset experience I have ever had. Strongly recommended (your mileage may vary).
I get the impression that the windy part of Highway 64 through the mountains would be a fun drive, though it was pitch dark for most of it. After gassing up in Taos, I headed back to Los Alamos and called it a very very long day.
It was a long trip for one day, and required getting up hideously early in the morning, but I wanted to do something other than work during my spring break and this was it. I didn't have an alarm clock with me so getting up at 4:00am might have been tricky, but I somehow managed to wake up without an alarm at exactly the right time.
I decided to eat breakfast in Las Vegas along I-25. I arrived there at about 6:00am and promptly got lost looking for early-morning dining options. By the time I found a place, it was 6:30am and it happened to be the same place that Erik had eaten on his trip - Charlie's Spic & Span Diner. A good small-town diner; the service was good and the food was great. Note: they open at 6:30, so there's no point leaving Los Alamos any earlier than 4:45 or so if you want to eat there.
Back on the road at 7:15am, it was a long drive to Oklahoma. The drive got significantly less interesting after the turn off of the interstate. The eastern-most portion of New Mexico is rather flat. The vast majority of the drive through Oklahoma was also devoid of geographic points of interest, except in the last 20 miles or so where it suddenly became beautiful again.
The road around the Black Mesa State Park is well signed, though it seems that the mesa itself is not actually in the park. Getting to the trailhead involves not turning onto any of the roads that indicate they go to Black Mesa State Park. When I arrived at the trailhead parking lot, I was the only car. The time was 10:20am.
I packed 1.5 liters of water, my camera, some granola bars, a bananna, and some dried apricots into my bike courier bag and hiked off with no special gear. It was windy and I'm glad I had my sweatshirt, but regular tennis shoes were adequate as were my jeans.
The hike starts with a long flat journey along the base of the mesa through some wonderful desert. It seemed to be more dry that usual, as most of the cholla were looking pretty dead. I didn't see too much wildlife, except right at the beginning I scared a very large deer-like animal and it went bounding away. Not sure what it was. Definitely not a mule deer, looked more like an antelope or something. There were numerous songbirds as well. Most were very far away and too difficult to identify. Some were vaguely yellowish, others had black wings with white bands.
After about 4 km, the trail turns and makes its way up the escarpment. The rise is only about 230 m, and it was easy even for my out-of-shape lungs. Once on top the trail is once again flat and continues for another kilometer or so to the highpoint obelisk, which is somewhat anticlimatic. The obelisk is a 3m tall piece of granite with some tidbits of trivia carved into the sides about the highpoint and the surrounding area. It sits in the middle of the mesa top, surrounded by flat desert in all directions. The closest mesa edge is due south (conveneitly indicated on the obelisk), and the view from this overlook is a good one, but there is no trail leading there.
I signed in on the register located at the base of the obelisk and noted that it had gotten about 20 visitors in the last two weeks. I did not see a single other person the entire time I hiked.
The hike back was remarkably quick and easy, and I was back at the car by 1:00pm. The drive back to Clayton was shortened significantly by my taking a shortcut. Just after 325 turns east and heads toward Boise, there is a turnoff to the right with a sign indicating a route to Felt, OK. This road will take you to 56 and cut many kilometers from the trip. Plus it is very straight, flat, and cop-less. I put my poor three-cylinder, three-speed Geo Metro rental car through its paces. The rev-limiter seems to kick in at about 90mph.
At Clayton, I refilled my gastank at the same gas station for the second time that day. The drive north to Capulin takes you past Sierra Grande - 2,658m (8,720') - the highpoint of Union County, NM. Capulin Volcano National Monument is just on the far side of this. Unfortunately, I arrived at the volcano at 3:45pm, just as the visitors center was closing. The ranger told me I coudld drive up to the top and take some pictures but wouldn't have time for either of the hikes.
The views from the top are great! It was rather hazy, but the sfumato effect on the distant cinder cones was great. There is a short trail that goes down the center of the Capulin cone and anothe that runs around the rim of the volcano. Both looked trivial, but I didn't have the chance to try them.
I grabbed some subway in Raton, NM, and headed southwest towards Taos. Highway 64 through the Sangre de Cristo mountains is gorgeous. I had never been this way and it was great to drive through it none expecting it to be as exquisite as it was. When I rounded a corner and Eagle's Nest lake popped out of nowhere in all its enormity, it elicited several profound comments such as, "wow!"
It just so happens that if you leave Capulin at about 4:00pm, you will reach Eagle's Nest just around sunset (given non daylight-savings time in mid-spring/mid-fall). The sun sets over the Wheeler Peak group and over the lake, and it is amazing. There were clouds when I was there, but they lit up brilliant orange and yellow and I loved it. The combination of the lake, the mountains, the strangley numerous mule deer, and the burning sky made for the best sunset experience I have ever had. Strongly recommended (your mileage may vary).
I get the impression that the windy part of Highway 64 through the mountains would be a fun drive, though it was pitch dark for most of it. After gassing up in Taos, I headed back to Los Alamos and called it a very very long day.
Written by Mouser Williams on 2002.04.05