First Steps in the First Wilderness Part 9: January
Monday, January 20th, 2020: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Southwest New Mexico, Whitewater.
Above 8,000′, the snow was too deep to hike my favorite trails. And my 4wd was in the shop so I couldn’t drive muddy and/or icy roads to most of the other trailheads. After trying and failing to drive an unfamiliar backroad an hour from home, I was forced to fall back on a low-elevation trail into a popular canyon, a trail much shorter than I usually hike on a Sunday.
But it was worth it! I’d forgotten how beautiful the landscape is from this trail. The side canyons had rushing water, and the main creek was raging with snowmelt.
Approaching the snowcovered crest from the southeast
Ascending the first ridge above the canyon, looking back down at the canyon’s mouth
Looking up-canyon toward the snowcovered crest of the range
Crossing the first side canyon, which is normally dry
Discovering a “window rock” above the trail that I hadn’t noticed before
Cliff overhanging the canyon bottom
Volcanic breccia along the trail
Down in the canyon, looking up to its head
This small stretch of canyon is perpetually in the shade and retains freezing temps despite its low elevation
A new patch of the very destructive invasive plant Vinca, commonly known as periwinkle
Vinca smother all native vegetation
Pinnacles above the trail
The creek is about 15′ wide, carrying up to 8 times its normal volume
This “weeping” bunchgrass is one of my favorites
In patches of sun I was swarmed by clouds of leafhoppers that were massing on trailside oak shrubs
Graphocephala atropunctata, commonly know as the blue-green sharpshooter
After reaching the canyon bottom trail, working my way up along the raging creek, and fighting my way through clouds of leafhoppers that rose from trailside shrubs in the few sunny patches, I was finally stopped when the trail ended in an impassable rockslide. None of these trails has been maintained since the 2012 wildfire.
A giant sycamore leaning over the creek
A stretch of trail reinforced with flatrocks by long-ago volunteers
Vinca smothering two yucca
I climbed above the trail to the window rock for some closeups
I love the strata in this cliff
At center, in the far distance, the Mogollon Rim of Arizona can just barely be seen behind the peak of the Blue Range
