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| Heartleaf Arnica growing along Santa Barbara Creek |
The
northern section of the Pecos Wilderness is in the Carson National Forest and
its entry points are generally a littler higher in elevation than the Santa Fe National
Forest portion. Our plan was to stay at
one of two campgrounds – either Santa Barbara or Agua Piedra after checking
conditions at the ranger station in Penasco.
The drive was supposed to be an easy one of about 2 hours from Santa
Fe. And it would have been if we hadn’t
missed our turn onto State Hwy 98, part of the “High Road to Taos.” (In our travels, we have found that highway signs are often not as clear and
well-placed as we would like them.) By
the time we saw this sign, we were already passed it and there was no place to
turn our RV around. The road we were on would still get us where we were going,
it just looked very small and crooked on the map and if it looked that way on
the map, well, that could be scary.
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| The spring-swollen Santa Barbara Creek overflowing into the trail |
We
drove on hoping for a turnaround place and as that did not materialize, we just
started hoping that the road would not get any narrower than it already
was. But that was not to be. The road twisted and turned and climbed and
finally got so narrow through this one little village of Cundiyo that I swear I
could have put my arm out the window and touched the sides of some of the
houses as we drove by. It was absolutely
the narrowest one lane road I have ever been on in our RV.
All
we could think was that we better not meet anyone coming down this crazy road
we were going up. What would we do? There was no place to pull over and towing
our car, we could not back up. Maya and
I started thinking about what color flowers we wanted on our road side
memorial. But thankfully disaster was
averted and we met no one until we were nearly at the top and there was a small
place to pull over. Right after that, we joined with the “High Road to Taos”
which was itself a curvy road, but we felt like we were back on the freeway. Silver was never worried and she handled like
a dream through it all. Once again David
and I were grateful for our amazing little RV.
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| The roaring Santa Barbara near our campsite |
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| Maya gets a little too close for comfort and mom makes her get out |
The
lady at the ranger station in Penasco told us that the Agua Piedra Campground
had no water so Santa Barbara was where we headed. It was a warm afternoon of 82 when we arrived
but within an hour the clouds rolled in and we had a wonderful little afternoon
thunderstorm. We read books, listened to
the rain and made a late lunch. By
sunset we were back to being mellow and looking forward to a peaceful night next to
Santa Barbara Creek. Snow melt and
recent rains had the Santa Barbara almost roaring but it still made for nice
sleeping.
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| Trampas Creek |
The
next morning, we took a short drive to the Trampas Creek trailhead hoping to
reach one of the Trampas Lakes or perhaps Hidden Lake. But after a couple of miles, the stream
crossings started to be more challenging. Log
bridges were out and in most cases we had to cross on piled up logs and rocks
that were not very steady considering the swiftness of the spring swollen
Trampas Creek. Then we hit one crossing where
the water was several feet deep and there was nothing steady enough to walk or hop across on. We did not want to wade/swim in that cold water. Even Maya wasn't eager to go in,
so we had lunch in the sweet little aspen meadow by the creek and then
walked back enjoying the spring wildflowers. The wildflowers were fabulous along the creek
and in the meadows. It was just a little
early in the season to make it to the lakes.
We will try again another day.
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| Canada Violets along Trampas Creek |
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| Dandelion field heading up the Serpent Lake Trail |
The
next day we thought we would take the Serpent Lake Trail as it was not near any
big creeks and mostly a mountain climb. We
should be able to reach that lake, right?
Well, things started out fine anyway. We walked through a beautiful meadow of
blooming dandelions and into the forest.
For about two miles it was a steady climb with some steep switchbacks
but then at about 10,800 feet we started seeing more and more snow. When there wasn’t snow in the trail, the
trail itself was running like a small creek from all the snow melt. We were either walking in water or slogging
through snow.
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| Snowy Trail |
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| Cooling the water bottles at lunch |
We
continued on as the snow drifts became bigger and bigger covering most of the
trail. According to David’s GPS we were
at 11,800 feet and only about a third of a mile from the lake but we decided to
turn back. It was just too hard plowing
through the snow without snowshoes. Those waterproof boots and gators only help so much and we were all getting wet and cold. Maya loved it for a while but even she was
struggling and sinking to her shoulders in the snow.
Thwarted again, no lake! I guess
early June has its hazards in the Pecos Wilderness – swollen creeks and/or snow
can be quite the obstacles.
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| Had enough! |
Our
third day we got an early start and hiked the Middle Fork of the Santa Barbara
Trail right from our campground. As I
have already mentioned, Santa Barbara Creek was flowing very strong, but the
trail map promised only one crossing in the first few miles and we were hoping
for a bridge. Yay! There was one.
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| A big bridge is a joy to behold when waters are raging... |
This trail was delightful and there
were so many wildflowers – Western Red Columbine, Canada Violet, Mountain
Lupine, Tall Chiming Bells, Mountain Iris, Rock Clematis, Rosy Pussytoes, Marsh
Marigold and Heartleaf Arnica just to name the ones I know. Early June is a great time to see wildflowers.
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| I'd turn back if I were you... And we did! |
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We ran into some backpackers who did cross
the Santa Barbara here and they were pretty wet!
|
After
our hike we drove 8 miles back into Penasco to a little restaurant we had seen
on the road called Sugar Nymphs. It had
such an appealing name and cute sign that it made me want to try it. The menu was limited to mostly sandwiches for
lunch so we both had green chili cheeseburgers on homemade bread with sides of steaming
corn chowder. As the afternoon was cooling
off and clouding up for another rain, that warm soup felt great to our tired,
chilled and hungry bodies.
David’s Stats:
Days
Hiked 3
Total Miles Hiked 18.78
Ave. Miles per Day 6.26
Total Elevation Gain 3,279
Ave. Elevation Gain per day 1,093
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| Rosy Pussytoes and pink Cindy toes... |
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