Name: Scott, aka "The Santa Fe Naturalist"
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Bio: New Mexico is an almost perfect place to explore the Earth’s history, because it’s all laid out here for you to see. From the ancient rocks that glitter coldly in the mountains above Santa Fe to the ashy cliffs west of town that have barely cooled off, travelers here can find windows into the past wherever they look. Let Scott Renbarger, Director of Sales at the Inn on the Alameda, be your online guide to the remarkable natural world that surrounds Santa Fe.
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Springtime in the Rockies
May 7th, 2012
Newly-leafed aspen among the conifers
It seems like I was just writing about icy trails and late winter snowshoeing, but suddenly there’s been a change of scene and the mountains are stirring with new life and issuing invitations to have a walk. The snow has vanished from the middle elevations of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and many of our most popular trails are free of ice and spangled with the first wildflowers of the season.
One of the most popular walks among visitors to Santa Fe is the Borrego-Bear Wallow loop, whose trailhead sits at an elevation of 8880 feet, squarely in the middle of the lovely mixed-conifer forest, immediately north of Hyde Memorial State Park. There’s free parking just off the the Ski Basin Road – NM 475 – and it’s only an eight mile drive from downtown Santa Fe. The loop itself is about a 3.2 mile ramble through a shady woods, with a 640 elevation loss/gain, and a sunny meadow at the bottom alongside Tesuque Creek perfect for a snack break or a picnic.
The sign at the intersection of Borrego and Bear Wallow Trails
The Borrego Trail drops down through a forest of Ponderosa, White Fir, Douglas Fir, and Aspen on its way to the Winsor Trail along Tesuque Creek, which you will take downstream until its intersection with the Bear Wallow Trail, which will take you back up to the trailhead.
The aspen are leafing out now, in a fresh yellow-green that contrasts vividly with the much darker evergreens:
Aspen along the Borrego Trail
Is there any tree more delightful than the aspen? It’s handsome in summer and winter, and it is exceptionally beautiful in the spring and fall. Would that we all passed through the seasons of our lives so gracefully.
White fir with grizzled grey bark grow along each of the trails, calling for your attention:
The mixed-conifer forest
These trees frame views of the higher ridges to the northwest:
The Sangre de Cristo
Meanwhile the forest floor is dotted with color and new life:
Red columbine are blooming all along the trails. Hummingbirds rejoice!
The exceptionally tough Creeping Mahonia
And the delicately-flowered Rocky Mountain clematis
One of my favorites peeks out this time of year:
The cheerful Canada violet
Meanwhile a variety of small deciduous trees send forth their first leaves and flowers:
Tiny flowers on the twigs of the lovely Rocky Mountain Maple
Tesuque Creek is singing with snowmelt:
Tesuque Creek at the midpoint of your walk.
It wasn’t too challenging this time, but you have to cross this stream twice to make the loop, and sometimes you have to be inventive. Here’s a picture of the Borrego crossing:
Kids LOVE this spot
On your ascent back up along the Bear Wallow Trail, you’ll pass one of my favorite trees, a Limber pine perched on a rugged outcropping of gneiss above Tesuque Creek:
Limber pine and Tesuque Canyon beyond
In that most delightful of nature books, “A Natural History of Western Trees“, Donald Culross Peattie writes “. . . and Limber Pines have a way of growing in dramatic places, taking picturesque attitudes, and getting themselves photographed, written about, and cared for. . . ” This specimen is no exception. It grows in a dramatic place, and I’ve enjoyed my tea in its shade many times.
So plan for a springtime walk in the mountains when you make your visit with us in Santa Fe. We can help you with lots of suggestions, and our neighbor, the Travel Bug, can supply you with maps and guidebooks of every kind.
New life
Looking out over Santa Fe
April 9th, 2012
Taking in the view from "Lookout Rock" above Santa Fe
In keeping with the theme of “short hikes near Santa Fe” I have another suggestion for those of you with only a little time to spare for a walk in the woods: a section of the Dale Ball Trails up as far as a rocky ledge on the flanks of Picacho Peak with a great view of Santa Fe. The trailhead is literally minutes drive from downtown, at the end of Upper Canyon Road, and the hike itself is perhaps 45 minutes to the viewpoint.
At the parking area - lots of choices
The walk is a nice introduction to the pinon-juniper forest that characterizes the Santa Fe area, the “Sun Forest” that softens and warms the hills and peaks around the city, a forest which supports a rich ecology in spite of its diminutive size.
Pinon nuts, a rich source of nutrition for many creatures
The shadier parts of the walk are graced by some of the larger Ponderosa pines near town:
Along the lower parts of the trail
Some of these trees bear a massive crown:
A "Grandfather Ponderosa" spreads its generous canopy
These pines also support the local ecology with their abundant seeds:
Pine cones littering the ground
It’s still a little early for wildflowers, but it won’t be long now. A few forbs are jumping the gun:
A aptly-named Perky Sue brightening the path.
Check out those black tourmaline crystals in that bit of pink granite just to the right of the blossom. There are all sorts of fascinating minerals visible to watchful eyes in our mountains.
The Dale Ball Trails are clearly marked by signposts at critical junctions, complete with little maps, so it’s easy to find your way around the network.
The sign at the trailhead of the south Dale Ball Trails
This particular walk gets off to a “rocky” start:
Heading up the canyon
But with a little persistence and a few switchbacks, you’ll emerge onto a ledge of slickrock with a great view of Santa Fe and points west.
Handsome outcroppings of ancient gneiss
It’s a perfect place to offload your pack, have a drink of water and a snack, and to enjoy the vista. There’s even Santa Fe’s own version of “Jeffrey Pine, Sentinel Dome“, as famously photographed by Ansel Adams, to shade you:
The Lone Pine
Well, perhaps I exaggerate. But it’s certainly a beautiful place to stop, and you’ll get just the right amount of exercise getting there and back. And this walk is good to go now, and for the rest of the year into early December, easy to make even in the summer when the inevitable early afternoon thunderstorm might make walks at higher elevations a little more risky. You can complete this rewarding walk easily on a cool morning and be back in town for lunch.
Some guidance: a PDF map of the trails. Go from 29 to 30 to 31, and just a bit up toward 34, and you’ll be there!
Bear Canyon
March 26th, 2012
Looking up into the branches of a Ponderosa in Bear Canyon
Springlike weather has reached high-altitude Santa Fe at last, creating that notorious restlessness that has you planting seeds in the garden too early and heading out to hiking trails up in the mountains still treacherous with ice. There are plenty of walks closer to town to enjoy, however, when you feel that urge to get outside and enjoy the strengthening sun. Just up the road from the Inn on the Alameda is the perfect jumping off place for an easy early hike: the Randall Davey Audubon Center.
There is always plenty of parking at the Audubon Center, and plenty more at the Santa Fe Canyon Nature Preserve lot at the top of Canyon Road. The Audubon maintains a looping trail through the pinon-juniper forest that backs up against its buildings, and a spur of this trail leads into a little tributary of the Santa Fe River that flows down Bear Canyon, just behind Picacho Peak. You can be enjoying a wilderness walk here in literally minutes from downtown Santa Fe.
In spite of its rather ominous-sounding name, Bear Canyon is a gentle place, and it gives you the opportunity to have a walk among shady trees that normally grow at much higher elevations. A pleasant little brooklet trickling over mossy boulders of gneiss and granite keeps you company, and the spicy fragrance of Ponderosa needles warming in the sun fills the canyon.
A walk in Bear Canyon
A little sign points the way:
The shaded and relatively well-watered environment here supports an example of the mixed conifer forest more characteristic of higher elevations, up along the Ski Basin Road.
Ponderosa pine and White fir growing together in Bear Canyon
There’s even a little Old Man’s Beard clinging to the firs, here and there:
Old Man's Beard on a fir tree
Nearby, sunny spots host plants more common to the pinon-juniper community, like this datil yucca, pushing its way up through the pine needles:
A yucca growing in Bear Canyon
Altogether it’s a very pleasant place to have a walk.
Looking up the slopes of Bear Canyon into the forest
Back at the entrance to the canyon you’ll rejoin the looping path through the sun-loving pinon and juniper trees, where the Audubon guides host many of their Saturday morning bird walks. It’s a completely different setting:
A bench along the bird watching trails
Later this Spring there will be plenty of wildflowers among these trees. Even in the winter, the odd, parasitic Juniper mistletoe will no doubt catch you eye, with its distinctive waxy, lime-green branches; its tiny white berries are an important food source for certain birds that flock in this pygmy forest.
Juniper mistletoe
The trail begins just behind the classroom and nature store at the Audubon Center. There a little entrance stop where they ask you to make a $2 contribution to have a walk – a small price supporting a good cause. And there’s no charge to park, nor to walk around their extensive grounds or down along the Santa Fe River with its beaver dams and cottonwoods.
The old Randall Davey House at the Audubon - a true Pink Adobe
So keep little Bear Canyon on your list for a quick escape from the cultural delights of Santa Fe. It’s short, it’s close, it’s kid-friendly, it’s easy to find, and it’s free from snow and ice now. Our Front Desk staff will point the way!
Late Snow and Winter Walks
March 12th, 2012
Snowshoeing above Aspen Vista in Santa Fe
Although the calendar says Spring is almost here, someone forgot to tell Mother Nature, and this past weekend she gave another touch up to the 155 inches of snow (!) she has showered on our peaks. Forecasters promise warmer weather in Santa Fe this coming week, however, and that was a sufficient spur to have a hike up at Aspen Vista after the skies cleared Sunday.
There’s nearly always plenty of parking at the Aspen Vista trailhead, maintained by Santa Fe National Forest. This popular trail is only about a 25 minute drive from downtown.
Easy parking at Aspen Vista
The Forest Service has a few helpful hints posted there:
Winter in the mountains
Just getting out of your car will get you this view of Big Tesuque and the soft, sensual western face the Sangre de Cristo Mountains presents to Santa Fe, far below:
The view south from the Aspen Vista Trailhead
Even if you only have a short time to make a drive up to see the snow on your Spring Break, you’ll enjoy a stop here:
Aspen Vista Trailhead
But if you have a little more time, and are feeling adventurous, be sure and rent a pair of snowshoes and head off on your own. You’ll see aspects of the forest you really can’t enjoy any other way – like these hypnotic tangles of aspen covering entire ridges:
Among the aspen
From place to place the trees open up to give marvelous views of the mountains in their winter garb:
Big Tesuque
When the clouds part, the alpine sky embraces you in blue:
Reaching for the sky
In places the trees part to reveal unexpected meadows:
A snowy meadow high above Aspen Vista
These are good place to stop and find a fallen tree to rest on, and enjoy a warm drink. You might see evidence of other mystic activity – obviously someone is maintaining the Snow Spiral in this meadow:
The Snow Spiral
It even has a banco built in!
With the parade of storms we’ve had this winter, Ski Santa Fe is having a great season, and there’s no reason why they won’t be going strong all the way until they close at Easter. And if you’re not comfortable striking off in snowshoes on your own – or if you want to explore a trail you’d never find otherwise – engage a local guide from a company like Outspire or Santa Fe Walkabouts to help you out. You’ll probably discover that a guided adventure like this will be the absolute highlight of your trip to Santa Fe, and something you’ll remember for a long long time.
The Tyuonyi Overlook Trail
February 27th, 2012
The Frey Trail descending into Frijoles Canyon, seen from the Overlook
Even after years of visiting the park, I’ve discovered that Bandelier National Monument still has pleasant surprises concealed within its boundaries. Bandelier is one of the most popular day trips out of Santa Fe, just about an hour’s drive west of town, and most visitors feel amply rewarded with an excursion to the cliff dwellings in Frijoles Canyon, and the pleasant walks along the little Rito de Frijoles, burbling in the shade of the singing Ponderosa pines and the warm glowing walls of the Bandelier Tuff. But the park has an extensive network of trails throughout its bounds, and some of these are easy walks that give a different perspective on the way the Ancient Ones lived – and which will reward you with some wonderful views of Frijoles Canyon and the archeological sites it shelters.
This Sunday’s adventure started near the old Amphitheater not far from the entrance to the Park. On my last visit to Bandelier I walked down the Frey Trail, which is the pre-1939 way of getting down into Frijoles Canyon, and at the brink of the descent, admired a precipice of Bandelier Tuff off to the west:
Descending into Frijoles Canyon on the Frey Trail
A closer look at the map showed another trail not far from this one, that actually leads to the top of this cliff. It’s called the Tyuonyi Overlook Trail, and of course I immediately made a mental file to have a walk on it on my next visit to the Park. This past Sunday was a perfect opportunity for a winter hike on the sunny flanks of the Jemez Mountains, and after throwing a few things in the day pack, made the short drive west to Bandelier and the Juniper Campground just inside, where the trail begins.
The sign at the trailhead
Your walk begins in a grove of fragrant Ponderosa:
Off on our adventure
Much of the walk winds across the dry, sparsely wooded top of the plateau just north of Frijoles Canyon, which still shows signs of stress from our drought around 2005. There are a surprising number of archeological sites up here, with small interpretive signs to enhance your stops:
Partially excavated ruins just off the Tyuonyi Trail, up on the mesa
There are more modern cultural features up here too, like this rustic corral:
A corral near the old CCC Amphitheater
Distant views of the volcanic mountains that surround Bandelier lie off to the south and west:
The San Miguel Mountains and sharp Boundary Peak southwest of Bandelier
In only 45 minutes of easy walking you reach the Overlook, perched high above the ruins of Tyuonyi Pueblo:
Looking down from the Overlook at Tyuonyi and the Visitor Center
This is a perfect place to sit and contemplate the vast history, cultural and natural, of old New Mexico.
Contemplating the past
The Tyuonyi Overlook Trail loops back to the trailhead across the mesa so you don’t have to retrace your steps back to the Amphitheater. There are beautiful views up Frijoles Canyon:
Looking west up Frijoles Canyon
And dizzying ones down:
Just above the ladders to Alcove House, looking down
Bandelier, like all National Parks and Monuments, is a wild place at heart, and evidence of the more brutal side of Nature isn’t hard to find:
A murder site along the trail, thoroughly picked over
Past and present mingle to thoughtful eyes. Modern pine cones holding new life lie over a bed of the Cajete Pumice that showered over the mesa perhaps only 40,000 years ago:
Pine cones and pumice littering the mesa
The return trail winds through an airy forest of Ponderosa before returning you to your car:
Fire and drought-thinned forest typical of the Pajarito Plateau
This was a very rewarding walk, and a perfect one for a late winter day in New Mexico when you need to get out for some sunshine and exercise, but don’t feel like facing the icy and somewhat muddy trails in Sangre de Cristo Mountains nearer Santa Fe. So be sure and put the Tyuonyi Overlook Trail on your mental list of things to do when you come visit us!
Winter Adventures in Santa Fe
February 7th, 2012
Fellow travelers above Aspen Vista
The mountains above Santa Fe have been getting just about as much snow as anyplace in the Rockies this winter, and if you’re in the mood for a winter adventure, New Mexico is the place to come! Ski Santa Fe is having a stellar season:
The top of the hike, at the Quad Lift of Ski Santa Fe
With yet another coating of fresh powder last Friday – and soft flurries all weekend – I decided to get out the snowshoes and make a trek up the mountain and see things for myself. I chose Aspen Vista as my starting point, and at the spur of the moment decided to take a route straight up the mountain, where a path had been broken in the fresh snow, leading in an inviting way through the spruce and aspen:
Into the woods
The great thing about snowshoeing is, first, you can wander through the forest almost any way you please, far above the tangle of fallen timber and other obstacles on the forest floor, and second, you have the traction to ascend steeper slopes without switchbacking along a trail. (Of course, you have to have the stamina to ascend – and I was beginning to have some second thoughts around 11,000 feet altitude!)
It’s always worth it. I passed through hypnotic groves of aspen with violet shadows on the snow:
Aspen and light
I came upon a completely unexpected meadow and had a chat with some fellow adventurers and their dog:
The unexpected meadow. A good place to break out the thermos!
Santa Feans have an obsession with spiral shapes – I don’t know how many stone spiral mazes I’ve come across hiking in our mountains – and there was a veritable Stonehenge of a spiral, built of snow, at the top of the meadow:
Snow circles
Persistence paid off with marvelous views into Big Tesuque and its cloud-shrouded ridge:
The view south into Big Tesuque at the top of my climb
The path ended at the boundaries of Ski Santa Fe near the Quad Lift, with many happy skiers:
Ski Santa Fe - the Quad lift and slopes beyond
After a little rest, it was time to head back down the mountain (at a far faster clip!)
The path back down the mountain, through the spruce
And then home, for a well-earned rest.
It looks like conditions are going to be favorable all winter here in Santa Fe, so make some plans to get out in the snow while you’re here. Unlike skis or snowboards and their accessories, snowshoes are inexpensive to rent, and you can pick up a pair or two right on your way up the mountain from town, at Cottam’s, in Hyde State Park, about half way up to the snowy places.
Even if you choose not to get on the path less traveled, don’t rule out a short hike along some of our high country trails while you’re here in the winter. A day or two after a snow, many trails, like Aspen Vista are compacted sufficiently for an enjoyable walk in regular hiking shoes.
This could be you!
Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument
January 29th, 2012
The classic view: Seven Dwarfs Overlook
One of the most remarkable hikes you can make in the entire American Southwest is all of about 40 minutes drive southwest of Santa Fe, in one of our newest National Monuments, Kasha-Katuwe. This phrase means “white cliffs” in the Keresan language spoken by Cochiti Pueblo, which you will drive through on your way over to the Monument. For those of us around here it’s always been known as “Tent Rocks” – for obvious reasons, as you can see from the photograph above. It’s an amazing geological window into an apron of white volcanic tuff ejected from one of the older volcanic centers in the Jemez Mountains, and its display of bizarre “hoodoos”, or earth pillars, is about as perfect as any on the planet.
The drive into Tent Rocks is well marked now, and since its induction into the Federal Park System, the road from Cochiti to the parking area has been completely paved. There is an entrance station where a $5 charge per vehicle will be taken, and once you get to the parking area, you’ll find plenty of paved spaces, some shelters, an interpretive kiosk, and a restroom. There are two trails in the park, one short loop that takes you to a small habitation carved into the soft tuff, similar to ones in Bandelier National Monument, and another, a little over a mile and a half long, that takes your into a beautiful slot canyon and then out again, and then up a mesa for some of the most expansive views in the Southwest.
The view as you start your walk
After crunching across a short distance of soft pumice underlying the typical juniper biota of this part of New Mexico, the trail will veer into a much more enclosed canyon:
Entering the canyon
There’s an unusual assemblage of vegetation here, highlighted by the white tuff. A few Ponderosa Pines thrive by virtue of water channeled by the canyon. An almost endemic species of manzanita grows here and nowhere else I’ve seen in the region. At the appropriate time of year, in May, you’ll see cholla cactuses blooming in every shade of magenta, prickly pear in festive yellow, with their rose-like extravagance of stamens, clusters of hedgehog cactus in scarlet bouquets, and sidebells penstemon flowering on short spikes growing out of impossibly arid slopes.
Soon the canyon literally closes over your head:
The Slot Canyon
It is extremely narrow in places and you might find yourself walking sideways. This is NOT a place to be caught during a summer thunderstorm. On this visit, a layer of icy snow, covered in wind-blown grit, actually smoothed the walk through this confined place.
Overhanging walls of volcanic tuff
This part of the walk has an almost cave-like feel. Eventually the slot opens again into a light-drenched Shangri-La of desert landforms:
A pyramid of tuff
Everywhere you turn there seems to be a photographic opportunity. You’ll start channeling your inner Ansel Adams before you know it:
A spire of tuff
The trail turns again, shortly, and you’ll begin your ascent onto the mesa that crown the Monument:
Ascending the mesa
In summer you’ll be reaching for your water bottle at this point. In winter, you’ll probably be wishing you’d put on crampons; this part of the hike faces north and there are some treacherous places, slippery with ice.
Once on top, however, the views are unsurpassed:
This could be you!
Every mountain range in Northern New Mexico is on display, in panoramic vistas.
Looking back toward Santa Fe
Looking into the Jemez Mountains, with the canyon below.
If you have any interest in geology, Kasha-Katuwe is an imperative stop. Almost every way that volcanic pyroclastics can be deposited is displayed here, from air falls of tephra, to pyroclastic flows, to volcaniclastic aprons laid down by floods. If you’re interested in landforms, well, the place speaks for itself. Be sure and get a copy of the High Desert Field Guides for Kasha-Katuwe before you go!
Whatever you do, bring the camera:
Light
The Coyote Call Trail
January 15th, 2012
Looking north into the Valle Grande from the Coyote Call Trail
The winter light is so beautiful here in northern New Mexico that every weekend calls out for a walk somewhere in the country. This weekend was no exception, and that intriguing volcanic range on Santa Fe’s western skyline, the Jemez Mountains, was particularly seductive – the range catches snow as if to cool down its hot and turbulent past, and the great caldera in its heart, with its vast meadows, simply radiates light on a clear winter day.
Much of this range is protected now by the Valles Caldera National Preserve. Under the terms of its establishment with the Federal Government, the preserve must attempt to pay for itself through a variety of services to the public. There’s no charge to drive though it, but it is not a National Park – yet – and you generally can’t go hiking just anywhere you like without making arrangements and paying a small fee. There are, however, some short and delightful trails on its perimeter that are free, and a friend and I decided to check out one we’d driven past many time before – the Coyote Call Trail.
This is a popular trail for viewing elk, of which the preserve has an enormous population, and in the winter it makes a wonderful loop for snowshoeing or cross-country skiing. Openings in the forest give views north of the Valle Grande and its crown of volcanic domes:
At one time this vast meadow held a crater lake, and today, its dense lake-bed soil and the fact that the basin traps cold air inhibits the encroachment of the forests on the surrounding mountains. Small creeks wind their way across the Valles, meandering in a lazy way until they find exit through the rugged lavas to the southwest. These are buried in ice and snow now, although we did see one ponded spring, apparently fed by volcanically-heated water, covered in happy waterfowl.
This trail just cries out for a saucer sled, to speed you back to your car:
Views through the trees on the east end of the trail (where we were stopped by uncompacted snow) show the Sierras de los Valles that cradle the Valle on its east side, and form the western backdrop to Los Alamos on the other side:
As you can see, this ridge has been severely burned by the Las Conchas Fire, the largest of all the fires that ravished New Mexico this spring. There’s very little of this loop that hasn’t been scorched, so if you are wanting to visit a verdant forest this summer, this walk isn’t for you. It’s still beautiful in the winter, and the animals haven’t forsaken it:
Sketching odd animal tracks on the snow
There are plenty of untouched groves that will seed future growth:
A pristine aspen grove
And the views are marvelous. Look how small the Valle Preserve Staging Area – the visitor’s center just right of the La Jara dome – looks, swallowed up by the snowy meadow:
The smallest lava dome in the Preserve, with the Staging Area to its right
Oh – we did see a coyote. He wasn’t on the trail – he was out in the Valle Grande hunting rodents under the snow – but I wanted to mention it. These mountains never fail to hand you a wildlife encounter.
View through a clearing
A natural sculpture of fire and ice
A New Year’s Story
January 8th, 2012
Can you see them?
“When the world was very young, a beautiful tree began to grow in the forest. With every day that passed, the tree grew taller and taller. From its lofty place, the tree could look down on all the life of the forest, both the very small and the very large. It could see how difficult life was for the smallest animals: the mice, the rabbits, and the squirrels. The tree watched hawks and owls swoop through the forest every day, hunting the small animals and making them run for cover. Each day, the hawks and owls got better and better at hunting. This made the tree sad because it liked all the animals of the forest, even the hawks and owls. One day, the tree watched a tiny mouse run from a hawk until it had run out of places to hide. The tree could see the mouse cowering amidst the cones that lay on the forest floor, bravely awaiting its fate. “Quick”, said the tree, “make yourself as small as you can so that you can hide between the scales of one of my cones.” The mouse did as it was told, squeezing its body under one of the cone’s woody scales, with its tiny hind legs and tail just peeking out from beneath the scale. Frustrated, the hawk flew off and the mouse was safe, its life spared by the kindness of its tall friend. To this day, Douglas-fir cones have an unmistakable three-pointed bract between each cone scale, one that looks just like a little mouse in hiding and reminds us that we must always look out for others”.
Variations of this simple tale are many. This particular version is related by Audrey DeLella Benedict at the beginning of her chapter “The Raven’s Forest: Douglas-fir forests” in “The Naturalist’s Guide to the Southern Rockies” – a book I highly recommend if you are making a visit out our way.
From Stardust to Sardine Cans: a guided walk in the Cerrillos Hills
December 3rd, 2011
One of the most common cultural artifacts found in the Cerrillos Hills
Consilience. That’s the word I suspect was trembling on the lips of our guide for the afternoon, Ranger Sarah Woods, as she led us for a walk with that eye-catching title, along a dusty, juniper-dotted trail in Cerrillos Hills State Park, Sunday afternoon. Consilience literally means a “jumping-together” of knowledge, and when you’re wanting to link stardust with rusty old sardine cans from late 1800′s, while standing in the arid hills of the oldest mining district in New Mexico, you need all the jumping together you can get.
The biologist E. O. Wilson revived that unusual word in his 1998 book “Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge“, and appropriately enough, Sarah’s background is ecology, one of those sciences that concerns itself with the way organisms relate to each other and their environment. Perfect for taking the big-picture, “how does this relate to that” viewpoints so necessary when you need to relate stardust to sardine cans. Or to turquoise, or bald-faced lying miners, or old holes in the ground, or State Parks in New Mexico, for that matter.
We met in the parking lot of the Cerrillos Hills State Park, about half an hour’s drive south of Santa Fe, just off the famous “Turquoise Trail“, NM Highway 14, the picturesque back way to Albuquerque from Santa Fe.
That's Sarah Wood, our ranger and guide for the afternoon
Cerrillos Hills State Park is the newest park in New Mexico’s state park system, and its network of trails is dotted with helpful interpretive signs. The park also features a remarkable calendar of guided walks with naturalists and historians for the daylight hours, and, for those of you wanting to explore the night sky, a dedicated ranger-astronomer with telescopes hosting frequent evening excursions into the Universe.
One of the new signs at Cerrillos Hills State Park
Soon we were off on the Jane Calvin Sanchez trail, up a dusty path of crumbling shale, the once-murky, muddy floor of an ancient sea, now baking in the New Mexico sun.
On our way
Sharp eyes can find marine fossils from the Cretaceous Period in these fragments of shale. And while these rocks are baking in the sun these days, it wasn’t long ago – geologically speaking – that they were broiling in the heat of violent intrusions of scalding magma, forced up from the lower crust as New Mexico began to decompress after all that “building the Rocky Mountains” business. I mean, 34 million years ago is the new 20, don’t you agree?
The forcefulness of these intrusive episodes can be gauged by the completely upended strata – shouldered aside by wedges of magma – that you see on your drive down to the park, at New Mexico’s little “Garden of the Gods”, on Highway 14 just before you get to the village of Cerrillos:
Colorful tilted strata along the edge of the Cerrillos Hills intrusive complex
These magmas carried up the traces of gold, silver, lead, copper, and other elements which gave birth to the Cerrillos Hills and Ortiz Mountain mining districts.
All of this is stardust, you know. Giant stars, bloated with hydrogen and contaminated with the 91 heavier elements born via long-acting and complex thermonuclear reactions, carry the seeds of their own destruction by virtue of their massive size (And we’re talking big – Sarah showed us pictures). When these stars finally implode/explode under their own stupendous, self-inflicted gravity, they fling these elements as dust and gas out into the universe. And in the course of time, some of this material is gathered into new stars and planets, among which is one system with a modest star and a planet we call home.
Peering at the Ortiz Mountains in the glare of our own little star
To find out what this has to do with rusty sardine cans littering the New Mexico desert, you’re going to have to go on Sarah’s walk, yourself. There are all sorts of fascinating side-tracks related to these cans, such as these holes in the hills:
A mineshaft dug into bleached rock in the Cerrillos Hills
And the presence of this rather attractive mineral:
Fragments of turquoise found in these hills - and mined for centuries
Plus it’s pleasant just to be out here, under the vast – turquoise – skies:
A walk in the Cerrillos Hills
So have a look at that calendar of events and choose something that piques your interest. It’s all related, one way or another. It all hangs together. Sarah quoted John Muir: “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” Muir also made this happy observation: “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.”
And to that I say, Amen.
