Ruidoso, New Mexico--Off the Beaten Path

We decided that we wanted to stay near Ruidoso, New Mexico, even though we had already explored much of the most popular tourist areas. Plus, we found a great campground on the east side of town that would allow us to explore some things off the beaten path. It was just a 15-mile drive to the new campground, so we didn't even hook up the pickup. We got the rare picture of the motor home pulling into a campground without a tow vehicle attached.

This is the first-come-first-served Rob Jagger BLM Campground. We love BLM campsites, but they almost always have no hookups. Here we have electricity and water for only $10 per night. We also have a great view of the Capitan Mountains from our site.

The very friendly campground host explained that this is one of the few mountain ranges in North America that runs east to west. We could also see that in the middle of the Capitan Range is a low spot known as Capitan Gap.

We love signs that point out the names of the peaks in front of us. They range from the gap at 4,643 feet, to Summit Peak at 10,201 feet.

Our campground is just five miles from the little town of Capitan, New Mexico, with a grocery store and several restaurants. We also wanted to visit the Smokey Bear Historical Park, so we headed into town our first day. Even though their posted hours showed they were supposed to be open, they were not. So we could only look at the outdoor signs that explained that Capitan Gap is where Smokey the Bear was found as a badly burned cub after a fire burnt his home in 1950. The little cub was found clinging to a charred tree when fire fighters rescued him. He grew up to become the living symbol of fire prevention. We could peek over the fence to see where Smokey the Bear is buried within sight of the Capitan mountains.

Our campground is still in sight of the ski peaks with their smatterings of snow to our west. We also found miles of gravel forest service roads to explore off the beaten path.

We drove out to the Fort Stanton Cave, with forty miles of mapped passageways and a large population of bats. But we found that it was also closed to the public. Because of the spread of white nose syndrome among bat caves in North America, the chain link fence had four different locks on it to prevent people from going into the cave and spreading the virus.

No paved roads lead to the Capitan Mountains, but we tried to get as close as possible for a hike. Our four-wheel-drive pickup can take us down some of the gravel roads, but we finally had to turn around when Denisa started screaming. She does that when parts of the pickup (other than the tires) make contact with the gravel road.

So we parked and made a loop hike across the desert landscape, with the mountains still very far away in the background.

We assume that water once flowed in the bottom of these canyons. We found an old rickety aerial cart that went over the canyon. Even though Mark tried to ride it over the canyon, he finally joined Denisa in hiking down and back up, rather than riding across.

We didn't see another human being on our drive and hike off the beaten path. But we did find some surprised birds that weren't used to having company. Many of them flew before we got close enough for a good picture.

But this meadow lark posed for a picture . . .

as did this blue mountain jay.

Our friendly campground host stopped by to check on us at our camp site, and told us that the little grocery store in Capitan had a first-rate meat market. He spends his winter here, eating whatever meat they have on sale each week. We tried his strategy, and found these thick-cut sirloin steaks that Mark grilled up. At just $3.99 per pound, that will keep us fed for a week!

We really love finding these comfortable first-come-first-served government camp sites off the beaten path. In April it was uncrowded, and the birds loved to pose for us on the fence beside our rig.

We visited with our camping neighbors, and enjoyed the wide view of the clouds and landscape around us.

The campground host pointed out that the only time that this large campground gets busy is during the scheduled horse-back trail rides. The miles of gravel roads and trails around Rob Jagger Campground make for great mountain bike and equestrian rides. For us, it was just a great respite off the beaten path near Ruidoso, New Mexico.

Can we hike only using a map?

We have been hiking all over North America for the last eight and a half years, so we feel like we are some pretty experienced hikers. But some times we forget how much we depend on technology to find our way on some remote trails. This morning we left early, and completely forgot to download the hike directions for a trail in Lincoln National Forest. Once we got to the trail head, we didn't have any phone signal to download the information. Can we hike old school--only using a map?

Denisa had snapped a picture of the trail system that starts at the Argentina and Bonito Trailhead. Our plan was to take a loop hike that started at trail #36, continued on to trail #37, veering onto trail #25 across to catch trail #39. That's supposed to be around six miles. But if we miss any of those turns, we could have a very much longer hike, and end up lost in the forest. If we had downloaded the Alltrails version of this loop, it would alert us if we missed a turn. Or if the trail got faint, we could always check our progress to see if we were heading the right direction. Or sometimes, we have used the Alltrails app to connect different trails that we didn't even know about. But today we have only a picture of some trail numbers, and we won't have that GPS dot on the screen that tells us exactly where we are on that trail. We're a little concerned about our abilities to not get lost out here.

The other way that Alltrails helps is to show the topography and water crossings. Because of all the snow melting out of the mountains from this winter's generous snow cover, the little creek on this hike was swollen. A trickle that usually only requires a step across, now is 15-feet across. No bridges are needed most of the year, so we struggled to find enough rocks and logs to form a footpath across. We made a couple extra water crossings because we got on the wrong trail and didn't have Alltrails to keep us on the right path.

We ended up with 14 creek crossings before the day was over! While Mark dances across on the least amount of support, getting Denisa across that much water isn't always pretty.

We certainly didn't want to fall in and get our feet wet this early in the day. It's miserable hiking all day in wet boots, and this water was ice cold. You can see the icicles hanging from the log near the water because it was icy cold.

Other parts of the trail were still covered by snow. That's another time when it would be nice to have Alltrail's guidance because we couldn't even see the trail.

We got to a major trail intersection, and were glad to see a sign with the many different trails that split off in different directions. We need that guidance today.

The only problem was that the sign was laying on the ground, and we had no idea which way it was pointing for those different trails. We had to use our best map skills to make a decision, and we hoped it was the right one.

The trail turned upward, and we started seeing snowy mountain peaks about the time we stopped for lunch. This was our view for our picnic meal.

At this higher elevation, we suddenly had a phone signal. It was good enough to get a face-time call from our grandchildren! What a beautiful place to be able to stay in touch with loved ones!

This little falcon was interested in our conversation, as it sat in the dead tree beside us and listened.

Even without technology to guide us, we wandered into another of God's wonders today!

The trail skirted around the base of Argentina Peak, so we had to scramble up the last steep slope to get the views from the top. From here we saw other peaks in Lincoln National Forest that would make good hiking destinations.

As we started our descent, we could look to the west to see a wide band of black in the valley where Mark was pointing. While we saw the white sands from view-points several days ago, we can see the black lava fields this day.

That sea of black lava is Valley of Fires BLM Recreation Area that we will visit in a few days.

Now we just hope we are on the correct trail through the mountains to complete the loop back to our pickup. 

Again we found some wooden signs that gave us some assistance in navigating our way. That's when we learned that during the little while that we had a good phone signal at the top of Argentina Peak, our Alltrails app had finished downloading our route. We no longer had to depend on just using a map to get us back! Whew!

While we didn't see any wildlife on this hike, we did see evidence that feral pigs were in the area. This hog trap was open and ready to relocate these invasive nuisances.

While we counted the number of water crossings on this hike at 14, we wished we would have counted the number of fallen log crossings we made. 

Over and over we found fresh trees that had recently fallen over the trail, slowing our progress. While we only saw a handful of people on the trail today, two of them were working to clear those trees off the trail. The two guys were part of the New Mexico Conservation Corp camped in the national forest below us. They were training new corp members, and were camped in this area a couple days ago when the awful winds kept us inside the motor home all day. From their camp site they could hear trees falling from the strong winds all over the forest.

The two guys we met going up the trail were looking for a tool that the team had left behind. Knowing that information, we weren't surprised to find this heavy metal hammer along the trail, past the place that they had already walked.

We were planning to return it to their campground, but we met up with them again on the trail. They were glad to see that hammer!

By the time we got back to the trail head, we had hiked 6.2 miles, and gained 1,280 feet in elevation. We're pretty proud that we hiked over half of that using our own map skills, and not just depending on technology to guide us. This trail head was at the very end of the red road on the map below. We drove it to get to the hike, but we were also looking for places to camp in the motor home.

We were driving the pickup this day, looking for national forest roads that were smooth enough and wide enough for the motor home. It really was a lovely area with healthy trees and some great boondocking sites that were open to the public.

We took pictures as we explored, and this was one of our favorite spots. It was a Thursday, and RVs were already sifting into the national forest to secure places for the weekend.

While it looked like we could have lots of neighbors by the weekend, we also liked that some of our neighbors were wild horses.

In the end, we decided that we had hiked the best trail in the area, so we really didn't need to drive the motor home the 18 miles out of the way on the forest service roads to boondock for just a night or two. We've changed our plans again, like we often do. But we had fun exploring this section of the Lincoln National Forest west of Ruidoso, New Mexico. We also can answer the question, "Can we hike only using a map?" with a shaky "Yes"--(at least half-way until we can download the trail app at the top of the mountain).

Welcome to Ruidoso, New Mexico

Yesterday was a very windy day with visibility nearing zero because of all the white sand in the air in Alamogordo. So we were glad to wake up to blue skies and calm winds. After our unplanned trip to the valley, we were once again heading into the central New Mexico mountains. We were excited to see the snow-covered Sierra Blanca Mountains framed by the pine trees as we approached Ruidoso.

We found that the city of Ruidoso is an expensive place to camp, even in the off-season. So we booked a two-night stay at "On the River" Campground with plans to explore the area for some boondocking possibilities. Our little campground was almost deserted in April, but we're sure that it is very popular in the summer when campers will love the spots on the river.

We first explored the tourist attractions of Ruidoso. We were told that the streets will be busy and all the stores crowded once the quarter horse racing season begins on Memorial Day. In the off-season, everything is quiet and driving and parking are easy. The race track was deserted, but we stopped in at the casino for $20 in free play.

The other attraction is the Inn of the Mountain Gods, with Sierra Blanca Peak looking over its backyard. Again, we stopped only long enough to use up another $20 in free play at the casino in this no-smoking facility. After our two casino stops, we came out $20 richer. If we had used our own $40, we would have been losers. But since it was all won on free play cash, we felt like winners.

Our next stop was an in-town stop that felt very much like we were in the wilderness. Grindstone Lake park has an impressive trail system that allows hikers to get exercise on a maze of trails that can be woven together to make loops.

Close to the entrance of the park, we stopped when we saw a herd of wild horses.

While the herd included a nice group of adults, Denisa seems to always take pictures of the foals. This little one still had shaky legs, and made a couple trips around the mare before figuring out where to get dinner.

We had to chuckle at the graphic at the start of the trail system. When the snow is melting off the trails, it is replaced by mud. The mud-meter points to the level of mud on the trails. We were glad that the mud was drying up, so we took one of the loops and hiked our way down to Grinder Lake.

This interesting spring bloom was one of the brightest whitest wildflowers we had seen.

The lake was very still, and looked like a nice place to kayak. But it was chilly and getting late on our first day in Ruidoso. So we left the kayak in the pickup and admired the glass-like water from the shore.

We also admired the lake wildlife. We watched as this osprey landed on a tree close to Lake Grinder's shore.

He posed for a photo as he scanned the water and the shore-line with those keen eyes that can see through water. We assumed that he would swoop down to do some fishing, but we were a little surprised to see what he caught.

The picture is blurry and taken from quite a distance, but that osprey swooped down to catch a snake. We watched that wriggling snake trying to free itself from those talons as it experienced flying for the first time.

Another herd of wild horses came down to the water's edge for evening drinks while we were watching.

It must be spring, because we saw more foals in this group that paraded down the sidewalk to the lake.

These wild horses seem to be well-fed on the native grasses.

While they are still wild, they are used to people around the lake. This one walked right towards Denisa and her camera until veering off towards the water.

While she looked healthy, this wild horse wears the mud and has a tangled tail and mane without the care given by a horse owner. The mud-meter is still high in some of the areas where this herd has been hanging out.

We enjoyed our first day of driving around this small city, and saw some of the more famous parts of town. We feel welcomed to Ruidoso, New Mexico.