‘Twas a cloudy, windy day in New Mexico. None the less, the dauntless duo set off to hike a new trail, Palomas Peak. Not to disappoint us, the dreary day on the mountain brought — a steady fall of snow throughout the hike.
The Hike
The trail, starting from the parking lot for the Sandia Man Cave at about 7100 feet elevation, the well traveled trail leads up a canyon for about a mile, the slope steady but never strenuous. The trail then levels out at about 7900 feet; we took the trail to about 1.7 miles where we took our break, just before the trail turns south on the edge of a quite steep down-slope.
Throughout, the trail passes through New Mexico woods: juniper, pinon and a few ponderosa pines, some white fir, and many smaller “shrubs” that I can’t name. This day we didn’t have an views, weather having the area “socked in”, but we could see enough to think that views in all directions will be spectacular. We’ll return in coming weeks; this trail will be one for the summer months.
Statistics
Total Distance: 3.38 miles Elevation: start 7,049 ft, maximum 7,970 ft, minimum 7,049 ft Gross gain: 921 ft. Aggregate ascending 1,154 ft, descending 1,186 ft Maximum slope: 40% ascending, 45% descending, 11.6% average Duration: 2:54
This hike is an old standby for Jay and me, having made this loop a few times in the past.
The Hike
Del Agua Piedra Hike.Jay.2016-04-24
The weather was perfect – sunny, cool, no wind ’til late in the hike. There was a nice flow of water along the bottom of the canyon, such nice sounds to accompany our hike. Spring is in the offing – cottonwoods are leafed out, grass along the bottom of the canyon is vibrant, and flowers are a’bloom. The GoogleEarth screenshot above, a view to the south, gives you an idea of the location of these trails – on the north end of the Sandia Mountains. The Northeast Heights of Albuquerque are in view over the top of Rincon Ridge. And the green ‘meander’ beyond Albuquerque is the Rio Grande River. Beyond the Sandias, the horizon in the center of the view, are the Manzano Mountains. Our track, the yellow line, was a counter-clockwise loop: up the Del Agua trail then down the north end of the Piedra Lisa trail.
A bit of explanation about the bar across the bottom of the screenshot above. The red line (and pink area) depicts the elevation of our track, left to right/start to finish. The jagged blue line depicts our speed in miles per hour. (As you can see we kept up a steady and rapid pace during the last quarter of the hike – keeping up with Jay gave me a strenuous workout.)
Statistics
Total Distance: 4.3 miles Elevation: start 5,949 ft, maximum 7,035 ft, minimum 5,949 ft Gross gain: 1,086 ft. Aggregate ascending 1,509 ft, descending 1,509ft Maximum slope: 51% ascending, 43% descending, 11.7% average Duration: 2:53
If you haven’t explored these hiking tracks with Google Earth, I urge you to try it. With the virtual 3-dimensional presentation, achieved by panning and tilting the view, you can get a much better idea of the hikes and terrain than you can get from the screenshot above. For some ideas, check out Using Google Earth Track Files.
Today Jay and I explored new territory in the Placitas area. We started with a track from an ASCHG hike, “Placitas Knobs“. But a short distance into the hike, Jay recalled his visit to the area some years ago so we followed his lead (with some help using trail tracks on my PN-60 and on the Smartphone with the Maverick App and MapQuest maps).
The Hike
Track of Placitas Knobs hike, 04/16/2016, on GoogleEarth image.
Weather was cool and cloudy with snow showers high above us on North Sandia. The trails were well traveled, wide but often rocky. Slopes were not terribly steep so this was an easy hike. From the GoogleEarth image above you can see that we circumnavigated a good sized hill, often with great views overlooking Placitas, across the Rio Grande valley to Bernalillo and the Jemez mountains, and beyond. Even ‘tho it was not as long as many of our hikes, none the less we paused for a coffee/picker-upper break before heading towards the car.
Statistics
Total Distance: 3.1 miles Elevation: start ft, maximum 6,458 ft, minimum 5,882 ft Gross gain: 751 ft. Aggregate ascending 753 ft, descending 753 ft Maximum slope: 23% ascending, 30% descending, % average Duration: 2:36
If you haven’t explored these hiking tracks with Google Earth, I urge you to try it. With the virtual 3-dimensional presentation, achieved by panning and tilting the view, you can get a much better idea of the hikes and terrain than you can get from the screenshot above. For some ideas, check out Using Google Earth Track Files.
We’ve looked “longingly” at the Crest of Montezuma as we’ve driven from Placitas to the east side of the Sandia Mountains, thinking – there must be some hiking there. This winter I came across a report, “Bushwacking up and down the north slope of the Crest of Montezuma” which showed a route we could follow (a site report on Trimble that has disappeared from the Internet). I transcribed the GPS track into files for my GPS tools, and off we went. Oh, boy.
(Refer to the GoogleEarth printout above to track these instructions; our hike is a yellow line, the turquoise line is taken from a report, “Bushwacking ..”.)
The Drive In
To get to our starting point, we drove through the village of Placitas, and where the road takes the 90 degree turn to the south and the back side of the Sandia Mountains, we turned left onto Diamond Tail Road. About 2/3 of a mile down the Road, we parked just off of Diamond Tail Road, close to the entrance gate for Diamond Tail Estates.
The Hike
Track of Crest of Montezuma hike, 02/28/2016, on GoogleEarth image.
Note: There are -no trails-, this is entirely bushwhacking through (and around) juniper, cholla, occasional pinon pine, and of course rock outcroppings.
From parking it was easy hiking over the hill, down into the ravine (1/3 mile), following the ravine to the southeast (.55 miles), then a relatively easy grade on the dogleg generally southwest then southeast.
Then the going became difficult; the ascent up that ridge to the Crest is very steep. From my GPS record of our track, the GoogleEarth Profile measured a maximum slop of 51.7% (that is about 21 degrees from horizontal). This is by far the steepest grade we have yet hiked.
Jay climbed well ahead of me, thinking all the time he was just a few steps from the top.
I lagged behind, carrying our victuals in a 25# pack. That weight on my back challenged my balance, so I was almost ‘hugging’ the ground (sloping up in front of me) and using everything growing (except cholla and prickly pear) to pull myself up and maintain balance.
Once up on top, the hike along the ridge was easy (certainly by comparison). We looked down a -very- steep slope to the southwest into Las Huertas Creek and Canyon, and beyond the east face of the Sandia Mountains. The views to the north were spectacular, as are so many in the Sandias. As is our custom, we set up a ‘micro camp’ at the top to enjoy hot coffee (augmented with a bit of Makers Mark) and trail mix.
Again following our predecessor’s track, we headed down a different ridge which was much easier than the ridge we climbed – should we return for another visit, we will go up by this route. Along the way we came across a what appeared to be a vertical mine shaft, maybe 15 feet deep. This raised images of having found the long-rumored Montezuma Mine (read accounts of the story here and here), but so many people have searched for their riches that it is unlikely that we found it.
Statistics
Total Distance: 2.93 miles Elevation: start ft, maximum ft, minimum ft Gross gain: 766 ft. Aggregate ascending ft, descending ft Maximum slope: 52% ascending, 35% descending, % average Duration: 4:17
I urge you to explore our hiking tracks with Google Earth. With the virtual 3-dimensional presentation, achieved by panning and tilting the view, you can get a much better idea of the hikes and terrain than you can get from the 2-dimensional screenshot above. For assistance: Using Google Earth Track Files.
