NM #34--Amtrak to New Mexico, Part 2: Valle Grande Hike

Page Two:  Valle Grande Hike (8 Photos)

 We have a book called "Albuquerque: 60 Hikes Within 60 miles."  It cheats sometimes, as today's hike was an 80 mile drive.  Anyway, it was a drive up the Jemez Valley deep into the Jemez Mtns.  This was our highest hike of the week, and it was chilly when a breeze was blowing.  The book was written in 2007, so it is a little out of date.  In 2011 a devastating forest fire struck the area, the largest recorded in NM at that time.  At its peak it was burning an acre of forest every 2 seconds.  So, much of our walk was in a forest cemetery, though the views out to Valle Grande were spectacular.

          After the hike we stopped in at a saloon in Jemez Springs as we drove back down into the valley.  All pub stops have been recorded on the pub page, the final one of this set.

View from our hotel towards the Sandia Mtns.

 Beginning the climb up into the Jemez Mountains from the desert.

We are now way up there, deep in the pine forest.  Our little car was not the greatest for
mountain driving, and at times I felt quite sorry for it.  However, it was roomy and comfortable.

Our trail was called Coyote Call Trail, and is also a marked snowshoe trail in winter.  Valle Grande spreads out below us, only a small part of Valles Caldera, a vast volcanic area.  Behind us was part of the enormous area of fire damage.

 Once a glorious hike among high altitude pines, sadly it no longer is.

 Deb was fully at home up here.  We both huffed and puffed as we climbed to over 9100' on our first day, not a recommended thing to do.  A few trees survived the fire, somehow.

 That night we had dinner at Thai Vegan!  I ordered the Pad Thai, left, while Deb had a Stir Fry.  It was as good as it looks!  We also had their own mix of ginger tea, along with green tea coconut ice cream!  This was my order...

...and Deb's.

To be continued...