After returning from the loop the visitor's center was open so I went in and perused their exhibits and then asked about trails. The lady working there was very helpful and even gave me information about Carlsbad Caverns which was my next stop. She recommended 2 hikes to me: Smith's Springs and McKittrick Canyon.
The trail to Smith's Springs starts at the Frijole Ranch. This is an old homestead that is maintained by the Park Service and has several buildings and a spring on-site. The house is actually quite large for the time and there were several exhibits inside that were interesting. In the back of the home they have a small orchard, planted by the boy scouts, with heirloom fruit varieties. The irrigation channel still in use today was built in the 1800's and is a simple stone lined causeway.
The trail to the springs goes in a loop and had a guide with a few stops in it. The first part of the hike is open desert and then goes into a wash that is lined with trees. One of the prettiest is the Texas Madrone which has a beautiful bark and pretty flowers in the spring. As you head up the wash you encounter Smith's Springs which bubbles quietly under a shaded outcropping of rock (making it hard to take good pictures). I figured out when I got to the springs that I had actually gone backwards on the trail (oops). The trail back is covered at first then gets back into the high desert and wraps around to Manzanita springs which looks like a small pond in the middle of the desert. There were fish in the water and a number of birds flying by including a golden eagle. As I was wandering around the pond I startled a deer who ran off into the trees, upsetting the eagle who talk off to parts unknown. Back at the ranch house one of the volunteers wanted to talk to me about the Prius. It's quite the conversation starter!
By this point it was 11:15'ish and getting hot so I debated heading on to the next trail (which was 7 miles round trip) but figured, what the hey, you're only here once :) The road to the canyon visitor center is mostly unpaved and there is absolutely no shade in the parking lot. At this point I was starting to freak out about the meat Wade gave me because I had just put a bag of ice in there as a stop-gap measure and every time I got into the car it was super hot. I decided to gamble it and figured it was silly to plan a trip around food that might spoil. The water at the visitor's center was ice cold so I lapped it up and filled up my camelbak and headed out. The first part of the trail is open desert and you cross a couple of dry stream beds. I passed the older couple I had talked to the night before over one of these stream beds. Surprisingly there are a few places where you cross spring-fed 'rivers' that carry water year-round though it's only a couple of inches deep and the signs everywhere remind you not to get into it in case you disturb the fragile ecosystem. The trail winds its way in and out of trees and dry stream beds until you get to Pratt Cabin.
Until recently you could get water and use a restroom there but they still have power lines running to the property and some electric fans and heater inside the cabin itself. When I got there nobody else was around but while I was trying to find a way into the cabin I heard someone inside and when I walked around the cabin I found a park ranger had opened it and I got to go inside. The cabin is unremarkable to me except for its location. It's a nice size and very rustic and would probably be a fun place to stay.
The next landmark on the trail is the 'grotto' which looked pretty neat and sort of unique in the pictures so I hoofed it that way. I think that somehow my Garmin got screwed up while I was in the house because I had magically gone a mile further than I thought I had when I'd looked at it earlier. The trail to the grotto was mostly shaded and you could tell the vegetation and micro-climate had changed. The canyon is surrounded by cliffs that reminded me of Peru and India. Perhaps that is because they are all limestone based? I don't really see cliffs like that here in Utah so I'm not sure. There were a lot more pines and higher altitude plants there that had survived from the last ice age by going higher up on the mountain. The grotto was really quite small but visually interesting. There was a collection of stalagtites and stalagmites jutting out of the side of the mountain.
There were a large number of stone picnic tables and benches so I rested my weary legs and had a bite to eat there. I could imagine that during the busy times (Spring/Fall) that this area would be packed with people and much harder to navigate. On the advice of the ranger at the cabin I peaked into the creek close by to see if there were any fish in there and in fact there were. Don't ask me how they got up there because the ranger didn't know either :)
The hike back went by pretty quickly as I was just ready to sit in the car for a bit. In the end my gps said I had gone 7.25 miles which made for a total of 10 for the day so far and I still had the Carlsbad Caverns to do!
It's a short drive from one park to the other and it passed by quickly. Right now the visitor's center is undergoing major reconstruction so everything is housed in temporary 'trailers'. I can only imagine how much the center is costing since they have things like copper rain chains that I know cost a couple of hundred dollars a piece. You can enter the cave through the natural entrance which is a steep paved trail that takes you 700 feet underneath the surface or you can take the elevators. Either of these are free with park admission (park pass to the rescue again) which was a nice deviation from Wind Cave where there isn't any entrance fee but you have to pay to see any of the caves. I picked up the self-guided tour stick that plays audio about the various areas in the cavern. Randy Travis was trying to hawk some cd he'd made in the caves at the beginning and then never came back. Being the adventurous type I chose to take the Natural trail and would recommend it to anyone whose knees can take the beating. After getting a quick rules talk from a ranger you head down to an amphitheater where you can watch the bats fly out at dusk if you are there in the evenings. The caves are a major summering destination for a large colony of mexican free-tail bats and they used to mine guano out of the caves. From the amphitheater the entrance is visible and several swallows have built nests on the ceiling of the cave opening so it's quite a sight.
Right away the trail is quite steep as you descend into near darkness. The first explorers of the cave used a guano bucket to get in and out. An Indian family came in right behind me and an old man and woman left the group and wandered ahead. At some point the old lady had too much gas and decided to stop and fart. Of course, in a cave, sounds like that are magnified and I had to hold back a snicker. I don't think I know of any culture that enjoys sharing bodily functions with other whether they are gassing out or going to the bathroom on the street :) There are a number of neat formations that you have to see for yourself. I brought the tripod with me and tried to take some long exposure shots but most of them came out blurry.
At the end of the natural trail is a large complex they've built into the cave. I have mixed feelings about this...it's nice to have bathrooms down there but they've got gift shops and restaurants down there as well. It seems a little weird to have so much development inside of a cave but I guess it makes it accessible to more people. If you want a rustic experience this is not the cave for you but having paved trails and lighting makes it a lot nicer. You can take tours that go into undeveloped parts of the cave but I am cheap so I just stuck with the freebies :)
The second 'cave' that you can explore on your own is called the 'big room'. It's quite literally a large room in the cave with a number of interesting features. There was a group that obviously lived out in the country somewhere that I kept intersecting with along the trail. At one point the dude with the cowboy hat let out a loud fart. Why do people fart in caves? It's not like you can blame that on anything else. Oh well, only Indians and Rednecks :) By this time I was starting to get a little weary of hiking and walking so I cruised through the room and then out of the cavern via the elevators. These things were pretty cool as they had windows in them so you could see the limestone walls as you went up. Back on the surface I scoured the gift shop for a pin or a shot glass but found nothing so I grabbed some postcards in case my pictures didn't turn out. I figure it's always a good idea to get some professional photos when visit a cave or anyplace that is dark as it's much more difficult to get good pictures.
By now I'd been in the caves for 2.5 hours and the car was roasting. It's cool enough in the cavern to want a jacket or something long sleeved but when you get back on the surface you take that off pronto. Since I wanted to go to White Sands the next day I programmed Alamogordo into the GPS and headed off. The drive from Carlsbad (no dry ice there either :( ) to Alamogordo is pretty as it gets into the mountains and then makes a 4000 foot descent into the city. I'm pretty sure I've travelled this road with Elaine in the past as I remember being freaked out about how steep and narrow it was.
In Alamogordo there was some VFW convention so I had to hunt around for a motel room. I ended up at a motel 6 for 36.99 a night! Score. Unfortunately I got there so late that all of the restaurants were closed. After harassing the girl working at the front desk (Becky) and not being able to find anywhere that was open she offered to cook me something at her house so I had mac and cheese and green beans for dinner. We watched the sequel to Underworld which wasn't very good but had some cool action scenes. I was totally passing out during the movie though so I headed back to the hotel and sacked out.
Guadalupe Mountain Pics
Carlsbad Caverns
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