Good Riddance New Mexico
In the Covid-infused, whirlwind road trip from San Diego, a night in a flashy Vegas hotel, time in Salt Lake with my family, nightmare airport security, Molly’s near-debilitating airsickness, to staring out the window of our rented truck at the vast, bleak, drought-stricken landscape of southern New Mexico, the reality of fending for myself out there finally began to sink in. I watched the little arrow on GAIA GPS slowly approach my starting point as Molly drove the empty two-lane highway. It was emotionally overwhelming and surreal when we got to a dirt crossroad with no discernible significance other than a cattle gate, and I would venture off into nothingness and Molly would get back in the truck and drive back to El Paso for her flight home.
Molly was as nervous as I was when I had to approach the herd of 100 cattle territorially guarding a mud puddle that was likely their only water, one of their relatives dead lying next to it, no doubt contaminating it. Ten miles later I crossed paths with a guy from Mexico, decked out head-to-toe in Broncos gear, trying to convince me he was from Denver and was just out for a bike ride through the desert and cow pasture when his bike broke down. I gave him some water and the bad news that he was still ten miles from the nearest highway and another 30 miles from the nearest town which had no services. A few miles down the road I found his bike, and a few miles after that I finally reached “Crazy Cook,” the official Southern Terminus of the Continental Divide Trail.
Day 2 started with about half a liter of water that was supposed to get me seven miles to a solar well, about half the water I would normally carry for that distance. Two hours after starting I drank my last drop, thinking I was less than an hour from the well. An hour later, finding no well, I checked Avenza GPS and saw that I’d been off the trail for over an hour. I found my way back to the trail, found a sign that had blown down, and proceeded toward the well. But I couldn’t see anything where I expected the well to be, so I kept walking, and walking, and walking until I was out of the canyon. I checked Avenza again and I was two miles past the well. Desperate, worried, and a little nervous, I turned back up the canyon, retracing my steps toward the well.
My mouth and throat were drying up fast, it was now after 1:00pm and I hadn’t had water since before 10:00am. I felt my muscles cramping, I began to feel nauseated and like I needed to stop every few steps to keep from passing out. My Garmin InReach hung from my shoulder strap and I began contemplating at what point I should send out an SOS signal. If I waited too long, I could lose consciousness and die. If I called too soon I’d be embarrassed by an unnecessary rescue. If I couldn’t find the well on my third attempt, I decided, I’d have no choice but to call a rescue.
Angling up from the trail in a direction I would’ve had to turn around to see before, there was a dirt road, and off in the distance a defunct windmill next to a water tank and a solar panel. I virtually crawled to it, stopping every few steps. The exertion of pumping water was enough to send my head spinning. I lay down on the ground in the shade of the tank for hours, sipping water when I could, yellow jackets buzzing all around, drinking the same water, falling in, drowning. Finally, I was hydrated enough to pick myself up and keep going.
In the days that followed the “trail” was completely absent through foothill sage, cactus, and xeric brush, marked only by occasional wood posts set in piles of rocks, or miles and miles of indiscernible cow pasture, no signs, no trail, no scenery, no variation, like walking across an endless sea of dried mud hoof-prints and cow shit. Between the ruins left by hard-scrabble people who gave up on the bitter experiment of eking a life out of the desert, so many decades later the only life-giving water was muddy, cow-contaminated puddles, or old tractor tires repurposed as cow troughs. Finally, a green-glazed rock held its own tiny ecosystem of life in a puddle left by a monsoon from the previous year. There might have been three liters total in the teeming little oasis. Since my filter was broken, I dismantled it and used the hose to siphon about one liter, treating it with Aquatabs.
Carcasses, skeletons, skulls, and bones dotted the route. Prince was in his tent in the middle of the day by highway 81, but he popped out when he heard me accessing the water cache. His friend Arrow had been evacuated by Border Patrol and hospitalized for kidney failure due to severe dehydration. Prince was waiting there for Arrow after his release from the hospital. The next day Weanie Beanie was in his tent by highway 9, but he popped out when he heard me approach. His friend Arrow had been evacuated by Border Patrol and hospitalized for kidney failure due to severe dehydration. Weanie Beanie was waiting there for his friends Prince and Arrow after Arrow’s release from the hospital. About a week later I met a guy in Silver City who had been evacuated by Border Patrol and hospitalized for kidney failure due to severe dehydration. His name was Arrow and he had been waiting there for his friends Prince and Weanie Beanie since his release from the hospital.
Horse, Hamilton, Babs, Mantis, El Dorado, Beats, Honey Pot, and Trail Daddy were also in Silver City. So was Money Mustache. Horse and Hami I’d met slipping under a barbed wire fence to hike across another endless cow pasture. Babs passed me early in the morning as I was packing up. Mantis I knew from the PCT in 2018. El Dorado and Beats I’d met chilling in some shade. Honey Pot and Trail Daddy, well, what can I say about them? Mustache liked quesadillas and carrying more gear than necessary.
Descending into the Gila Wilderness was like going to another planet. A deep, narrow canyon with red, sandstone walls and a gentle green river winding through it, supporting a whole world of wildlife. Black bears, turkeys, wolves, coyotes, ducks, all variety fo birds, frogs, snakes, fish, javelinas, the list goes on. Hardly ten minutes would pass between river crossings for days. My blistered, battered feet lavished in the constant immersion in cool water. Jordan hot springs offered one of the most memorable breaks in the day with its crystal clear pools and not another soul to share it with.
Quick resupply at the roadside convenience store Doc Campbells with WiFi bandwidth being hogged by hipster posers wearing hiking clothes so they could drive around in their decked out F250. I tried to FaceTime Molly and was horrified to see my own sunburned, weathered face looking back at me. The WiFi was a fail and the best I got was Molly’s gorgeous face freeze-framed and a few seconds of her voice in fragmented sentences.
Up out of the Gila and into the wind-blasted hell of New Mexico’s waterless, rolling prairie. Water the color of chocolate milk from man-made Snow Lake. A huge cow trough/koi pond with two bulls eying me dispassionately. Climbing toward the fire lookout, a jeep pulled over on the bumpy dirt road to warn me about snow in the forecast. “Uh-oh,” I thought. In high gear I hustled to the summit and down the other side. A windy, snowy 18-mile walk into Pie Town the next morning.
Jefferson, the 71-year-old host and caretaker of the Toaster House welcomed me to the rustic, filthy, magic of the donation-based hiker house. Imagine an old cabin inhabited by a fraternity of constantly rotating upper classmen who are mature enough to skip the hazing shenanigans, but dedicated enough to the ideals of the frat to prioritize that over care for the house itself. The Toaster House has a life of its own that at first can be horrifyingly off-putting, but slowly soothes you into acquiescence to the towel-less showers, the stack of stained mattresses, the piles of used dishes, the pantry full of expired hiker food, and the friendly, eccentric, accepting, intriguing, ruggedly honest Jefferson. Pie Town. It lives up to its name.
Walking roads, taking alternate routes and scrambling through brush, down steep slopes. I trespassed a barbed wire fence onto private property to access an overflowing cow trough. That water got me through the miles of lava flows that punished me with shin splints and blisters so painful they brought me to an immediate halt.
Then it was Grants. A spread-out city built around uranium mining and held together by meth and poverty. It looked like an old commercial chicken house, or a fertilizer factory, but it was my motel. At around midnight the loud, repeated thuds of physical violence jolted me out of a deep sleep. I waited. It worsened. “Please stop,” I heard a female voice plead. I called 911. A few minutes later they were leading the guy away in hand-cuffs. Only nervous, uneasy sleep followed.
Two-Feathers drove me around town in the free city shuttle and gave me a quick synopsis of each passenger just before they boarded the bus. He showed me his man-cave of carefully curated music paraphernalia and blessed me with an owl feather for protection and resilience.
Mt. Taylor was the highest elevation yet at 11,300 ft. There was some snow before dropping down to a deep gorge, then up the other side to a mesa rim. Sun, snow, sun, rain, snow, sun. Finally, Cuba for a quick resupply and onward to San Pedro Peaks, where there was not only substantial snow on the ground, but snow blasting out of the sky. Back to lower elevation, across the Chama River and up to Mesa de las Viejas before dropping down to highway 84 where Molly would pick me up.
Three days of utter bliss with Molly in an Adobe Airbnb crafted to fit into the desert landscape. It was surreal to be away from her for a month and out on the trail in perpetual discomfort, and then be right there with her, able to hold her and kiss her. To have amazing food and just relax with my favorite person in the world. The dream was short-lived and soon Molly was once again dropping me off on the side of a highway.
Each of the next few days got progressively worse. From deep mud that stuck to my shoes and trekking poles and offered no traction, to howling winds, and abject loneliness, to snow, snow, and more snow. The ski gear Molly brought helped, but it was still an incredible, time-consuming slog. When there wasn’t snow, there was mud. When there was snow, the trail was impossible to follow. I wandered around dense forest in skis, got tangled in bushes, fell in the snow, tore my pants, lost a shoe, hiked over 50 miles in ski boots, fell all the way down in mud, had a few minutes of downhill skiing lines through trees, and finally reached the Colorado border. Good riddance, New Mexico.
An amazing group of people agreed to give me a ride into town, took me to the store, the bar, bought me a beer, and invited me to stay at their cabin for the night. It was a great reset before venturing into the San Juan’s and the rest of Colorado.
