Trip to Taos
We planned to camp in Chaco Canyon under October’s new moon, but instead we went to Taos for a few days. A former hurricane parked over the southwest a few weeks ago dumping record-breaking rain over, among other places, Chaco Canyon. The better road that approaches Chaco from the north was entirely washed out about four miles from the park. It will take months to repair. The southern road is 21 miles of scramble on a good day. After the storm the road has deep mud and, in places, standing water obscuring bumper-scraping boulders. We had rented a Jeep for the trip, but the warnings were sufficiently discouraging that we canceled our camping reservations. A cat sitter was still traveling to Santa Fe to care for Jackpot and Mocha, and so we made plans to go to Taos for the forest and fall color.
We stayed in a comfortable “chalet” nestled in trees of various hues. Our first full day, we drove into the Taos ski valley, following highway 150 all the way to its end and then continuing through a parking lot and up two switchbacks with roads of deteriorating quality, to a poorly signposted municipal park. Clouds hung over the valley, dimming the brilliance of the golden leaves but deepening the contrast between Aspen and evergreen. We parked just on the other side of a red metal gate that blocked the road and hiked into the park that was basically a road decommissioned by successive avalanches. The wide, rocky path offered good views of ski runs, the ski village at the base, the rocky tops of mountains, and colorful mountainsides. Occasionally a patch of sunshine would float overhead briefly spotlighting golden and bright orange leaves, but mostly it was cloudy and windy. After our hike we drove home for lunch and spent the afternoon beside the firepit reading our books. For the evening we moved indoors to play Terraforming Mars, while Monday Night Football occupied the TV.
Our second full day in Taos started slowly. We slept in and breakfasted at home. At eleven, our counter-clockwise drive around the Enchanted Circle began. Last year at this time, we drove it clockwise. Either way the scenery is spectacular. The road curved through the valley and when we changed elevation the curves tightened into switchbacks, offering thrilling views of golden Aspen, vibrant sumac, and all the hues in between. We stopped to take a photo at the Elliot Barker trailhead, where a couple of birders were tracking a Pygmy Nuthatch.
Beyond this quick stop, the valley opened wide for a bit as we travelled north, before the road turned west and crossed back into the mountains. As we passed through Red River, a place with ample candy shops and recreational vehicle rentals, I noted that the Texas license plates at least equaled the number of New Mexico plates. About 10 minutes outside of Questa, our lunch destination on the original itinerary, we decided to skip lunch as neither of us was hungry and instead stopped at a convenience store for just-in-case snacks. Soon we were on our way to Rio Grande Gorge Bridge and West Rim Trail.
West Rim Trail is a nice flat path along the rim of the gorge offering a good view of the bridge, rugged cliffs, and (far below) the Rio Grande. After walking about three miles back and forth along the rim admiring the view, we were left with about a hour and a half to kill before our Earthships tour. So, we drove into Taos for a beer and a snack.
Earthships are off-grid, self-sustaining homes out on the plains west of Taos. Over the years they have tried and refined various designs. An early innovation involved using used tires packed with dirt to form thick walls. The most recent iterations harvest rainwater into a cistern buried in a berm on the north side of the home. The southside is all solar panels and windows for passive heating and greenhouse. An interior glass wall separates the greenhouse from the living space and just inside the living area there is a roof transom window to allow heat out. A vent tube travels under the northside berm and cistern, which serve as a heat sink cooling the air as it comes into the living space.
Non load-bearing walls of earthships have aluminum cans and glass bottles embedded, instead of tires. It’s good that some people have the drive and passion to try out new ways of doing things. Our current systems certainly are unnecessarily wasteful.
We enjoyed our tour and returned to our rental as the sun faded into the west.
This morning we are enjoying one last fire as we pack up and prepare to go back home.
Thanks for reading.