Was fun and good exercise. It's hike #51 in the Salzman's book, Hiking Adventures in Northern New Mexico. Very nice of our leaders to agree to take the group on it so I could scout it for the WRSC hiking group. There were twelve of us. Everyone seemed to enjoy the beautiful views of the badland's rock formations and of the Jemez and Sangre Mountains.
The trail starts at the boundary between Nambe Pueblo and BLM land, right where there's a sign on NM503 saying that you're leaving Nambe Pueblo. You park on a dirt road that's just below NM503 and go through a gate that's easy to open and close. You start out walking along the Nambe Pueblo boundary fence and then turn to the right at a three-way trail juncture, leaving the boundary fence, to walk fairly easily uphill a little over one and a half miles to a four-way trail junction that you'll recognize by the gray, pavement-like rock cover. At this point, you can turn to the left and follow an easy path back to the vehicles. I didn't do that option but I bet it's no longer than three to three and a half miles. Our leader did that because her right knee was hurting her. She really gets winded walking uphill and was sweating heavily. Maybe she's become deconditioned with the knee pain.
Or, for a five mile hike, you can turn right and go down into an arroyo. Going down into the arroyo, the trail was rough because it was badly eroded. You follow the arroyo's twists and turns for a while and then go left up a bank and eventually up on top of a mesa for lunch that has great views of the mountains all around and a picturesque butte that had crows flying all around it. From our lunch vantage point, we could see the back of the spine of the Pojoaque Badlands.
Then it's down off the ridge and up and across another and back down to the four-way trail junction to return to the cars. The footing is fine but potentially slippery on this part. Some WRSC members would not appreciate the steepness and neither would some WI's. I'd recommend taking those hikers on the bottom part of the loop, i.e., turning left at the four-way intersection.
It was a beautiful day with high-pressure blue skies and no snow or ice or mud. It's a perfect time to go there before it gets too hot. Our leader said don't go there when it's wet or windy or hot!
Our leader's birthday is February 10 so her husband passed out brownies he had baked.
I took off my gloves for heat regulation but now my hands have the rash again and are very itchy. I need to run hot water on them before they drive me nuts!
I didn't sleep well last night - lots of peeing, lots of putting covers on and taking them off and my right foot bunion was giving me pain, which hasn't happened before. It almost seems like the orthotics are making the bunion bigger but not much I can do about that!
Grandson comes over tonight and I am prepared with ten issues of Boy's Life, which he loves, that I checked out from MPL.