Well, what small but perfectly formed New Mexican overnighter we enjoyed last week, in a parcel of public land upriver from Abiquiu. To a winter backdrop of the snowy Tusas Mountains peaks, Eric, Mehedi and I rambled our way across the beautiful Mesa de los Viejos in the late afternoon with a simple intention: to spend a night’s camping on the rim of the mesa and see what view we’d wake up to. And, despite the frigid -10c night, what a vista it proved to be! The scale was both remarkable and unexpected, our perch overlooking the Chama river several hundred feet below us, and a vista far into the Chama River Canyon Wilderness.
The surfaces on New Mexican mesas never fail to charm me, and with riding across them with big tyres is as much an auditory experience as a tactile one. Terrain can be fast rolling and baked dry, shiny in the sun, or sculpted into deep, organic, pedal-grabbing ruts. It can also be loose and powdery like a child’s sandpit, or crunchy with ice and frozen mud, then slippy slidey in patches that have thawed. Invariably at this time of year, the land expels red mud splatters onto bicycle frames that later must be chipped off like cement, unless you prefer to leave them on as telltale reminders of places once travelled.
Mehedi had promised us “millions of two tracks and piñon foraging for days” and he certainly delivered. When we weren’t riding, we were crawling around the dirt on all fours until our pockets were full, under the largest piñon tree that any of us had ever seen. These oily, fatty pine nuts were such a meditative delight, as much to crack open in our teeth as to fill our bellies with. And as usual, my compadres were packing top tier treats. Eric’s silicon snack bag brimmed with dehydrated homegrown pears and peaches, mixed in with Turkish apricots, Black Mission figs, and walnuts, whilst Mehedi’s provisions included Majoule dates stuffed with peanut butter and sprinkled with coarse sea salt. These hermanos don’t mess around!
Also noteworthy is the winter light on the mesas here in the north of the state. It begins as a pre-dawn spectrum of cold blues and lavenders that’s gently warmed by a sunrise peeking over junipers. Then, there’s a sharp charity to the light that’s tantalisingly brief, for it feels like the December sun has only just begun to warm up land and bodies before dusk is closing in once more, and our ball of heat slips away once more behind the hills. At this time, the shadows are the deepest and darkest of them all. Oh, the bitter sweet joys of winter camping in New Mexico!
Thanks for the video, Eric! Check out his IG reel here, too!
The Route
A late start and commitments the following day meant this was a short but sweet little outing! It would be a lovely day ride too, but giving yourself time to camp out makes it super special.
That’s it for now. Any questions, fire away!
