Ghost Ranch, NM
Ghost Ranch on a good day
Taking a zero at Ghost Ranch, NM after a nero. This place is just TOO good. I think NM is the most beautiful state on the CDT so far–the fall colors are gorgeous and the desert canyons and sandstone make me itch to climb. Ok, so we’ve been almost entirely on dirt roads since we hit the state, but there’s a huge unseen benefit to roadwalking:I can read Harry Potter and walk at the same time! No worry of tripping on rocks or bumping into a tree. We picked up HP at the thriftstore in Pagosa and I’ve been practicing my acting as I read with full gusto.
Leaving Pagosa Springs
Aside from costing a little money, Ghost Ranch is hiker heaven. Ghost ranch was summer home to Georgie O’Keefe and the landscapes are seen in her paintings. Also, the ranch is a big dino hotspot–home to the only full dino skellies found in N. America. There’s a museum onsight displaying the Native American history and artifacts found right on the property and the dino bones (unfort. no O’Keefes, though). We get AYCE meals every 5 hours and the internet is open 24 hours and free and there is a library with books and DVDs that anyone–even hikers–can check out. I spent my afternoon under a beautiful yellow cottonwood sitting on a bench reading and looking out at Mt. Pavernal (O’Keefe loved to paint this Fuji-esque mountain). I couldn’t have spent a fall day in a better way.
Bushwacking down a canyon to get to Ghost Ranch
I ran out of food the night before and had about 90 calories of GU for the gnarly 8.5 mile bushwhack into town. By gnarly, I mean up and down, but mostly down 2,000 feet loss fighting through cacti and pinion pine going down steep cliffs. I kept ending up too far east and then too far west off course, caught in mini-canyons caused by dried up strems. When we found the “trail,” it ended up being an old, rocky jeep road that just happened to be completly destroyed and split in two from a landslide. You’d be walking on the road, then it’d end and there’d be a cliff and you’d carefully go down and look up and see the road 100 yards ahead and below or above you. The Forest Service really needs to check out what “trail” conditions are like before designating/designate/build trail.
Ghost Ranch on a rainy day (aka: perfect day for a zero day)
The only bad news about Ghost Ranch is that I might have food poisoning. An hour after the AYCE lunch, I vomited and only had a few bites of dinner, which I vomitted up, too. A sad state for a hiker!
