Just An Easy Two Mile Hike….That’s All

 

Yeah….

Famous Last Words.

After Jen, Dobbie and I left the Jemez Pueblo State Monument, I decided we would stop off at Battleship Rock Picnic Grounds to enjoy a beautiful 2 mile hike along the East Fork of the Jemez River in the Jemez Mountains, while searching for a letterbox. The destination we were hoping to reach would be McCauley Warm Springs.

(Yeah. I know they don’t even show it on the map. That should have made me suspicious, don’t you think?)

Just let it be known right here, right now, that I rarely ever get lost while out hiking. I’ve been hiking since I was a young girl and I can count on one hand the times that I “got turned around”. And each time I was able to quickly find my way back to the right trail without  anyone having to send out a search party to look for me.

(Battleship Rock, a side view, looking up from the trail)

This trail was supposed to be easy, albeit with a steep, switchback on one brief section. Although once I got home and did some research I did discover that it is easy to miss the main trail because of all the fishing trails that have been made along the first section of trail.

That’s apparently what happened to us.

We missed the turn-off to head uphill.

Maybe it was partly because we were enjoying hiking alongside the beautiful, singing, Jemez River and it probably didn’t feel right to leave such a scenic place just to head uphill on a steep rocky trail.

In fact we did have a wonderful picnic on top of a huge boulder.

Nevertheless we knew were going the wrong way after about a mile and half because the trail we were following got continually more rugged with huge boulders and fallen logs to scramble over, and washed out sections to traverse.

We also noticed that we were the only people on the trail, which was odd because it was a gorgeous Saturday and Battleship Rock Picnic Grounds was very crowded.

(Another photo of Battleship Rock taken from the trail, with Jen in the forefront)

 

Where were all the people?

Obviously they must not have missed the correct turn in the trail and had made it to the top of the mountain to soak their weary bodies in the wonderful warm springs.

(Jen took this photo of me. Thank Jen!)

When we finally reached, what I believed to be 2 miles, we were also blocked from going any further due to a huge fallen Ponderosa log. We couldn’t go under it because there was only about a foot and half height down there and I wasn’t up for belly crawling. And we couldn’t go over it because it was at least four and half feet tall. And on the other side it just looked overgrown with weeds and brush.

But it was just as well, because I had that gut feeling that we were on the wrong trail and needed to turn around.

(This was a very high step over these tangled roots and rocks. I was grateful for my trekking poles!)

(Dobbie amazes me every time we go somewhere new, especially considering she spent the first two years of her life in a cage owned by a backyard breeder, and I’ve only had her two years now. She thoroughly enjoys herself, is able to keep up, and even with so many interesting sights, sounds, and scents, she never leaves my side while off-leash)

So in the end we didn’t make it to McCauley Warm Springs because by the time we finally got back to the beginning of the trail we were out of water and it was a hot day.

We were also very tired and sore (or at least I was. Jen probably could have made it. She never once whined or complained or needed to rest).

But, even though we could have refilled our water at the picnic grounds, another two mile hike up a steep mountain trail wasn’t something I really felt like doing, plus it was getting close to dinnertime back at our campsite.

(Battleship Rock, zoomed in, looking straight up from it’s base while on the trail)

Jen and I made the best of it, though. And we had a great time just hanging out together.

And being silly.

We also decided to stop off at another picnic ground on the way back to the campsite just to soak our feet.

Hey, maybe the water was icy cold, and it wasn’t a hot or warm springs, and yeah, we didn’t find that letterbox up there.

But sitting there beside the river, soaking our feet together, was still very refreshing after our adventurous hike that day.

And besides we wanted to rest, relax and get a good night’s sleep because we were packing up our camping gear the next day, so we could head across the Jemez Mountains to visit one of the most fascinating and enchanting places that I have wanted to visit for a very long time………..

Sneak Peek: