TURAS GIRLS

Stef and I packed up Beastie and headed south to the Gila this past weekend with a rough plan and a Delorme map.

We drove I-40 west out of Albuquerque to highway 117 and found Apache Creek campground a couple of hours later. Along the way we had a bear run across the road right in front of us and a herd of elk hanging out by the side of the road.

Apache Creek is a beautiful campground surrounded by tall trees. The sites are spaced pretty far apart and we had the campground almost to ourselves for the night.

We popped the tent open, unloaded our chairs, and popped open a couple of beers. The sky was clear and the stars were abundant making for a great night in our sky-gazer chairs. Looking up in the night sky admiring the stars we began to hear elk bugles. The bugling lasted quite a while and overall made for a pretty entertaining evening.

The next morning we packed ourselves up and headed south on highway 180 to Mogollon with a detour south to the Catwalk National Recreation Trail. The trail weaves around the rocks following Whitewater Creek. There is plenty of fishing opportunities along the route but unfortunately the trail is closed about 0.75 miles in so we let Riley swim in the creek and hiked back out.

Mogollon is off US 180 on NM 159. In the late 1800’s, Mogollon was one of the richest and wildest mining towns supporting both gold and silver mines in the surrounding mountains. Today it’s a ghost town with very few residents or businesses. If ghosts are your thing, the Silver Creek Inn operates in town and is supposedly filled with ghosts from the mining era.

Since ghosts are not up my alley, we headed out of town along NM 159. Our plan for the day was to find a campsite along our route to Snow Lake. We found Snow Lake before we found a campsite and ended up running right into Dipping Vat campground. The campground was empty so we had our pick of spots. We popped the tent up and took a hike down to Snow Lake to let Riley swim.

We had a great night at Snow Lake and contemplated staying another night but stuck to our plans of heading the rest of the way along Snow Lake Rd to NM 61. We drove and drove and drove trying to find the perfect campsite. We never found it along this route and ended up in a spot with a fire ring just off the road after hours of looking.

This is a beautiful area and the sunset and night sky were bewitching. But there are flies. Lots and lots of flies. They tortured us and tormented Riley. After fighting the flies while eating burgers, we started a fire and they dissipated slightly. We heard coyotes this evening staring up at the huge night sky full of stars. It was a pleasant evening despite the flies.

By morning we were over the flies. We packed up as we swatted them away and headed down to Highway 35. Gas was our main priority and the closest gas station was in Bayard about 25 miles away. We gassed up, found some caffeine and decided to head to NM 152 and head east to see what we found.

NM 152 or Geronimo Scenic Byway is a long, winding road with beautiful mountain views. There are several campgrounds along the route but we decided to continue along the route up to Emory Pass.

Although the view was beautiful, we left the high mountain pass for Hillsboro and on to Caballo Lake State Park. The lake has some great campsites in the developed campground and a good amount of dispersed camping sites along the lakefront. We found a spot right on the lake, settled in, and let Riley do her favorite thing, swim.

We headed home the following morning, glad we only had a 2 hour drive back. It was a long haul of driving in the last several days. We saw a lot of Gila National Forest and loved the trek but we were ready for home and a nice shower.

I would return to the area in a heartbeat. Our favorite spot was probably Snow Lake but there is so much more to explore in this breathtaking corner of New Mexico. I can’t wait for our next adventure there.