Another day, another State!

I was away from Harry & Kathleen’s early on Sunday morning, continuing east on the 160 through Durango, where I knew there was a big bike rally being held and on to Chimney rocks. I had no real idea however, of what to expect when I got there! There were more Harleys on the road than you could shake a stick at, once I was through Durango, which incidentally was where Bob & Debbie, that I had met back in Tuba City, were spending the weekend.

Chimney Rocks National Park was easy to spot as I approached from the east. The twin towers of rock standing out way above all surrounding mountains, my only issue was how to get closer to them! That was soon solved as I spotted a sign pointing off to my right. A little way along the road a further sign to the right, indicated the Chimney Rocks National Park. I turned in and parked up at the visitor center. Speaking to the rangers at the reception, the first thing I was told, was that the two and a half mile road up to the top car park, from which the guided tour left, was very rough, far worse that the short stretch of gravel road into the park which I had just ridden. As there were no restrictions on ground clearance for cars, I guessed that I would be fine. Indeed the only problem was that there were a couple of short patches of rather nasty washboard. At the top car park, John, our guide gathered us all together and did his health and safety bit, then we all toddled off to the first of the buildings. John, had certainly learnt his stuff on the whole Ancient Pueblo culture, but as I’m not an archiologist much of it was on me. Then it was on up to the very top on the mountain, just below the Chimney Rocks themselves. It was a fairly easy scramble, and once again, the centre at the bottom had made far too much of it, although to be fair, one or two of the party struggled a bit. The views from the top were fantastic, and the old buildings themselves, very interesting. John, when talking about the finds during the excavation work mentioned that they had found two corn different corn seeds in one of the storage jars and I caused a bit of a laugh when I suggested that they were probably the only two in the world that Monsanto hadn’t managed to get hold of!!! The whole tour was about 2 ½ hours, which to be honest was a bit over-long. But then again I guess it depends on how interested in the culture behind the ruins you are.

From Chimney Rocks it was a run South Easterly along the 164 to Taos, another Pueblo village, that Taz & Joel had marked for me but this time one that is still lived in. Before then I would need to find a camp ground, and it was a beauty! I turned left up a National Forestry road which ran quite steeply up hill. It was at least a couple of miles before I found what I was looking for; a nice flat, secluded spot in the trees. There was a caravan at the very entrance to the area, but it didn’t look as though it was being used. Even so I ran quite a way down so that we even if it were used we wouldn’t actually be able to see each other. It was amongst mature lodge pine trees, which left a nice view of the sun through the canopy. The only thing that could have improved it would have been a little stream for my morning shower; hey ho, you can’t have everything.

When I got up in the night to answer the call of nature (no not the bears)  a thin sliver of a crescent moon was peeping through the tree canopy and the stars were shinning brightly in the inky black sky. I stood for ages just gazing up in awe at the scene. My night was otherwise undisturbed by man or beast. Had I not been on my own it would have been absolute perfection.

It was still quite a run down to Taos, something around 120 miles so I was up at about 6.30 and on my way before 8am. Back down the forest road and onto an empty road in the early morning sunshine and before the heat had begun to pick up, although I had camped at around 7300ft so it was somewhat cooler anyway.