Derricks and Mines

(Forest Service, U.S.D.A.)How To see the Rio Grande Valley—from Sandia Crest

While passing through the mountains between Santa Fe and Las Vegas, the traveler should be aware that a critical Civil War battle was waged in the fastness of these passes. In 1862, Confederate forces, which came up the Rio Grande from Texas and won a series of victories over Union troops, met a combined force of Colorado Volunteers and New Mexico Union troops in a decisive contest over the control of the American Southwest. The Union troops were successful, preserving New Mexico and the West for the Union.

These, then, are some of the things to look for in this region of plains and mountains. Picture buffalo by the tens of thousands pushing up the Canadian River, or long lines of wagons winding their way along the Santa Fe Trail carrying goods and people into new lands, or the Blue and the Gray locked in deadly combat far from the thunder of the main Civil War battles. The mosaic here is sharp and vividly different.

Northwest New Mexico is typified as ancient Indian country. While seemingly a harsh land, it is only this to the uninitiated, to those who lock their minds to beauties of history and lands unlike their own. The Indian found this country good and productive. Some of the finest ruins of Indian antiquity are in this region—Chaco Canyon and Aztec, both National Monuments, and hundreds more that remain unnamed. The Indians of the Four Corners area (named thus because New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona meet here, the only place in the United States where the lines of four states intersect) created levels of culture unsurpassed in what is the continental United States; only the Indians of Mexico and Peru claim a higher culture. This is a land whose ancient people reached their great peak at the same time as the later Romans, as Charlemagne in ancient Frankish Europe, and as Mohammed and his successors in the Middle East.

But ancient Indians hold no monopoly on this vast region. Today many of the Indians of New Mexico still find homes here. The Navajo Reservation lies between Gallup and the Colorado line. Part of the Ute Reservation lies along the northern edge of New Mexico, and the Jicarilla Reservation is in the eastern part of this region. Many of the pueblo people are found between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. At Gallup each year, the famed Indian Ceremonials bring together peoples from many of the tribes in the United States.

This region is also renowned as an oil and natural gas producer and is one of the booming areas in New Mexico. But this is only one aspect of the mineral riches of the northwest; the mines near Grants, between Albuquerque and Gallup, produce tremendous quantities of uranium ores. The atomic energy capability of the United States begins at Grants. And near Gallup and Fruitland are huge open-pit coal mines.

The northwest is drained by the San Juan River, a tributary of the Colorado River, and is therefore a part of the Pacific watershed. The Navajo Dam project, just east of Farmington, is a part of this drainage pattern.

Thus the region is characterized by Indians old and new, ancient things buried deep beneath the earth, and great beauty in pastel colors and subtle contrasts—the mosaic of the land.

East-central New Mexico, like the northeast, is an area of plains and mountains. Here the buffalo roamed, and in their place, cattle now utilize the hardy and nutritious grasses of the High Plains. Mountains are the Manzano, southeast of Albuquerque, and Sierra Blanca, near Carrizozo, as well as numerous minor ranges. Also in this region is some harsh and desolate country, seared by the southwestern sun and lacking in rainfall, but supporting the exotic plants and wildlife typical of the Sonoran desert regions.

While the desert regions may not be attractive to the eye, they should be appreciated for their part in the historical mosaic. In the area east of the Rio Grande is the northern half of the well-known White Sands Missile Range, one of the significant test centers in the rocket and space age. It was also in this arid region that the first atomic bomb was exploded (southeast of Socorro).

The early use of this desert, however, emphasized its harshness. For centuries, the Spanish suffered across this waterless waste on their way from Chihuahua in Old Mexico to Santa Fe, for this was the Jornada del Muerto, journey of death, the hardest and most dangerous part of the trip over the Camino Real. The Camino Real was the lifeline of New Mexico from 1598 until the Santa Fe Trail was opened in 1821, and all visitors during that period were obliged to cross this arid section. A modern rocket crosses in mere seconds what took the Spaniards many days.

(Forest Service, U.S.D.A.)Who says this is desert country?... Sierra Blanca fromU.S.70

In the Manzano Mountains, there are numerous Indian ruins which represent the eastern fringes of the pueblo-building Indians of New Mexico. These ruined villages have been given the name by historians of “cities that died of fear,” fear of the vicious Apache and Comanche tribes. For centuries, these brave village people tilled their crops and lived peacefully on the land. Then, in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries,the great migrations of Plains Indians that pushed into the Southwest gradually did their deadly work. One by one the villages succumbed, until by 1700 few people remained, and these were ultimately killed or driven into the sanctuary of the Rio Grande pueblos. It is awesome to stand mid the rubble of one of those ancient cities and imagine the circumstances of its demise.

In the eastern part of this section was the heart of the High Plains cattle empires. Here is a land that once belonged to the great cattle barons, a land of free range, the home of the cowboy. Although it is fenced today, it is still a land of cattle and is still very close to the early days of the cattleman.

Again, there is an intricate and varied mosaic. No simple land this, but a complexity of plains, mountains, and desert, all of which color its history. The Indians no longer inhabit their villages, the Spanish no longer struggle along the Jornada del Muerto, and the free range of the cattle baron is gone, but if the traveler sees it through its historical past, it will again come alive.

This section is a complex and colorful mass of landforms scattered helter-skelter across the western part of the state. It stretches from the green Rio Grande Valley, with its irrigated lands, quaint farms, and picturesque agricultural villages, up the Valley’s steep western slopes to the rolling grassland and mesas and alluvial fans, ending in precipitous and treacherous canyons in the rugged mountains. Socorro Mountain, the Magdalenas, the San Mateos, the Ladrones, and countless others seem always to ring the horizon. Some of them are timbered and abound in cool, refreshing shade and springs; some are harsh and dry. In the west, the famed San Agustin Plains stretch to the sunset, a wide carpet fringed by black, timbered hills, site of fabulous cattle drives of a bygone day. The complexity of the region’s geology, scenery, and terrain is matched by an equally complex history.

The history is a mosaic of many hues, some harsh and stark like its dry desert mountains, some inviting like the shade and coolness of its timbered canyons and mountain springs. First were the many diverse and sometimes hostile Indian cultures. There were peaceful pueblo peoples tilling their lands, using the Rio Grande’s flowing water to produce abundance. Also, prehistoric village dwellers struggled to create agricultural societies along the banks of now-dry rivers in the western part of the region. And there were the fearsome Apache Indians who founded their homes in the broken mountain fastnesses and added their excitement and tragedy to the mosaic. So, too, did the Spaniard make his mark and the Mexican who followed close behind. The place names of the eastern part of the region are primarily Spanish, although the Spanish found the area a difficult one in which to maintain themselves. And then the American came to dominate this land, adding realism and technology.

Finally, two major economic factors left a profound imprint: stock raising and mining. The first began with the Spanish, was continued by the Mexicans, and commercialized by the Americans. Everywhere are signs of this heritage. Mining also played a dominant role, although of a shorter duration. One can hardly lift his eyes to the hills without seeing signs of the prospectors shovel or the miner’s work. One can hardly converse with local citizens without discussing mines of the past or mines of the future. Livestock and minerals, then, are woven through the historical pattern and are never far from any part of the story.

Let the traveler be aware of several important facts when he passes through this region. First, this is empty country, an area that has fewer people now than it had eighty years ago. Its mines are mostly closed and the towns that grew with the mines are ghosts. One of the most famous of these is the town of Kelly, a short distance from the community of Magdalena. Another is Mogollon, off U.S. Highway 180 in the southwestern part of this region. Either of these will give to the viewer a vivid picture of the mining camps of the nineteenth century.

To the average tourist crossing the San Agustin Plains, they seem desolate and uninteresting. To the traveler with imagination and knowledge of the history of this once great inland lake, the trip can be exciting. He pictures this great basin full of water, forty-five miles long and fifteen miles wide, and sees mountains covered with blue spruce surrounding the great lake. His mental motion picture rolls on thousands of years, watching the water evaporate and the forest of spruce die, to be replaced eventually by the piñon and juniper now dotting the hills. Grass grew in the old lake bed, except in the last areas to evaporate, for these had an alkali content too high for most grasses. The traveler then watches the Indian enter the scene—not the pueblo builder, except as a transient, for no water is available. The nomadic warrior uses the pathway later. In 1774 and in 1776, he sees several important battles between the Spanish and the Apaches fought on these Plains. Later, the American cattleman dominates them, as he does today....

And so the mosaic grows—Indians, Spanish, Americans, cattle, and mines—and the spectacular vistas and the vast emptiness add color and excitement for the traveler who sees the past with the present.

Much of southeast New Mexico is an extension of the Great Plains, but it has some rugged mountains and a severe desert in the middle of which lie White Sands National Monument and the White Sands Missile Range. Mountain ranges include the Sacramento east of Alamogordo and the Guadalupe Mountains, in which are located Carlsbad Caverns.

The plains part of this region are devoted to cattle, potash, and oil. Like the other plains regions of New Mexico, the heritage passed on from the great cattle empires of bygone days is very strong and detectable in the people. Since the early 1930’s, oil has come to play an increasingly importantpart in the history of this section. This is especially true near Hobbs.

(Forest Service, U.S.D.A.)Anyone for a hike?... in the Guadalupe Mountains

The desert region in the western part of this section has clearly defined aspects of the old and the new. The southern part of the dread Jornado del Muerto swept across this arid land and only returned to the river near modern Hatch, or sometimes farther south, near modern Las Cruces, according to the whim of the river. Here also lies the White Sands NationalMonument, a desert spot of unusual beauty and interest. Near the Monument, the White Sands Missile Range stands as an advanced scientific test center for the most modern of vehicles, the rocket. Near Alamogordo, another advanced space development and testing facility is located at Holloman Air Force Base. So the desert is useful, and it is beautiful, and it is full of tragic history.

This is also Indian land. East of Tularosa is the Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation. In a way, this region has always belonged to the Apache, at least since he migrated into New Mexico. The area contained no sedentary groups and the Apache appropriated it as his own. His strongholds were in the Guadalupe and Sacramento mountains. The forts along the Rio Grande, like Forts Fillmore and Selden, were located to control the Mescalero and other Apache groups. All that remains today are the Mescaleros.

There was little Spanish influence in this area except near El Paso and in the Rio Grande Valley. The Spanish were more attracted to the upper Rio Grande Valley because of the sedentary nature of the Indians of that region. The southeast underwent its greatest development in the American period.

Again, sense the mosaic: These are not blends of land and history; they are sharp and distinct, each with its own character. Search for the history and the beauty, for they do not come automatically.

Finally, the southwest, another region of harsh desert and cool refreshing mountains, part of New Mexico’s unusual contrast. The country south of U.S. 70 is Sonoran desert, thinly populated and poorly watered. To the north of the highway lies one of the most spectacular beauty spots in the Southwest, the mountains and forests forming the headwaters of the Gila River. The Gila River flows west across Arizona until it joins the Colorado River which empties into the Gulf of California.

The Indians in this part of the state fall into two distinct categories: The builders, known as the Mimbres culture, constructed homes in caves and along the watercourses of the Gila and Mimbres rivers. They reached extremely high levels of culture, and then they disappeared. The Apache Indians, who entered this country at the same time as they did the rest of New Mexico, were responsible for the end of the farmers and builders, at least in part. The Apaches were predators and the farmers were peaceful, unversed in the arts of war. Finally the Apache ruled supreme, and this region became the most important single stronghold of the Indian. It was here that Geronimo found sanctuary. But the Apaches, too, were forced to surrender their claims and were placed on reservations outside this area.

Mining is and has been the main source of wealth. The great open-pit operation of Kennecott Copper Company is at Santa Rita, east of Silver City. This is one of the largest open-pit copper mines in North America. To look into that huge man-made pit is a thrilling experience. This mine was first opened in 1803 by the Spanish who needed copper badly as acirculating currency in New Spain (Mexico). For a number of years, the coins used for money in Mexico were from copper mined in southwestern New Mexico.

Copper represents only a part of the mining activity in this region. Famous mining districts in earlier days were at Kingston and Hillsboro, just east of the Black Range on State Highway 90. These areas produced considerable quantities of silver. There is some activity yet, but the boom has long since passed them by, although they are interesting towns to visit. The trip from U.S. 85 to Silver City via State Highway 90 is one of the most scenic routes in the state.

In the region north of Silver City lies high mountain country, much of it preserved as the Gila Wilderness Area. Here a person who wishes the solitude of forest and mountain, the thrill of trout fishing in a clear cold stream, and a wealth of wildlife can find his heart’s desire. In the heart of this wilderness, the traveler might well find some of the ancient homes of the Mimbres people. History and recreation blend into one.

These complete the mosaic. Everywhere one travels in New Mexico is enchanting history, in the land and/or in the people. This has not been an effort to acquaint anyone with the intricate detail of all the history of every nook and cranny of this land, but these broad strokes made on the canvas may help the traveler, transient or native, to enjoy himself. Let him accept the challenge, stop to investigate, search out evidence of the history that is there in the colorful and changing land itself, the Indian heritage, the Spanish past, the cattleman’s range, the miner’s endless search—and become enchanted.

(Forest Service, U.S.D.A., by John Whiteside)Wheeler Peak near Taos—highest point in New Mexico, 13,160 feet above sea level

(Courtesy Elliott S. Barker)Ghost Ranch Mountain north of Abiquiu

byGeorge B. Griswold

New Mexico is a mineral-rich state. The gross production value of oil, gas, and minerals was $671 million during 1963, making the state the sixth ranking mineral producer in the nation. New Mexico ranks among other states as follows: first in the production of potash, uranium, perlite, and carbon dioxide; third in helium; fourth in copper; fifth in natural gas and liquids; and seventh in petroleum. Important amounts of zinc, lead, gold, silver, magnesium compounds, coal, gypsum, pumice, and salt are also produced from deposits within New Mexico. The oil and gas industry holds a dominant position in the state, accounting for almost two thirds of the value of minerals produced.

Most of New Mexico’s oil and gas are produced in the southeastern part, south and east of Roswell. The bustling towns of Hobbs, Artesia, and Lovington, as well as Roswell, are headquarters for the many oil companies and the associated service and supply organizations operating in the area. Oil and gas are produced from numerous reservoirs, calledfieldsorpools, in Paleozoic sediments ranging from Ordovician to Permian in age. From the standpoint of production, the Eunice-Monument field (lying between these two towns) is the largest, having produced more than 250 million barrels of oil. Other important fields are Hobbs, Vacuum, Langlie Mattix, Denton, and Jalmat. All these fields produce a considerable amount of gas associated directly with the oil.

When driving an automobile through southeast New Mexico, a layman finds it difficult to comprehend the immensity of the petroleum industry of that region. This is due to the scattering of wells over a large area. Seldom are wells spaced closer than one to every ten acres, even in the most productive fields. There are, in fact, some 16,000 wells in this part of New Mexico, ranging in depth from less than 1000 feet to 17,555 feet.

The other oil- and gas-producing area of the state is in the northwest, in the San Juan Basin. Farmington serves as the base of operations for most of this activity. In 1962, there were 7378 wells in the area, 1770 of which were producing oil and gas and 5608 producing gas only. Most of the San Juan Basin production is from Cretaceous sandstones, in contrast to the southeast where the oil and gas are derived from Paleozoic sediments. The development of the San Juan Basin production is relatively new; most of the wells have been drilled since World War II. The petroleum industry can be proud of the great help it has given to the development of this once-almost-forgotten part of the state.

(Courtesy El Paso Natural Gas Co.)There’s the way to refine oil! Look at those mesas, near Gallup

The methods of finding and producing oil and gas have come a long way from the “boom town” days when wells were drilled for the most part on pure hunches and hopes. The exploration and exploitation of petroleum are now highly specialized technologies. All branches of the geologic and geophysical sciences are brought into play to piece together a comprehensive picture of all the factors which may have made a certain area favorable for the accumulation of oil or gas. These factors include such things as the age, thickness, and permeability of the sedimentary rocks, the structure, old shorelines, and buried reefs. Once a target is selected, a drilling rig is moved onto the location to prove or disprove the theory. This is the costly step of finding oil. A single 10,000-foot hole may cost $350,000, and some individual wells in New Mexico have cost more than $1 million to drill. If the well is in a completely untested area, it is called a “wildcat.” Once a discovery is made, then the land around the wildcat is explored by “offset” wells until the complete extent of the new field is proved.

During 1962, 1666 wells were drilled to an average depth of 5153 feet. The average drilling cost was $71,000 a well, representing a total investment of almost $120 million in a single year! Most of these wells were of the development (offset) type, but even then, 27 per cent were dry. During 1962, 295 true wildcats were drilled; of these, only 46 found oil or gas—about two out of every thirteen.

The story of oil just begins with the discovery of a well. Various special “completion” operations are applied to the oil-producing horizon so as to increase the flow into the well. The most common techniques are either by“acidizing,” pumping acid into the formation to increase flow by enlarging the pores in the rock, or by “hydrafracing,” whereby actual cracks are induced in the formation by pumping oil from the surface back into the well under very high pressure. After the well is “completed,” it may be a natural-flowing well if sufficient gas is associated with the oil. If sufficient gas is not present, then the well is pumped.

In recent years, considerable success has been achieved in revitalizing old fields where production had dropped below the point of economic operation. These fields are reactivated by forcing either water or gas down selected wells within the field, thereby forcing stagnated oil within the producing zone toward the other wells. This technique is calledsecondary recovery. Many fields will produce more oil under the secondary recovery program than they did during their primary life.

Here’s a wildcat for you!

Once the oil is on the surface, it passes through separators to remove any admixed gas from the oil. The gas is sent into pipelines while the oil is sent to storage tanks calledtank batteries. Periodically, the oil is drawn from the tank batteries where it is transported by pipeline or rail to refineries. The great bulk of the crude oil leaves New Mexico for refining via a major pipeline network extending through Texas to both the Gulf and East coasts. Some oil is refined in New Mexico, however. Oil refineries in Artesia, Bloomfield, Ciniza, Farmington, and Monument have a combined capacity to treat some 30,000 barrels (42 gallons a barrel) of crude oil a day. On the other hand, practically all the natural gas is treated in New Mexico so as to recover its liquid petroleum constituents before sending it out of the state by pipeline.

The mining industry of New Mexico dates back to the days of Spanish rule. Copper was mined from the Santa Rita mine as early as 1800 for shipment to Mexico for use in coinage. Significant mining in New Mexico did not commence, however, until the late 1800’s. There are three major centers today: Carlsbad, potash; Silver City area, copper, zinc, and lead; and Grants, uranium.

Question: where are the other oil pumps and tanks in the San Juan Basin?

The potash mining east of Carlsbad, a $75 million-a-year industry employing more than 3600 persons, is the largest operation of its kind in the world. Six mining companies are active in the area, and a seventh is developing yet another mine.Potashis a word used to denote various potassium compounds. The principal ore mineral at Carlsbad is sylvanite, a mixture of potassium chloride and sodium chloride (common salt). The ore contains the equivalent of 21 to 25 per cent potassium oxide (K₂O).[6]Another ore mineral, known aslangbeinite, a double salt of potassium and magnesium sulfate, is also mined.

The potash ores occur as horizontal beds sandwiched between thick salt and anhydrite layers. These beds are the result of evaporation of large quantities of salt waters during the latter part of the Permian period some 240 million years ago. The potash-bearing horizons now are buried from 900 to 1800 feet below the surface. The discovery of potash in southeast New Mexico was almost by accident. In 1925, the Snowden and McSweeny Company drilled a wildcat oil test a few miles east of Carlsbad. The hole was dry, but potash minerals were detected in the drill cuttings. The discovery generated considerable interest because the United States was forced to import most of its potash prior to this time. Further drilling proved the existence of tremendous deposits of potassium salts in that area.

The potash mines are among the most highly mechanized of themineral industry. Access to the buried deposits is gained by vertical shafts. Actual mining is now done to a large extent by continuous miners, machines which bore or rip the potash ore from the face and load it into shuttle cars in one continuous operation. The shuttle cars then transport the ore to conveyor belts which move it to the shafts for hoisting. Working conditions and safety are excellent and have led to high productivity from these mines.

The potash ore is refined or processed by fractional crystallation or flotation. These plants remove most of the unwanted sodium chloride and other gangue minerals to produce high-quality potassium chloride or sulfate. After processing, the potash salts are stored in giant bins to await shipment by rail to the major agriculture areas of the United States. The Carlsbad mines produce some 15 million tons of ore a year which, when refined, produces 4 million tons of marketable potassium salts having a K₂O equivalent of 2.5 million tons.

(Courtesy International Minerals & Chemical Corp.)Crunch!... continuous mining machine at work

Uranium mining is the newest major industry in New Mexico. The boom started in 1950 with the discovery of uranium ore west of Grants by a Navajo sheep rancher named Paddy Martinez. This discovery started one of the most extensive exploration and development campaigns in all mining history. By 1957, the area had proved uranium reserves accounting for more than half of the entire reserve of the nation. These discoveries will make this country self-sufficient in this vital atomic energy metal foryears to come. Five mills were built that are capable of producing “yellow cake” (almost pure uranium oxide) from uranium ores containing as little as 0.20 per cent U₃O₈. Four mills are located in the Grants area, ranging in capacity from 1500 to 4000 tons a day. The fifth mill, rated at 500 tons a day, is at Shiprock.

There are numerous mines, ranging from tiny two-man operations up to great mines producing more than 1000 tons a day. The most prolific producing area is the Ambrosia Lake District north of Grants; most of these mines are underground. Probably the largest single uranium mine, however, is the open-pit Jackpile-Paguate mine of the Anaconda Company on the Laguna Indian Reservation some thirty miles east of Grants. The mine uses electric shovels capable of loading eight cubic yards of ore at a time into large diesel trucks.

Copper is produced from the Chino mine located at Santa Rita, about fifteen miles east of Silver City. This mine, operated by Kennecott Copper Corporation, is the showpiece of the New Mexico minerals industry. The copper ore is low grade, containing only sixteen pounds a ton of the red metal, but the deposit is immense, allowing the mining of 22,500 tons a day. The Chino is by far the largest single mining operation in the state. A large concentrator and smelter are located at Hurley, about ten miles southwest of the pit.

The Chino pit is a spectacular sight for its scenic setting and its sheer size. The deposit is located below the Kneeling Nun, a famous natural statue formed by the erosion of a rhyolite flow which caps a high mesa. The pit covers almost one square mile and is 800 feet deep. The mining is highly mechanized. Large rotary drills make blast holes twelve inches in diameter into which explosives are loaded. A single blast may break 100,000 tons of rock. The ore is loaded with 8-cubic-yard shovels into large trucks carrying from 25 to 65 tons each. The trucks transport the ore to an inclined skipway on the west end of the pit. The skip then carries the ore up to the train level where it is transferred into railroad cars for shipment to the mill. Waste rock, too low-grade to justify sending to the mill, is transported to the very top of the skip way, where it is trucked to the dumps. At Chino, much of the waste rock contains some copper. The amount is small, but a part of it can be recovered by leaching-percolating water down through the rock to dissolve the copper. At the bottom of the dumps, the copper-rich water is collected and sent through precipitating tanks containing scrap iron. The copper plates out on the iron, forming metallic copper. The dump-leaching program alone at Chino is a substantial enterprise.

The concentrator and smelter at Hurley is the facility which reduces the low-grade ore into pure metal. The concentrator first crushes and grinds the ore, then recovers the copper-bearing minerals (principally chalcocite and chalcopyrite) by flotation. The concentrate of these copper sulfides is taken to the smelter to make metallic copper.

North and west of the Chino mine are important deposits of zinc and lead. Two underground mines are now active: the Hanover of the New Jersey Zinc Company and the Kearney—Pewabic of American—Peru Mining Company. Although dwarfed by the Chino mine, these are important producers.

(Courtesy The Anaconda Co.)Man, dig this hole!... Jackpile open-pit uranium mine near Laguna

(Courtesy Kennecott Copper Corp.)“Just scoop up copper ore, take it to the skipway....” up the side of the Chino Mine at Santa Rita

Copper, potash, and uranium are not the only mining operations of New Mexico. Perlite is recovered from deposits near No Agua in Taos County and just north of Grants. Two new gypsum plants are now operatingnortheast of Albuquerque, and a cement plant is located east of that city. High-grade copper veins are worked south of Lordsburg. Coal mining is being reactivated, with producing mines near Gallup, Fruitland, and Raton. A new molybdenum mine is under development east of Questa. New Mexico’s mineral industry is on a broad and firm base.

Mines and derricks are ever-present aspects of New Mexico’s landscapes; they are seen by every citizen of the state and every tourist as he travels across the plains, valleys, and mountains. The derricks and the mine openings are merely surface features through which the vast wealth of the underground is exploited, but they are a monetarily important part of New Mexico’s scenery, rocks, and history.

byFrank E. Kottlowski

The visitor and the native may be well acquainted with the more famous scenic places in New Mexico. Most of these are National or State Parks or Monuments—glistening dunes of White Sands, sandstone cliffs of El Morro, canyons eroded in volcanic rocks of Bandelier, the recent volcano of Capulin Mountain, multicolored sinkholes at Bottomless Lakes, grotesque carvings of volcanic rocks at City of Rocks, and the black tongues of cooled lava in the Valley of Fires State Park near Carrizozo.

Many of the lesser-known spectacular scenic areas are off the beaten path, far from the seventy-mile-an-hour Interstate highways. Even a brief description of all would fill a thick book. But near the most traveled routes are numerous enchanting landscapes. The traveler from the midwest or east, driving U.S. Highway 66 (Interstate 40) breaks over the edge of the “caprock” a few miles east of the New Mexico—Texas line. Atop the caprock is Llano Estacado, the Staked Plains, a level surface stretching along the southeast edge of New Mexico eastward into Texas. As seen south of Tucumcari near Ragland, east of Fort Sumner near Taiban, or east of Roswell near Kenna and Caprock, the bluffs of the Llano Estacado are topped by caprock, a cliff of white caliche-limestone as much as forty feet thick in places. Below, on gentle to steep slopes reaching northward toward Tucumcari or westward toward Fort Sumner and Roswell, are the varicolored red, purple, green, and gray shales and sandstones of Triassic age. Red Lake near Taiban on U.S. Highway 60-84 lies in the red muds of these Triassic rocks.

South of Tucumcari, rising boldly from the red-earth lowlands draining to the Canadian River, are Tucumcari Mountain and Mesa Redonda, and to the northwest the long buff cliffs of Mesa Rica. The latter mesa lies north of Interstate 40 as far west as Newkirk. Patches of the white caprock caliche-limestone cap these eastern New Mexico sentinels, whereas in other localities, the brown Dakota Sandstone tops the buttes and is underlain by pink Jurassic sandstones, with the mesa bases made up of the Triassic redbeds.

Near Santa Rosa, Interstate 40 dips down into the narrow green valley of Rio Pecos. Roadcuts lining the steep hills into the city show the red and brown sandstones and shales of the Triassic beds.

Driving westward from Santa Rosa, one crosses rolling hills near Clines Corners, then dips gently down into the northern part of the Estancia Basin near Moriarty. To the north on the horizon are the snow-capped peaks of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. From Moriarty, Interstate 40 pulls slowly upward toward Edgewood into the eastern foothills of the Sandia Mountains, the grassy plains giving way to juniper and piñon groves.

From the downgrade into Tijeras Canyon, State Highway 10 leads north to San Antonito and the turnoff to Sandia Crest. The crest road winds up canyon walls, on sloping limestone mesas, up through thick stands of ponderosa pine, aspen, and, near the top, Engelmann spruce and corkbark fir. Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep may be seen off the road on the high crags. From Sandia Crest, 10,678 feet above sea level, much of north-central New Mexico is visible; Mount Taylor to the west, the Nacimiento and Jemez mountains to the northwest, the mighty Sangre de Cristo Mountains to the northeast, and countless ranges to the south and southwest. The city of Albuquerque is spread out at the base of the Sandias, and the twisting north-south channel of the Rio Grande stretches, glistening, as far left and right as one can see.

From Tijeras, Interstate 40 plunges into Tijeras Canyon, slicing through vertical roadcuts in Pennsylvanian limestones and shales, then through the ancient Precambrian granite. At the canyons mouth, the road levels off on the broad alluvial plain on which much of east Albuquerque is built, although the “downtown” is really down, in the valley of the Rio Grande.

Westward, Interstate 40 rolls up out of the valley, crosses windswept plains spotted with black volcanic cones, in and out of the shallow brown valley of Rio Puerco, and then to the red-cliff-bordered valley of Rio San Jose. Cliffs are of brown, buff, and light-gray Jurassic sandstones, with the valley carved in Triassic redbeds. Near Laguna, on the north side of the valley, white gypsum of the Todilto Formation crops out. Then through the pink Jurassic cliffs the canyon winds, and near New Laguna, the highway is bordered by the varicolored, uranium-bearing Morrison beds, which are overlain by brown sandstones and black shales of Cretaceous age.

But as Interstate 40 approaches Grants, the dominant feature is black frozen lava. The mesas surrounding Mount Taylor are capped by black basalt, built up in many layers, each individual flows, and loose blocks tumble down on the hillsides. Young basalt, twisted and wrinkled as if it were still hot, winds along the valley; just east of Grants, a huge “field” of this recent basalt stretches southward beyond the horizon. And above all looms Mount Taylor, remnant of an ancient volcano, snow-capped in winter, towering 11,389 feet above sea level.

At Casa Blanca, southeast of Mount Taylor, State Road 23 leads south to Acoma Pueblo. Eleven miles to the southwest, Enchanted Mesa,Katsimas it is called by the Acomas, towers 450 feet above the surrounding valley floor. This sheer-cliffed rock is built by layers of (from the base to the top) pink and white Entrada Sandstone, gray Todilto limestone, pink and green Summerville beds, a massive cliff of light-tan Zuni Sandstone, and a cap of yellow-brown Dakota Sandstone.

The top of Enchanted Mesa is inaccessible by normal means. Legend has it that once the Acomas lived there, and there are Indian ruins up on the isolated rim. A terrific rain and lightning storm, one summer day, sent huge waterfalls down the sides of the mesa, tearing away large blocks of sandstone, and destroyed the trail to the top, a series of narrow zigzagledges and toeholds in crevasses. Thus the Acoma Indians moved a few miles to the southwest to Acoma, onto the top of another sheer cliff, a rock fortress carved in Zuni Sandstone and capped by Dakota Sandstone.

Talk about wide open spaces ... around the Enchanted Mesa

Southwest of Grants, the forested Zuni Mountains rise, bordered on the north by a valley cut in Triassic redbeds and on the east by the recent black basalt flows. The hurrying traveler will follow Interstate 40 to Gallup around the north edge of the Zuni dome, flanked on the north by the spectacular pink, red, brown, and gray cliffs of Jurassic and Cretaceous sandstones. If one has time, take the low road, State Highways 53 and 36, around the southern edge of the Zunis. For almost twenty miles, passing through San Rafael, the paved highway parallels the west edge of the Grants black basalt flow; then up over low ridges and past black cinder cones toward El Morro. In the lava tunnels, perpetual ice stays hidden from the sun; these can be visited at Ice Caves.

El Morro, Inscription Rock, with its towering cliffs of Zuni Sandstone, overlooks peaceful green valleys; farther west, the red and brown sandstones are carved into many mesas and buttes near Zuni Pueblo. Then northward to Gallup, swinging around the west edge of the Zuni Mountains, the roller-coaster highway, State 36, cuts through ponderosa pine country, bordered by Cretaceous brown sandstones, black shales, and coal beds.

Northeast of Gallup eight miles is Kit Carson’s Cave, a gaping door on the face of a massive cliff of Jurassic sandstone. A pool of cool water lies along its floor. The three-and-a-half-mile drive north of Interstate 40is through a vast broken country of sandstone spires, pyramids, cliffs, and ledges carved in the Jurassic rocks. Near Gallup, the drab coal-bearing Cretaceous beds form the landscapes, but westward near the Arizona line, erosion has cut down again to the brilliantly colored Jurassic rocks, and Interstate 40 is escorted westward into the Grand Canyon State by cliffs of white and pink sandstone.

Californians crossing New Mexico in the winter are likely to travel U.S. Highway 70-80 (Interstate 10) eastward. New Mexico is entered just before Steins Pass, which is channeled through the tan and green volcanic rocks of the Peloncillo Mountains. Then down across the mud and salt marshes of Alkali Flats lying in the Animas Valley and up onto the north edge of the Pyramid Mountains into Lordsburg. Mine dumps dot the Pyramids, and the ghost mining town of Shakespeare lies amid the purple volcanic rocks.

Eastward from Lordsburg for 118 miles are the Antelope Plains; plains, plains, plains. Steers graze on the sparse grass, yucca clumps border the highway, and here and there sand dunes flee before the restless winds. Mountain ranges, like islands on the sea of grass, yucca, and creosote bush, rise in the distance. West of Deming, the low Victorio Mountains lie south of the highway, made up of dolomite, limestone, and andesite ridges. Southeast of Deming are the lofty Florida Mountains, their northern toe crossed by Interstate 10. Volcanic hills dot the landscape east of Las Cruces, Sierra de las Uvas’ purple slopes to the north, and the Potrillo Mountains and Mount Riley to the south. The latter are part of a spectacular volcanic field where black cinder cones and basalt flows cover hundreds of square miles, and craters such as Kilbourne Hole are sunk below the plains.

The descent into the Rio Grande Valley is awesome, especially if the late afternoon sun is dancing on the spires and cliffs of the Organ Mountains to the east. From across the brown plains, Interstate 10 winds down into the green Mesilla Valley, a different world of cotton and alfalfa fields, pecan and cottonwood groves, and red-tile-roofed Spanish homes. The view of the Organ Mountains alone is worth the trip.

At Las Cruces, a city booming on cotton, rockets, and tourists, Interstate 10 turns south to parallel the east side of the Rio Grande Valley down to Texas and El Paso. If one prefers a quiet scenic route, State Highway 28 winds its way along the west side of the Valley amid fields and groves, through peaceful villages, to end at the bridge over the Rio Grande on the edge of El Paso. Here, to the south, is El Cristo Rey, a cone of massive andesite, flanked by steeply tilted beds of limestone and shale, Early Cretaceous in age, cut in two by the New Mexico-Mexico border. Atop the peak is a 29-foot-high, 40-ton, limestone statue of Christ; a winding path leads upward from the base for those strong enough of limb to make the climb. Beyond, to the south, Ciudad Juarez lies, famous for its bordertown flavor, markets, cathedrals, and bull rings.

The traveler to the east should stay on U.S. 62-180 from El Paso. This highway cuts through the Hueco Mountains via Powwow Canyon, a gashcarved from Pennsylvanian and Permian limestones, crosses the Diablo Plateau, rolls past the white patches of Salt Flat lakes, then winds up to the summit of Guadalupe Pass between the Delaware Mountains on the south and the towering Guadalupe Mountains on the north. Looking north from the Pass, Guadalupe Peak, highest point in Texas, and El Capitan are unforgettable sights, their steep lower slopes ribbed brown and green, overshadowed by the 1000-foot limestone cliffs of the peaks. The limestone-hewn Guadalupe Mountains parallel the highway in New Mexico and are pitted with many caves, with Carlsbad Caverns the largest known in the range. Eastward beyond the Pecos Valley stretches the Great Plains and Texas.

A side trip, near Carlsbad, over black-topped and gravel roads leads from Seven Rivers, up Rocky Arroyo on State Road 137, into the northern foothills of the Guadalupe Mountains to Sitting Bull Falls. Here, cool spring waters cascade over limestone ledges to join in green pools lying amid the cottonwood groves of the canyon floor.

Lake McMillan, a reservoir along the Pecos River north of Carlsbad, and the many potash mines east of Carlsbad are parts of the enchanting landscapes of this southeastern corner. Northward, following the green cotton fields bordering the Pecos River, U.S. Highway 285 leads through Artesia with its oil refineries to modern booming Roswell, second city of the state. East of Roswell, bordering the east side of the Pecos Valley, is Bottomless Lakes, azure blue pools spotted in sink holes.

Eastward from Roswell, on either U.S. Highway 70 or 380, redbeds of Permian and Triassic age lie half hidden by pinkish sands up to the edge of the caprock; beyond are the fertile grazing and crop lands of the Llano Estacado, with its queen cities of Clovis and Portales. Here, deep wells pump underground waters to irrigate lush fields that produce peanuts, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, melons, strawberries, cucumbers, and grapes. On the plains beyond the reach of the wells, wheat, maize, and broomcorn are grown. Southeastward, oil derricks dot the plains, surrounding Hobbs and Lovington.

Westward from Roswell, U.S. Highways 70 and 380 run together up the rolling limestone hills west of the Pecos Valley before plunging down Picacho Hill into the narrow canyon of Rio Hondo. At Hondo they divide. U.S. Highway 380 leads northwestward through Lincoln town, Billy the Kid’s shooting grounds, into Capitan, over Indian Divide, and down into sleepy Carrizozo—paralleled by the forested peaks of Capitan Mountains to the north and overshadowed by mighty Sierra Blanca to the southwest. U.S. Highway 70 runs up the green canyon of Rio Ruidoso, past Ruidoso Downs, past State Highway 37 which leads to Ruidoso and the Sierra Blanca Ski Area, up into the ponderosa pines, crossing the divide at Apache Summit, then westward and downhill past Mescalero, paralleling Rio Tularosa. Suddenly the canyon widens, and ahead is the dry Tularosa Basin with the White Sands glistening in the far distance.

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