the Zuni Mountains

hen you're driving along Interstate 40 between Albuquerque and Flagstaff, the scenery ranges from beautiful to boring, but mostly it all seems like different variations on high desert. There are stretches of cliffs and mesas, expanses of nothing but dunes and scrub, and miles of crusty black volcanic cinders. So it may come as a surprise that a few miles east of Gallup and a dozen miles south of the freeway, there are huge meadows and forests of aspen and ponderosa pines. And killer singletrack.

I ventured that way for a long weekend recently. The weather was unsettled when I arrived, the mountains socked in with threatening clouds, so I played it safe on Day 1 and rode the always-fun High Desert Trail north of Gallup.

The scenery is classic New Mexico:




I only saw one other rider all day:





And just one hiker, moving slowly but with determination:



On Saturday I headed up into the Zunis and met up with the enigmatic Bill Siebersma, consumate mountain biker, trail builder, and the driving force behind Gallup Trails 2010. His son Mike, also a mountain biker, was visiting.

It was 45 degrees and threatening rain, but no one asked whether we were riding or not. Bill drove us out to Twin Springs and we began enjoying the abundant singletrack.



The trail cruised along a long exposed shelf of Navajo sandstone, the southernmost expression of the Colorado Plateau.





We also rolled through some stands of aspens in full glory:





Iris the trail dog had a great day.




Sunday the weather turned nice and we hit the trails again. Lower Sawmill to Quaking Aspen to Plush Trail to Torreon to a beer at Bill's cabin. Life is Good!






An exceptionally huge alligator juniper:






You can thank this guy for these buff trails and the signage. If we all did one-tenth of the trail work that he does, New Mexico would be a true mountain biking Mecca.



Thanks for looking!