Baca Spring
Type: Scout
Date: Monday, 02 February 2009
Time: 1300 – 1600 hours
Location: Launch site is approximately 1.5 miles north of the junction of US 60 and NM 36 in Quemado, New Mexico.
USGS Coordinate:
34 Deg 21’ 29”N
108 Deg 28’37”W
Elev 7012’
There is room for several rigs, vehicles and horse trailers, just inside the gate on the north side of the highway. Land Status: BLM
Target: Baca Spring.
GNIS coordinate:
34 Deg 22’ 46”N
108 Deg 28’ 48” W
Elev. 7296’
USGS Map Ref: Mariano Springs 7.5’ Quadrangle
Coordinate:
34 Deg 24’ 46.1”N
108 Deg 28’ 46.1”W
Elev 7300’
BLM 1:100,000 Land Status Map: Quemado, New Mexico 1983
Land Status: BLM* The area is a mix of BLM and private. I contacted the private land owner and asked permission to cross private ground horseback. Land owner does not want quads or any other mechanized travel crossing his ground. If you are planning a private ride in this area, contact Far Rider for information. Email: far_rider@live.com
GPS: Recommend settings at NAD27 for use with USGS quadrangle maps. Check the map datum information in the lower left of the map sheet. Virtually all USGS maps are set at the NAD27 datum.
http://rockyweb.cr.usgs.gov/outreach/gps/gps_questions_and_answers.html
http://www.maptools.com/UsingUTM/mapdatum.html
Note: The westering coordinates can be over 200 yards off and northing can be several hundred yards off if the map datum on your GPS is set to the wrong standard.
Weather: Upper 50s. Slight breeze SW (note: wind directions always indicate what direction the wind is blowing FROM). Clear.
Posse: Far Rider, Stryker, Lancer, Caesar
Narrative:
We arrived at the launch site at 1300 hours. Stryker was saddled and Lancer was saddle packed. It was a perfect day for the ride and though the location is close to the ranch, it is a piece of country I have never seen. Can’t have that. The spring, summer and autumn hard riding season is approaching and the horses, Caesar’s paws and I need to get hard and fit for the long hours in the saddle.
Lancer gets nervous in a trailer and short hauls are a good way to acclimate him to the scary business of traveling in a side by side. Rides like this are great because everything that is done on a longer ride, with the exception of night picketing is done. The horses are loaded into the trailer, transported to a strange area, unloaded, saddled, ridden, and returned to the trailer for the trip home. Doesn’t seem like much, but horses need to know how to do this. It is part of the required skill set that horses must have, at least for hanging out with me.
A word about “Scouts.” I use the term “Scout” when I am working out a new piece of country by horseback as opposed to VR, recon, or patrol all of which terms have specified and bounded meanings. Maps tell but a small part of the tale. Here in New Mexico, as in most of the modern American West, land is fenced with lots of locked gates – if you can even find a gate. This country was settled by sheep herders and bean farmers and they just did not believe in gates. Growing up in the land the Spanish once called the Northern Mystery, fences were few as it was open range, and locks were considered rude. On what fences there were, a gate was mandated every mile and gates were in all the corners. It was the only way a cowboy could find his way home in a blizzard. Two of my many prejudices are sheep – next to turkeys, the dumbest critters on God’s green earth - and bean farmers. Sheepmen put up boxwire fencing with no gates and bean farmers turn the grass upside down. This is cow country. Leave it the hell alone.
A Scout is not a fun ride for social or urban raised riders. Often, I find myself wired out, rim rocked, locked out, or dealing with man made hazards like downed barbed wire, trash, toxic ground (southern New Mexico and Arizona especially due to illegal alien traffic), and even clandestine drug operations. It requires back tracking, walking or climbing and leading horses over ground you would not ride because of a fence or a locked gate. But, my worst day riding is better than my best day doing anything else.
Some days, the simplest things go south when horses are involved. It took me three tries to get my saddle with the britching on Lancer. Every time I threw the saddle across him, it moved the saddle blanket. I worry about soring my horses, so I had to pull the saddle off and try again. Jeeeez.
I managed to finally get the horses saddled, my chaps and gun belt on and was about to put the hackamore on Stryker when Caesar lit up. It was his “Come quick Dad, somebody’s comin’” bark. I peeked over Stryker’s hip and saw Bub driving through the highway gate. Bub has the cow permit for this BLM land. I walked up and said “Howdy.” He said he didn’t recognize the rig and wondered who was back in here. It is public ground, but it was wise for him to check as it is his money that is climbing around the country getting ready to drop their spring calves.
He explained a bit of the lay of the land to me and said that back in 1958, a T-38 Trainer had crashed on top of the escarpment that drops off to the west. He noted that they had recovered thirty-three pounds of the pilot to tag, bag and haul out. I’ll just bet. I have responded to several plane crashes as a law enforcement ranger and plane wrecks sure do make folks just fly apart. He also said there were still bits and pieces of the wreckage scattered about.
Bub departed and I slipped the hackamore on Stryker. Gathering up Lancer’s lead we lined out up the draw to find Baca Spring. Born and raised in the wild country of the American West, I am obsessed with water sources, especially for my animals, so looking for springs, wells and water points are good excuses for wandering around new country.
Baca Arroyo is a pretty canyon, unless you are from Tennessee or other places that have lots of green and the bugs to go with it. The canyon walls are compacted mud stone, sandstone and conglomerate rock. Natural desert grasses cover the red dirt meadows cut by arroyos and separated by small hills dotted with cedar. In the sandy wash bottoms of the canyon floor, there are tall, dense thickets of annual brush that is dry and ugly at this time of year.
We located a two track leading up a small ridge that would take us up and around towards Baca Spring and get us up out of the soft sand fetlock deep on the canyon floor. I rested the horses at the crest of the gentle ridge as they are fat from three months of little riding and good eating to keep them warm during the bad weather and snows of December and early January. We continued on and the two track quit in a washout and the horses snorted and skidded down the rutted path. Looking to the west, the oblong concrete drinker that marked Baca Spring was right where it was supposed to be according to the USGS map. Moss was growing in the cold, clear water and the nightly formed ice was all melted for the day. Stepping off, I dropped Stryker’s mecate and gave Lancer enough lead line to put their noses to the water. It is a pretty spot, boggy and muddy from the spring overflow on the south side that Caesar immediately made it his business to tromp through. Unless you are a horseman travelling in empty country, you cannot imagine how much it means to come to such a source of life giving water, especially here in the desert Southwest. A hand dug well covered with tin lies a few yards west and there is an abandoned barbed wire fence around the original dirt tank that was dug to hold the spring water. Bad place for horses because of all the downed wire.
The horses were sweating a bit due to their heavy winter coats and the climb up the canyon. It was enough for their first real ride of the year and we began the return trip to the launch site.
The eastern wall of the main canyon is a long series of broken ridges. As we ambled eastward I could see the faintest sign of a trail heading up the side of the ridge. An unmarked trail is more than I can stand to pass up. We crossed the sandy bottom of the canyon and began working up the side of the ridge until I found a cattle and game trail. It was ten inches wide, steep and rocky. I see no reason for my horse to pack me up such a trail and if one of them tips over, I don’t want to be on the downhill side if we fall off the mountain. Taking two loose wraps around the horn with Lancer’s lead rope and leading Stryker we set off. By the time we reached the top, we were all breathing hard. My brand new titanium knee put in last October performed flawlessly.
The view was great. 50 miles eastward stretched the long jagged line of the Saw Tooth Mountains. To the southeast snow covered Allegre Mountain reared over 11,000 feet, and Escondido Mountain, a thousand feet or so less stood sentry to the south. Lots of country. Very few people. A good place to live but not for the faint of heart or those that need urban conveniences.
Time to head for the home corrals. The top of the ridge is typical of this country. Covered with volcanic brecia, it is hell to walk on for men and horses. There is no place a horse or man can step without being on a fist sized or larger stone. I don’t want to cripple my horses so I continued to lead them and we turned back to the northwest and worked our way down the steep slope to the canyon floor. Blisters burned on both feet when I stepped back into the saddle and the horses were grateful for the soft sand as we proceeded south to the horse trailer and the trip home.
By 1600 hours, the horses were unsaddled, damp backs curried, trailer loaded and we were heading home. The sun was still an hour an a half above the western horizon but the temperature quickly dropped into the forties promising another cold night in the low teens.
It would require several more rides to work out ways to get down or around the Mariano Escarpment so that I can ride over to Ken and Lisa’s place where they raise Rocky Mountain Horses and there is always a cold beer available.
Pavorotti’s incomparable voice and the brisk afternoon breeze filled the cab as we made our way north. My urban friends tell me the wonders of the new malls, restaurants, cinemas, and so forth. They have no idea just how deprived they are.
Far Rider
See to your weapons and stand to your horses
