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After many recent cold winter mountaineering outings, the prospect of warm
weather hiking suddenly had an appeal when Leah and I decided to
head for Oklahoma. Driving East on NM 546, we did not expect the highway to become dirt,
but it added to the charm of the mesa system that extends much of Northern New Mexico.
The day was indeed outstanding. Getting out of the car at 11:00am, the first 2.5 miles were
on relatively flat terrain and enjoyable. Soon enough, the old jeep tracks headed to the South
for a final turn towards the switchbacks.
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The photo on the left shows the switchbacks viewed from the North. I had read some
reports that this section was troubling but wasn't surprised to find that we ascended to the
top of the Mesa in 10 minutes from the base. More flat terrain lay ahead, and I knew the marker
had to be a fair distance off because we had only been hiking for one hour on this 4.2 mile one-way
hike. A few yellow "High Point" signs lined the trail to the Southwest. Finally the monolithic
summit marker peeped up from the Horizon. I was surprised to see how large mountains in Eastern New Mexico
were from this vantage.
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For extra credit, I attempted to ascend the man-made monolith, but found the top to be
less flat than I expected, and covered with pennies. Hanging out in the nice weather for a while,
we descended back to our vehicle with little incident. This was Leah's 4th Highpoint.
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