Jemez Mountains

More specifically, the East Fork of the Jemez River.  For those of you that live almost anywhere other than the Southwest you have a different vision of rivers than we do.  I remember when we went over the Rio Grande the first time.  We went over the whole river and kept driving thinking that what we just went over was a tributary of the Rio Grande, nope, it WAS the Rio Grande, quite a disappointment.  This year New Mexico is in its third year of drought.  I believe we have received approximately 9” of precipitation over the last two years.  Our average precipitation to start with is only 9” a year so you can imagine what the rivers or former rivers are looking like.

Byron, the fly fisherman of the two of us, and me, the photographer, get together every so often to fish and photograph while hiking.  We both have a great time doing our things and check in with each other to see how the fishing and photography is going.

This part Jemez River is very small, we hiked along a section probably a dozen or so miles down from its origin.  The Jemez has run out of the Valles Caldera and winds its way between the rock ledges on its way to the Rio Grande.  The river here is very clear with occasional deep, 2 – 4’ deep pools.  The river valley is wide and open with the river meandering back and forth from one side of the valley to the other.  A number of bridges makes this a dry hike although at some point the bridges run out and if one wants to explore further you will have to get wet, at least your shoes will.

The grass along the river is fully green.  It turns out we are too early for both the trout and the flowers.  Byron could attest to the coldness of the water retrieving lines that got caught in the occasional bush, on the opposite side of the river of course.  We ran into a number of fly fishermen and women that were having the same bad luck.  I had better luck with the photography but did not find any blooming flowers.  I just made do with all the rock formations and river scenes.

After about two miles and two hours of activity we decided to turn around and try a different portion of the river.  (Next posting)

On our way out we ran into a group of women rock climbing along the side of the river.  One of the women in this group is the instructor.  Look closely, you can see two climbers on the wall.  We watched for a while and both of us decided that we already have enough hobbies.

Thank you for stopping by.

Mark