Vantage Points

While the big river is the namesake of the newly minted Rio Grande del Norte National Monument and certainly its crown jewel, it’s the Taos Plateau that beckons me.  The plateau, a swatch of arid scrub that stretches west 25 miles to San Antonio Mountain, is a flat desert punctuated by the occasional hillock and the faintest remnants of human occupation.  Two picturesque corrals and a couple of homesteads adorn TP 71 between the Rio Grande and Highway 285 and more are bound to be discovered as I return to those dry environs.

There’s nothing like the flats to showcase the snow capped Sangre de Cristos looming to the east and to accent the epic sky that I love so. Prompted by that sky I entered the Taos Plateau from the south on Gravel Pit Road and followed high lines to a batch of hippy built residences where a taut and sinewy cyclist was popping a wheelie.

Later above the John Dunn Bridge I followed a rutted path almost to the rim of the gorge to behold the epic show.