Cerro Pedernal

Standing 9,862 feet above sea level in the Jemez mountain range this is a major landmark in north-central New Mexico and just up the road from us. You can see this beautiful formation for miles before you ever get to it. The word "pedernal" is "flint" in Spanish. There are many colors of flint on this mountain and the natives gathered it there and used it for arrowheads and many tools. And it is still considered a very special place to them. The tower is a basalt shaft from a volcano left after eons of erosion worked on it's sides of softer rock.

Georgia O'keeffe painted it, called it her own, and her ashes were scattered there. She said "God told her that if she painted it often enough she could have it" and Cerro Pedernal is in over a dozen of her paintings. She also had a cassita at Ghost Ranch that had a view of the butte.. Many others have done what she did in painting it like my friend in Colorado who is a native Navajo from New Mexico, Al Livingston. His borrowed painting of Abiquiu Lake with Pedernal dominating the background hung in my house in Calhan, CO. This past December I was very excited when I saw Pedernal for the first time knowing I had the painting on my wall.

We can't see this very special butte from our house because we are so deep in the Rio Chama valley and the mountains to our south block the view. But crossing the road and walking just up the forest service road or driving home from Abiqui you can see it loom in the distance.

Here are just two shots of what we can see from the entrance to Copper Canyon. I will for sure be sharing many more pictures of this feature that dominate the skyline here. The hard part is being at the right spot at the right time. It seems that since I have been here it is usually very hazy or cloudy around the butte and the pictures haven't been very crisp.

Canyon del Cobres

I thought the canyon got it's name from the beautiful sandstones that have copper or yellow tones to them. However it was named because of four Spanish copper mines that were worked years ago. We have yet to find them. The canyon and this entire area were formed by a series of huge volcanic eruptions and flows and then years of erosion and upheaval. This entire region is made up of the Valles Caldera. The last recorded flow was 50,000 to 60,000 years ago. There were two caldera forming eruptions that took place 1.4 to 1.1 million years ago.

As you can tell from my previous pictures we are surrounded by fairly tall mountains and cliffs. But if you'd Google map this area you'd see just how large the caldera and impact of the explosion was. I am told that debris from the eruption can be found in substantial layers of soil as far as the Mississippi River.

Two weeks ago after Mark finally got me convinced to get outside and hike we headed up the arroyo behind our house. This is just one of several that drains the canyon. I was like a kid in a candy store looking at formations, pebbles, boulders, and the amazing array of colors in the sandstone deposits. I wish I was a geologist because we found a slew of different types of rocks and pebbles. There were flints, lava, mica, conglomerates, many different colors of quarts, of course sandstones, and a ton of others that we didn't know.

I always wanted to live in "Red Rock country" but I am very happy to live in an area that is so much more colorful. The pictures that Mark and I took can't begin to capture the colors, the beauty, or the scale. We took a hundred shots that day between us. It's very hard to pick just a few to share with you.

It all starts with some soils, some water, some wind, and of course a few million years!


Now can you see why I am not too upset that I don't live in the red rocks?




These lava formations were really amazing. Some looked like a sci-fi creature because of the erosion on them






In the distance is the red rock knife edge that has been in a couple other postings.


We have the biggest ravens I have ever seen. They have always intrigued me. This one decided to tag along with us for a short time.


Me on some of the yellow sandstone.


One of two dry waterfalls that become rushing torrents after a good rain. The erosion makes a beatiful place.






This is a nice red rock formation in the midst of other colors.


More beautiful colors.


Erosion can turn out some pretty suggestive forms. Or am I being bad?


I caught the indirect sunlight lighting up this cliff late in the day. This picture has not been touched up! This is the true color!


Our walk down the arroyo to home


That's it for this blog. In the next few days I will show you another set of cool views from this trip. But I want to focus on the subject matter a bit more.

Additions

I have always enjoyed going to hardware and feed stores. There is something that takes me back to being a kid and my grandpa making a big deal out of me going to one of them with him. I was always taken to the feed store to pick out chicks each Spring. I almost always was allowed to pick out a couple chicks that were of the more uncommon breeds to add to the flock and more than not they were of a Banty breed. His flocks consisted of egg laying and meat birds. More often than not he had Rhose Island Red, Dominique, Buff Orpington, and Leghorn. I usually had one or two banty roosters that I called "mine" but they were usually so full of themselves they'd send me running from the coop or yard. When I turned 17 I left the farm and began my life as a big city dweller and pushed on through life. Now I consider myself one of the luckiest people in the world to live a live back in the country. This isn't a farm we live on by any stretch but it's quite rural and has lots of room for animals. Of course a place wouldn't be home to me without chickens. Four weeks ago I brought home the Cuckoo Marans. This week when I went to the feed store they had Americaunas. Those are the chickens that lay the blue green eggs. If you followed my old blog you know that I already have some Americauna hens, and some pullets that are suppose to be the same. But since the pullets have matured more it's clear that I was sold a bill of goods. So I called Mark from the feed store and respectively made sure it was OK to bring some chicks home. That man really needs to learn that I shouldn't be allowed to go to the feed store alone!!! LOL! Anyway, I came home with 15 Americauna chicks last week. We have lost one that was a little weak since I got them home. The rest of the lot are doing quite nice. Here are some pictures to share with you.

Spring

I guess it doesn't take a whole lotta sense to figure out when Spring arrives. I am sure that all of you are enjoying it in some way or another. Hopefully all of you have been able to get out and really take it all in. For me in this new environment of New Mexico it feels like Mother Nature just cranked up the volume on my senses. Of course there were signs a few weeks ago. The twigs of the willow trees are yellowed up and the reds were really becoming pronounced on the Coyote Willow along the river and asequias. The willow trees were first to leaf out and now our elms are doing the same. the The grass seed that Mark has so diligently planted and cared for like a new born began sprouting and the few spots that it was established began to grow. The chickens started giving us a few more eggs daily. The snow has nearly all melted on the mountains near us. Our native wildflower seeds have sprouted in the many flats we have going. The eight varieties of heirloom tomatoes have shot up and we just repotted them. The lettuces, carrots, spinach, and radishes have finally broken ground. Of course the Cuckoo Maran chicks came home with me four weeks ago are a really flourishing. My cactus collection is greening up and small flower buds are developing on some of them. This week the gate was opened on the asequia and we can now listen to a quite rush of water twenty four hours a day. But what really made a difference was a weekend of occasional rains. Mostly at night, but it was slow and gentle. This morning I went out to check on the Cuckoo chicks, open up the coop door for the big chickens, and throw grains like I do each morning and my nose went into overdrive with the smells of spring. The deep rich smell of the soil was most prominent in the air. I think if you are a gardener like me you begin to develop a nose for soils over the years. The soil in Georgia that I gardened in had a mild scent. The soil in Colorado had a hard woody scent. The soil here has a deep rich sandy, loamy scent. (I know some of you are rolling your eyes and thinking I now should be committed) There is a very mild scent of sage and juniper in the air too. When the sun warms it more I am very sure that I'll be enjoying that deep scent that reminds me of this region. I have had a love for this region since childhood and I am about as happy as can be knowing that I am finally experiencing life and culture here.

Some additions

As if I didn't have enough going on in my life I decided to bring home twenty chicks on Tuesday. We've been talking about getting some chickens that lay darker brown eggs than the ones we have. Brown eggs seem to be very popular here. So I have been waiting for over two months for the feed store to get these girls in. They are a breed called Cuckoo Maran that originally comes from France. Our hope is to order Copper Marans or Blue Marans sometime soon. They lay the darkest brown egggs you've ever seen. The catch is that the Coppers and Blues cost a hefty $10.00 per chick, they are unsexed, and the minimum order is twenty-five chicks!

These are our Cuckoo Maran pullet chicks


This is what the adult birds look like. With a lot of luck I got all hens this time around. Chances are good I'll end up with a couple roosters even though the chicks are sexed at the hatchery. Sexing seems to be a secret of the Gods or one left only to a very select group of people.

The views

I know that I am way behind in sharing photos and stories of this new life I am living. It seems that there is rarely time to sit down and write or spend any time blogging. The process can be pretty time consuming and we have so many other projects that priorities have to be made. Here's a quick view of the way the property sits. Pictures of the house itself will be coming later.

This is looking South down our lane from U.S. Highway 84. Everytime I come home from a crazy day in Santa Fe or Espanola I always, always take a second to take in this view. I am always kind of energized when I see these mountains.


Mark will be disappointed that I used this picture because it really doesn't capture the colors of the sandstones we look at each day. This is our view from the back porch looking North. It's the mouth and the arroyo to Canon del Cobres. This picture doesn't begin to capture the breath taking sight you find after you crest that area of red and yellow on the mountain sides. Photos of the canyon itself are for later. In the foreground is a brush and cactus filled field and then the highway is hidden (yeah!) behind it. Immediately across the road is Forestry Service road that accesses the canyon. It might be about 200yds from the house.


This photo is looking to the South from the back porch. In the foreground is the roof of our old shed, then about 100yds away the roof of a neighbor. Behind the neighbor is the Rio Chama and these mountains are at the shoreline of the river. All totalled it's maybe half a mile away at the most.


This is looking West off the back porch. On the left is my very rigged up chicken coop. To the right is our little adobe building we call the capilla (or chapel). We have hopes of restoring it sometime soon. Behind both buildings is the arroyo the a couple farms, then the ridge line that eventually becomes the dam for the Abiquiu Reservoir.


We don't see much to the East off our front porch. That's where the lane to the house is and then a field of small trees, brush, and the ruins of an old adobe structure.