City of Rocks State Park

Making Sandwiches.  Lecturing Jef.

We had a few more days to kill before our date with Carlsbad Caverns.  While staying at KOA campgrounds is nice for sure, it wasn't really the experience we wanted for the whole trip.  So, we took a look at the map and I picked out City of Rocks State Park in New Mexico.  It was just a little drive from our place in Las Cruces, and looked pretty interesting.  Having a 2 hour drive instead of a half-day drive was nice, and getting into the destination at lunchtime instead of dinnertime was also really great.  Sarah was kind enough to make sandwiches, but I think she would have really preferred to stay looking out the window at the scenery.  (Added to the fact that I was a little curt since I was so hungry, and didn't communicate well about hunger levels, etc etc.)  We all survived the trip to the park intact.  Barely.

Checking out the rock wall

I picked this park because it looked like it had a few neat things to do, and we were looking for some hiking.  My expectations were low - the website didn't advertise a whole lot of hiking trails, and aside from the rocks, there wasn't much to do.

I think the website really undersold the park.  This park was really gorgeous.  The geology was very interesting, and different than some of the areas (limestone) we'd traveled through over the past week.

Peek-a-boo

The park was formed by ancient volcanoes - the rocks are either classic volcanic rock (red/brown porous) or what looks like compressed grey ash filled with white and brown crystalline inclusions.  I spent some time looking at one of the walls near the visitor center where a good cross section of the park's rocks was on display.

This park is also really interesting because the area was very volcanically active throughout time.  The rock pinnacles are eroded volcanic matter, most likely carved out by water and wind over a long period of time.  Several times on our hikes I found xenoliths - likely from other nearby volcanoes which, according to the ranger, can throw rocks hundreds of miles.

After making camp, we took a stroll up to a lookout where Sarah enjoyed a rock monument.  The trail was switchback up a steep hill, and the view was really nice - overlooking the rock pinnacles that made up the park as well as a nearby mountain.  It would have been a much nicer walk if Sarah hadn't chosen to throw rocks at me while I was trying to get a picture of a nearby windmill!

Throwing rocks at me!

Friendly Campers and their Cat

We took a stroll around the park at sunset and met a nice couple with a very interesting cat.  She was a rescue cat - someone was attempting to make a new breed.  Part siamese, part bengal, and part persian.  She appeared to be quite the hunter - apparently, on her harness and leash, she'd managed to capture half a dozen chipmunks in the last month or so.  She was very interested in a nearby hill of fire ants - I think she was outclassed.  Very cool, and seeing campers who'd brought their pets along was kind of neat.  Not sure that would work for our critters.

The next day we set off to climb a nearby mountain.  We were told there was a trail to follow, and quickly discovered a couple of cairns to follow.  Unfortunately, after a bit, these became more and more spotty, until we were off trail with no clear route up the mountain in sight.  Additionally, a nearby full-sized bull (complete with foot long horns) was keeping its eye on us.  We decided to make our own way up the mountain, picking a rock-filled gully to follow up to the first ledge.  Once up on the first ledge, we found the trail again, and followed this up to the peak.  The view was really great - we got some great pictures of the campground from the top of the peak.

I really enjoyed the hike because it exposed many layers of rocks, each one slightly different.  It was apparent that some layers were sturdier than others - the mountain had two distinct layers which resisted erosion well and then many layers inbetween made of different types of volcanic rock which didn't resist erosion as well.  I took several samples of rocks to the ranger station to ask about how they were formed.  One was clearly not from the area and was probably from a nearby volcano which had thrown the rock quite a ways to land on the trail where we were hiking.


That night we took another stroll at the golden hour to get some pictures of the rocks in the park and the sunset.  I was happy with the results.  On the way back, Sarah did her best impression of a Japanese Game Show, which was entertaining.  We spent some time looking for the milky way, but the moon was too bright.  I did manage to get a few more pictures of the park at twilight, which I was pretty happy with.