New Mexico Road Trip - Silver City Day 2

Saturday, November 2, 2024

It’s our second full day in Silver City and we’re going to do Scenic Byway #21 and visit the ghost town of Mogollon (Mogollon is pronounced "moh" + "guh" + "yohn").  We did our usual morning routine and were on the road just before ten heading north out of town on US 180.

Once again, we were driving through very desolate and sparsely populated terrain.  We drove through the small towns of Cliff, Buckhorn and Pleasanton without seeing any services except for Chuck’s Folly in Cliff.  We were tempted to stop and learn how Chuck’s Folly got its name, but we had other things to do.  Although the land was very stark, there was beauty in its starkness.

Highway 180 north of Silver City

The Mogollon Mountains had been east of us for the entire drive and kept getting closer and closer.  We reached the town of Glenwood that was a bit of a resort town and had all services, except for food, as the café wasn’t open.  Just ahead was our turnoff onto NM 159 and the start of Scenic Byway #21.

Entering Glenwood

The turnoff to the Catwalk Recreation Area where we'll eat lunch later today.

The turn off to Mogollon and the start of Scenic Byway 21.

After getting on 159, the first couple of miles were just a normal paved road, but as we started to wind up into the mountains, the road, while still paved, became very narrow and just one lane wide as it twisted and turned up into the mountains.  Luckily for us there was no traffic, so we never had to try to squeeze past an oncoming car.  It was only ten miles to Mogollon, but it took more than a half hour to get there.

The road started out as a nice two lane paved road, but it soon narrowed and got twisty as we got into the mountains.

Finally, after reaching an altitude of over 7500 feet, we started descending into a narrow canyon and the old ghost town of Mogollon.  Mogollon boomed during the mid to late 1800s because of the discovery of gold, silver and other minerals, but the mines were all played out and most of its inhabitants had left by the early 1900s.  As mineral prices fluctuated, the town went through several revivals over the years, but today it is mainly deserted with only 15 residents still there.

As we entered the town, we could see a lot of abandoned buildings with some evidence that there were still some people living there, but for the most part, everything was empty.  We found a place to park and walked back through the town taking pictures of the old buildings and just enjoying the old west flavor.  There were a few other tourists walking around, but otherwise the town seemed deserted.

Entering Mogollon

We saw a building called Mogollon Woodworks and it had an "Open" sign on the door and fortunately for us, we went in.  There we met Niels Mandoe who was originally from Denmark and had lived in Mogollon for 30 years.  The bottom floor of the building was his woodshop where he built wood furniture and household items.  They were very well crafted and of course, all were handmade by Niels.

Mogollon Woodworks

We spent a lot of time talking to him about the town and his life.  He was very nice, and it was fascinating to talk to him.  He and his wife lived upstairs, with his shop below.  He told us there were several other businesses in town catering to the curious who make their way to this isolated town, but they were closed for the season.  Before we left Val couldn’t resist buying a cutting board so now we’ll have something to remember Neils and our trip to Mogollon by.  

I put this picture in for my brother.  Woodworking is his hobby and he is very good, and our home has many nice things that he had built for us.  It seemed like every Christmas he wanted some sort of clamps and we used to joke about it.  When I mentioned that to Niels he said very seriously, "you can never have enough clamps" and said he had many more than these.

Some of Niels' work.

Val and Niels with her new cutting board.

Just before we left, Neils told us we should visit the cemetery that was outside of town, so we headed off towards that.  He said to turn left on the road just past the log cabin and told us to ignore the “Private Road” sign as that was just “local politics” as the road was a forest service road.  The cemetery was only a mile away, but it was very steep and rough.  I don’t think you’d need four-wheel drive to drive it, but I would recommend a high clearance vehicle as it seemed pretty rough and rocky for a passenger car.

There's the log cabin ...

and the turnoff onto Cemetery Road.

We found the old cemetery

The trip to the cemetery was well worth the trip up the rough road.  The cemetery is not laid out in any order just randomly place graves.  Some have iron fences around them with some in groups.  It was pretty fascinating to walk around the and look at some of the graves as many of them had things written on them including the cause of death and it seemed like there weren’t many that just died of old age.  I believe there were 127 graves there dating back to the 1870s and as late as recent times.

One particular grave touched us as it was for an 18-year-old girl named Susie Hand who had died in 1895.  The touching thing about this was a newer looking iron bench that was next the grave with a small sign saying this would be their last trip to the grave as they just couldn't make the trip again to keep up the grave and hoped that someone else would take over the caretaking. Eerily, the note was dated only a couple of weeks before today.  We didn’t know if this was some distant relative or just someone who felt responsible, but it made it kind of personal and it touched us both and made us sad.

This grave really touched us.  First off it was an 18 year old girl named Susie Hand who had died in 1895 and you could tell by what was written on the tombstone that she was beloved to her family.

After reading this sign, we realized the bench by the grave had only been put there a few weeks ago.  Someone was still looking after her grave after 129 years, but the really touching part of this was on the next sign.

S Brooks had been driving from Abilene, Texas (a 1,300 mile round trip drive) every year since 1974 to take care of this grave and was now probably getting too old to do it anymore.  The sign said they were hoping someone would take over for him or her.  This was very touching and made this young woman's death seem very real to us.  Was this person a stranger who visited the cemetery like we are doing and was touched by this young girl's death and wanted to do something or was it a distant relative keeping family memories alive?  We'll never know, but we will always remember this grave and Susie Hand.

We spent quite a bit of time wandering through the cemetery, but we had to move on, so we made our way back to the town.  The road west out of town turned to dirt as it headed further into the mountains.  We drove it for a bit, but I had read that it was closed for the winter ahead, so we didn’t bother going very far. 

We turned around and drove back through town, but just before we left, we saw someone picking something up off the road, and being curious, we stopped to ask him what he was doing, and it turned out he had a YouTube channel and was using a small drone while filming in Mogollon.  Although he was alone today, the channel is about him and his family going on overlanding adventures.  You can see Joe's channel at "The Day We Make - GO. LIVE. TRAVEL". 

Here's where we met Joe as he was retrieving his drone.

We had a very interesting chat with him talking about travel and comparing notes on places we’d been and things we’d seen, and then we headed back to the main highway.  It was getting late, and we still hadn’t eaten, so we started looking for a place called the Catwalk Recreation Area that was just outside of Glenwood and found the turnoff and drove back into the area.

The drive back down to Highway 180.

The Catwalk is part of a trail that follows Whitewater Creek up through a slot canyon.  The trail is a mile and quarter long and about half of it is a suspended metal walkway, hence the name “the Catwalk”.

The end of the road.  The picnic area and the start of the trail.

At the beginning of the trail to the Catwalk area there was a very nice picnic area, so we had our lunch there and then started out on the trail.  It was a short walk, but after our walk yesterday our legs were both a little heavy.  With the combination of the altitude and us being a bit out of shape, these walks are harder than they should be.  We made it to the end, and it was pretty interesting, but we didn’t spend much time there and returned to the parking area and our car.

We thought this would be a short day, but it was five by the time we got back to Silver City.  We had another late lunch today and figured we wouldn’t be very hungry again tonight, so we decided to stop and pick up a couple bowls of chili from Wendy's to eat later.

After returning to our hotel, we took a brief rest and then gathered some laundry we had to do.  The guest laundry was out of service, but the front desk told us we could use the hotel laundry and escorted us back to that area.  We got our laundry started and returned to our room.  We had several loads to do, but we were tired and decided to do only one load tonight. 

After several trips back to the laundry rooms, we were finally done with our laundry and were ready for dinner.  There was a microwave in the room, but the chili was still warm enough to eat and surprisingly quite good.  I’m not a big fan of Wendys, but I would eat their chili again.

Tonight is the end of daylight savings time meaning we’ll have an extra hour of sleep tonight, so we ended up staying up a little bit later than usual relaxing in our room.  Tomorrow is a free day for us before our push for home.

We thought today would be a short day, but we spent a lot more time than expected in Mogollon, but it was well worth it.  If you are ever in the area, be sure to visit Mogollon.

Scenic Drives Completed: 28 of 35

Scenic Drives Missed: 3