New Mexico Road Trip - Silver City Day 1

 Friday, November 1, 2024

Today is our first full day in Silver City, and our drive will take us up into the Black Mountains to the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument via The Trail of the Mountain Spirits National Scenic Byway.  As usual we were up around eight and after getting ready and having some breakfast, we were on our way.  We first had to stop and get gas and then replenish our lunch supplies at a market, but we were finally on the scenic byway heading up into the mountains.  This byway is a loop with a spur that leads up to Gila Cliff Dwellings.

Today we are doing Scenic Byways 22 and 31.  Yesterday we came into Silver City from the east on Scenic Byway 23 and the bottom part of Scenic Byway 22.

 

Utah Highway 15, the west side of the loop is a paved narrow winding road that started at an altitude of 6000 feet and went as high as 8600 feet with plenty of ups and downs along the way.  It was a beautiful drive through some pretty isolated country.  As we neared Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument, we started to see some ranches along the Gila River and just before we entered the National Monument we found the very small town of Gila Hot Springs.

Utah Highway 15 is part of Scenic Byway 22.

Turning right ahead will take us down the east side of the Scenic Byway 22 loop, but we'll be taking the spur to the left to Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument.

 

 

 

After entering the national monument, we stopped at the visitor’s center where we walked through the displays and watched a 15-minute video on the cliff dwellings.  Here is some information on the ruins from the New Mexico Tourism website. 

 “The cliff dwellings were primarily built in the 1280's. These Pueblo people built their homes in natural caves and in the open. There are examples of both types of settlements in the monument area.  Gila Cliff Dwelling National Monument offers a glimpse of the homes and lives of the people of the Mogollon culture who lived there from the 1280's through the early 1300's. Containing 533 acres, the monument was established on November 16, 1907. The dwellings are located forty-four miles north of Silver City, New Mexico, on Highway 15.”

Arriving at the visitor's center.

Even though the trail up to the ruins was only a mile long loop, it was moderately difficult because of the altitude gain and much of the steepest climb is old rock uneven steps of varying height that take a bit of scrambling to get to the ruins.  This was a concern for Val as after two knee and a hip replacement, these kinds of trails are difficult for her.  We talked to the rangers and the rangers said the climb was pretty difficult and suggested taking the loop clockwise as the first section has only a gradual altitude gain and not too many steps.

From the visitors center we drove up to the ruins trailhead and Val decided to give it a try.  At first the going was pretty easy, but we finally did hit the steep part and Val decided to go on.  We made it about halfway up the step section, before we decided it wasn’t safe for Val to continue.  We did get to see the ruins, but we didn’t make it far enough to actually walk into them.  It didn’t really matter as we have visited many ruins over the years.  I have to give Val a lot of credit for getting as far as she did, it wasn’t easy, I was very proud of her for the effort.

The trail to the ruins begins

Our first look at the ruins.

It got quite a bit rougher and steeper after this, so we turned back.

For her effort, Val got a Junior Ranger Badge from the ranger.  There probably aren't very many 76 year old Junior Rangers.

We walked back to the car and by this time it was after two and we were getting hungry, so we drove down and found a Gila National Forest campground with picnic tables and had a very nice lunch.  The day started out with quite a few clouds, but by mid-afternoon the clouds were mostly gone, and we had a sunny day.  We lingered a bit over lunch as it was a nice spot and as I said, a very nice day.

Finally, we headed back down towards Silver City, and after about 20 miles we turned onto Utah highway 35 that was the east side of the loop and continued on down.   

 

We're turning left onto Utah 35, the eastern side of the scenic loop

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Our day wasn’t done yet as there was another scenic byway on our list that would take us over to a couple of ghost towns.  We found the road and got started off on this scenic byway called The Black Range to Chloride.

The start of Scenic Byway 31

The road was a 70 mile long dirt forest service road and before long we realized we weren’t going to have enough time do the entire drive.  We had spent a lot more time than expected at the ruins and by now it was 4:00.  Not only did we not have time to drive this slow-going road another 70 miles, at the end we had to either turn around and come back or take an alternate route that was even longer.

As we have had to do several times, we drove on a little further and then turned around and headed back.  We got back on the main road and drove back down to Silver City.  This part of the loop we a much better road and wasn’t nearly as isolated as there were houses, ranches and recreational areas along it.

We had again bit off more than we could chew for the day and had to turn around after doing only half of Scenic Byway 31.

Back to Utah 35 and the final leg of Scenic Byway 22.

 

We made it back to our hotel room around 5:30 tired but happy, we had had a very good day.  Since we had eaten lunch so late, we weren’t very hungry so settled for some leftover snacks from lunch and then relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Today was a very good day and we really enjoyed it.  Seeing the ruins was a real bonus and the drive through such beautiful countryside was great.  Tomorrow, we have another long scenic drive to take, but this one will be mostly paved.  We are actually getting towards the end of our list scenic byways, hard to believe.

Scenic Drives Completed: 27 of 35

Scenic Drives Missed: 3