Silver City to Kingston, NM 48 challenging, uphill miles! 3/19/10

We all enjoyed our day off yesterday, but today we are facing the challenge of climbing the Southern Rockies of New Mexico!

As we fuel up with scrambled eggs and sausages in the motel breakfast area, the topic of the day is the cold weather to start the day, and the potential of hills and wind. After pumping up tires and gathering favorite snacks set out by Linda, our chef, Mike, Alayna and I took off. We try to get out as early as possible each day.

  The temperature was a balmy 28 degrees, and it had rained during the night.

 The pavement was dry, but there were metal cattle crossings that were frosted with ice, so we had to be very careful.

We started out our day biking uphill out of Silver City. It is difficult to make those hills without a warm up, but it didn’t take long.

As we headed toward the mountains, we left the main road for Hwy 152, the Black Range Highway, and it is obvious we are in for a change of scenery. Before the wilderness area, we came upon the Santa Rita open pit copper mine.

We are headed for the peak, Emory Pass, elevation 8,840 ft. The roads seem to be either steep uphill or sort of uphill. Occasionally there is a welcome downhill, but we know we are going to “pay” for those respites with more uphill!

We stopped at the look out at the "Kneeling Nun" monument.  The stone formation in the distance kind of looks like a kneeling nun.

We get into a zone of cadence and gear as we plod upwards. The road surface was excellent. I started to notice the sights and sounds of wind in the tall pines, the rushing of the snow melt streams, the smell of the pines, and hawks sailing on the updrafts.  I happened to look up the high wall of rock, and noticed this: 

The wind is not as strong as we feared, but the direction did not matter. There were so many switch backs on the roads, we had wind coming from every direction at one time or another. At some clearings we could see forever, and we could see rain coming down off in the distance.

We finally reached Emory Pass, and I have to admit the cheers of those who arrived ahead, plus the trailer with Carol and Linda combined with the effort it took to get there, brought me to tears of relief!

Karen, Mike and I walked up to the look out of Emory Pass, and we had to admit it was worth the climb.

As we left Emory Pass, Carol and Linda both warned us (again!) to take it easy going downhill the 8 miles into Kingston. It took us all day to get up there, and the ride down was full of switchbacks coming at us much faster than when we were grinding uphill to get there. The three of us left, and were breaking every five seconds to slow our decent. I had to make sure my pedals were up in the direction of the turns. There is no shoulder on this two lane road, but the traffic was very considerate to us. By the time we arrived at the turn for the lodge, our hands were sore from braking so much!

 

(Can you find the bikers? left side)

(Those at the end of the pack were caught by rain and snow. Carol and Linda had waited at Emory Pass for the last riders, but had no idea the change in the weather just a few miles down! Even when they arrived, some of them refused to be “bumped” down to the lodge. They made it just fine…tired, very cold, but happy.)

The Black Mountain Ranch Lodge is an amazing place. It is very old – parts of it dates back to 1880 – and it is filled with many small, eclectic bedrooms. Several of us were assigned to the house across the street, and I enjoyed a room to myself. The lodge owners made a wonderful turkey dinner for us.

Carol, Linda and others played pool, and Amy taught others “Apples to Apples” game.

At our nightly cue sheet meeting before dinner, it was announced we climbed over 4,115 ft in 48 miles today!

Tomorrow is 88 miles to Las Cruces, New Mexico.