Wait, that is not a fun fact. It is a terrifying fact. 70 square miles in 11 hours. This was the Las Conchas fire and it burned to the very edge of Los Alamos, which had to be evacuated for about a week.
It has been 3 years since Las Conchas and we visited the area, driving down the flank of the Jemez volcano on Forest Road 289, skirting the western edge of the Dome Wilderness and eastern edge of the Medio Dia canyon. Trees from the first fire still stand, silhouetted against the sky and contrasting with the abundant wildflowers thriving in the extra sunshine and this year's rainfall. We saw a few mammals, including one juvenile bighorn ram. A couple hummingbirds buzzed Cyndi, a few quail fled into the underbrush and a hopeful vulture followed us for a while. The views through the open fire-scape were awesome.
Medio Dia canyon is just one of many canyons radiating down the volcano. Chiquito Rio carved this canyon through the 600 feet of tuff deposited by a massive explosion 1.2 million years ago. The road was in good shape, except for the parts that weren't. A three foot drop-off about halfway down was fun to go down and seemed impossible to go up, except that an oncoming Ford (the only car we saw on the 17 miles) somehow did climb it and didn't seem overly concerned. Near the bottom we had to cross the Chiquito Rio, then drive along the stream for a quarter mile. I mean to say, in the stream bed and then in sidewall deep mud for a 100 yards. Shortly after this the stream disappeared into the alluvial fan before it had a chance to join the Rio Grande a couple miles further downhill. Most of the canyons here are carved by disappearing streams like this.
It took us about two hours to meander these 17 miles and we were late for lunch, so we hurried back to Santa Fe where Cyndi ate a huge barbecue brisket sandwich and crunchy waffle fries and I ate my standard lunch salad.
Cyndi sucks.
 |
More photos ... even better photos ... at osterhus.tumblr.com