Trip Report- 4 Days In The Gila Wilderness

Last week I met friends, Cappuccino, Level, and Jolly Rancher, in Albuquerque for a backpacking trip into the Gila Wilderness of SW New Mexico. Roughly a 5 to 6 hour drive from ABQ, the Gila is not exactly easy to get to. The nearest town, Silver City, is an hour south via winding mountain roads that put the hairy in hairpin turns. But there is a short cut with a slightly less hairy mountain road that approaches from the east. So that was the planned route.

We had settled on an 8AM start which, when all was said and done, worked out to be a 9AM departure. No worries, we powered on south along the interstate for nearly a half hour before we ran into a giant traffic jam. Seems the interstate was closed for several miles and all traffic was routed to the two lane county road. The next 45 minutes was consumed going 15 miles before we could get back on the I-25. We made it down to Truth or Consequences, NM where we grabbed some lunch and gas then it was back south on 1-25 to the Hillsboro exit and our shortcut to the Gila.

We had only driven a few miles when we got to a warning sign that the road we wanted was closed. After checking for alternatives, we concluded we would need to go way south to Hatch and then southwest to Deming and finally north to Silver City. Our arrival time in the Gila was getting later and later.

Cappuccino was driving and she put pedal to metal and skillfully got us to Silver City in good time. It was about 2PM. We continued north on Highway 15 to the Gila Cliff Dwellings along the hairy winding mountain road. It was a pretty exciting hour as we wound our way up to the end of the highway at the National Monument. We pulled into the TJ Corral trailhead about 3PM and were on the trail for the Middle Fork Loop 20 minutes later.

Starting from the Gila River West Fork drainage, we would need to hike up and over a ridge to get to the Middle Fork. We took the Little Bear Canyon Trail, which involves a long hot climb up a thousand feet then down along the Little Bear Creek Canyon to the Middle fork at about 4 miles. Where Little Bear Creek enters the Middle Fork, there is a large camping area with plenty of trees and fortunately only one other party camped near by. We had about an hour and a half to set up our hammocks, cook dinner, and decompress before sunset. Very near sunset another group arrived and set up west of us.

About 3AM I woke up to the smell of smoke. Our first neighbor had had a fire and I assumed it was smoldering and the wind had shifted, but at sunrise we got up to a canyon filled with smoke. I texted Nancy on my inReach and got the message back that there was a fire way up Indian Creek many miles away.

After breakfast we packed up and did our first ford of the day. The water was cold, but not bad and only about knee deep. We followed the trail as it lead us through thick Ponderosa Pine forests, past graceful old sycamores, and back and forth through the river flowing between 1000 foot red rock canyon walls. The air was crisp, but there was definitely still smoke in the air. We ran into some hikers that had been in the canyon a few days and they said the smoke cleared off in the afternoon, but returned in the mornings. We made a quick visit to Jordan Hot Springs for a look, but our goal was The Meadows a little over 9 miles from our first camp. We hiked on through willows and equisetum, past alder thickets and old log jams, working our way up river crossing many times. Along the way we were serenaded by a great variety of songbirds and an occasional frog, As the day progressed, it got warmer, but the smoke did clear as predicted. Around 3:30 we trudged into The Meadows. There were several very nice campsites available and it seemed unlikely we would have any company as we were off the main trail. After making camp we rested, did a little exploring, and got water. Following dinner, Jolly R, Level and I stood in the meadow and did a bit of stargazing while Cappuccino took some time to read her book.

In the morning we crossed back over the river and almost immediately started the switchbacks from The Meadows up to the rim. A 1000 foot climb in about 1.6 miles. It did give us a view of the smoke drifting down Indian Creek Canyon and entering the Middle Fork Canyon just below The Meadows. Luckily we had camped up canyon from Indian Creek so had been smoke free our second night. When we got to the top we had several miles of rolling terrain though pine forest, another climb out of the forest, and then down a chaparral south slope to the West Fork. There wasn’t much shade and the temperature was over 90 as the afternoon arrived. Still it was down hill and we finally made it to river mid afternoon.

Our camping possibilities looked grim, but there were a couple of make-do sites. Jolly R and Cappuccino dropped packs and decided to go on ahead to see what they could find. They met a woman, Carolyn who had been hammock camping in the area a few days and she sent them to a great site that we took. After setting up it was naps, washing socks, reading, snacks, and just generally relaxing. It had been a particularly hot, rocky, and hard 7 miles. That evening Carolyn dropped by for a visit and we chatted with her for quite a while. Her husband knew Cappuccino’s husband and in fact she knew Cappuccino. She quizzed us about camping gear as she is getting back into it after many years away.

The next morning we broke camp in record time and hiked the last 3.2 miles out of the wilderness and back to the car. Cappuccino wanted to see the Cliff Dwellings, so before we left we did a quick tour, with Jolly R as our tour guide (as he was an Anthro major in college and had done archeology.) Then it was off to Silver City for second breakfast at the Adobe Springs Cafe. We drove a different route back along the west side of the state, swinging east past the VLA and on to Socorro then up to Albuquerque. We walked away from another one. (Combined age of the 4 participants of this adventure was over 280 years.)