Mt. Taylor Fall Colors Run
By Mark Wolf (Trail Tales November 2012)
On Saturday, September 29, 2012 eighteen…YES!! Eighteen vehicles joined us for an easy run into the mountains to see some fall colors. It turned out to be a great trip though! We all met (well, most of us anyway) at the Route 66 Casino parking lot and made our way to Grants. Along the way we picked up visitors Bill & Laurie Reed and member Jennifer Jacobs with her friend Thomas. It was a beautiful day for touring the high country and grabbing some pictures of the beautiful fall colors. No issues developed on our way to Grants and when we got there we all stopped for a pit stop and refueled if needed. I gave everybody a time frame and everyone followed along as I had requested.
We made our way to the end of pavement on NM route 547 and pulled over to air down our tires. The run would be easy, but the wood cutter, hunters, and pinion nut gatherers probably had the road fairly well wash boarded. After about 30 minutes we loaded up and headed north towards FR 239 and onto FR 453. This took about 15 minutes to reach the turn off and when I did I noticed a sign that said something about a 5K run ahead. Ok, but as long as it doesn’t bother us we’ll just go on. About the time I was heading into the woods I heard someone tell me that Tracy Bakewell had broken down and was returning home. Too bad. That is the second time I have led a run and Tracy was broken at the start. What is this?! Anyway we kept moving and pretty soon I was at the bottom of the hill looking up towards La Mosca peak. I stopped to let everyone catch up as I had noticed a gathering of people along the way that must have been involved in the 5K run. They were off to the side of the road and nothing was blocked that I could see, so I just kept going as I was traveling about 25 MPH and never saw any runners. However, it didn’t take long to find out that Cody Bakewell had a run-in with an off-duty Sheriff’s officer (who was evidently working with the 5K people) over traveling through the area. Evidently, Cody and the officer did not see eye-to-eye. Right after Cody left the officer (the officer thought he was traveling too fast, but I think it was more like the officer thought the road was supposed to be closed and didn’t know what to think with all of these “Jeep” type vehicles traveling through there. However, no signage of ANY type had closed the road.) That was not the bad part! Poor Bob Provance comes along as the Tail Gunner and walks right into an officer that was already upset over dealing with previous drivers and feeling like the situation is out-of-hand. Bob kind of felt like he was set-up. Sorry, Bob it was purely coincidental and surely not intentional. Thanks for dealing with the officer in your professional manner.
Once we all caught up, we traveled a little farther down the road, but then ran into the runners along the side of the road. Supporters were parked where we had intended to park to take some awesome pictures, so we went on up to the top of the peak and stopped there for a while to take pictures. After about 45 minutes we traveled a little farther and then stopped for lunch. This spot overlooked American Canyon and provided some great photo opportunities. We relaxed in the warm sunshine, talked among ourselves, ate lunch, and some even took walks. It was an easy hour. We then got back in the vehicles and headed on down the trail.
We went stayed on FR451 and eventually made our way back to FR 239 and down to the air down spot. Some got out to fill their tires, but I had one more trail in mind and caught a few who decided to go with us. We traveled on a loop road which was FR 193. It had colors for the first part of trail, but it dropped down in elevation and got away from the deciduous trees. This route took about an hour and a half and we made our way back to NM 547. I turned left and found a wide spot in the road for airing tires up. I caught everyone who went with us and guided them into the spot to air up. After that exercise we headed towards Grants.
A few of us had decided to go to the Pizza Hut in Grants and have some pizza. The others went on back towards the Albuquerque area. We said goodbye to them. Our pizza was pretty good (or maybe we were just hungry?). After about an hour being there we all said good bye and headed back towards the Albuquerque area ourselves. Except for Tracy Bakewell, NO ONE broke down, had a flat tire, or anything else. That is a perfect run! Thanks to all who came along, especially the guests…Butch and Jeannie Stroud (TJ), Carol Bevel (NOW a member!) and her friend Ross Erwin (Toyota Taco), Ben Dackiewicz (TJ), Bill & Laurie Reed (CJ7), and Dan Linden (H3 Hummer). I believe that everyone had a good time. Until next year…see you on the trail!
