El Malpais Road Trip

While we are spending lots of time getting to know Albuquerque, there is a whole world of amazing destinations within a relatively short drive, and we decided to test out a road trip with Nathan. 340 miles later, we had an amazing day! Our route is below, click on the image for a link to Google Maps if you want the interactive version. We went to El Malpais first (point B), then passed through Pie Town (point C), on through Magdalena and to Socorro (point D). Then we jumped on 25 north and went home (point E).

El Malpais National Monument is a 114,000 acre monument, featuring the remnants of 3,000 year old lava flows through 200 million year old sand stone. The lava is textbook examples of pahoehoe and aa, which most people associate with Hawaii (and much of the land reminded us of our honeymoon on the Big Island!).

At the ranger station, checking in before venturing into the park.

Hiking around in the sandstone at the overlook.

Nathan taking a break in the shade, you can see the amazing views in the background.

Family photo, the sandstone glowing against the blue, blue New Mexicain sky (aided a bit by a polarzing lens on my camera :-)

Small photo here of the amazing panorama, but click on the photo for the full size. The silence was deafening. The black smudges amongst the green in the valley are the 3,000 year old lava flows.

We loaded back into the car and drove to the next vista, La Ventana, a sandstone arch. It was a short hike in, and we saw some pretty flora along the way.

Flower on a cactus...

Indian Paintbrush along the trail...

Finally made it! The light wasn't great, so it was hard to capture the depth of the arch, but hopefully this gives an idea... Practice for when we roadtrip to Arches National Monument in Utah!

After that we made a pitstop for lunch. Nathan enjoyed his yogurt and PB&J as we watched a thunderstorm slowly roll in...

Nathan was exhausted at this point, so we hit the road while he napped, headed for Pie Town (because Michael had heard about Pie Town on Ripley's Believe it or Not as a child, and always wanted to go!)

On our way, we crossed the continental divide...

Dramatic vistas of mountains, grass, clouds and sky...

Pie Town! Sadly, we did not stop for pie, since Nathan was napping and so we ventured on...

Nathan finally woke up (3 hours later!) just shy of Socorro. So we stopped for a snack, and ate it on the campus of New Mexico Tech, where Michael once spent a week in high school. Gorgeous campus...

And then we zipped home! Successful roadtrip, and we are already planning our next. Arches, Mesa Verde, Petrified Forrest, Monument Valley, what will come next? Stay tuned to find out!