Grand Enchantment Trail: Day 4 Flooding Bailout

Start: Red Canyon

Finish: Mountainair, NM

Miles: 18.52 / 92.83 total

Ascent: 1700 feet

My focus yesterday was walking around the Whiskey Fire and setting myself up to get back into the mountains early this morning to rejoin the GET.  However, as I looked at the maps and weather forecast last night, I may have been short-sighted with my push yesterday.  I knew rain was coming starting today.  I knew that I could get up and down the mountains before it hit.  But I hadn’t considered after that.

After the GET leaves the mountains, it follows a number of washes and canyons , and the NWS issued a flood watch due to the rains.  I knew that I would not be able to clear the canyons before the rains, and I would even likely have to camp in them somewhere.  I’m always up for an adventure, but I decided that was just asking for trouble for no good reason.

So after my long, hard push yesterday, I decided the best thing to do was to bail out to town for tonight and wait out the weather, dashing any chance at a continuous hike that was carrying me through yesterday.  I wish I had realized that yesterday, but I did not and here I am.

I had 2 bailout options: I could directly walk to Mountainair on roads that looked straight and boring, or I could take the more scenic route on a forest service road that paralleled the GET and even rejoined it for a time.  It would end not far from where the GET would cross US 60, so I would still be in the spirit of the route.  It was 18 miles, and with the rains forecast to start around 2pm, there should be plenty of time for me to get out before they hit.  That settled it for me, and I started early down the forest service road to ensure I would beat the rains.

As I started, there were a few sprinkles which made me immediately rethinking my plan, but I decided to go for it anyways.

The road wound around the foothills of the mountains, and gave me frequent views of them through the trees, so at least I got to see something of the Manzano Range that was supposed to be one of the highlights of this trail.  They were scarred by past wildfires but were starting to rebound and regrow.  The bard patches did make them look more daunting and rugged though without all the rock hidden underneath the trees.  Good views and I had the road to myself without having to worry about the traffic from yesterday.

The GET came back in at the first flowing spring I had seen on the trail and descended out of the mountains in a wide valley.

A few trucks passed me, and each either offered me water or a ride, but I had plenty of water and I thought plenty of time.

Things mellowed out and the pines were replaced with juniper and cactus as the road wandered in and out of ranchland. 

I was making good time, but once I crested a ridge that the road followed for a while, I saw that the rains were approaching, already obscuring mountains to the south of me.  I thought I might get lucky as the rain appeared to be tracking to the side, but soon I felt some drops, and then a sheet of rain was sweeping towards me across the plains.

I dove under a thick juniper and donned my raingear.  Some thunder and lightning accompanied the rain, and it quickly became thick and heavy, with a little hail mixed in for good measure.  Puddles started forming around me in minutes.  Then the puddles began to coalesce.  Then I noticed some of the bigger puddles were starting to flow in expanding rivulets.  The road turned into a stream in the matter of minutes since the rain had started.  I’ve seen flash floods in the desert before, but this time I saw the entire process behind my eyes, accompanied by thunder and lightning a second apart.  Maybe the quicker bailout option would have been better, but the rains swept in before forecast.

As soon as the rain started tapering off and the thunder and lightning had passed, I got back to walking to finish the 3 miles I had to go before I could hitch into town.  One truck flew out when I was hiding in my bush, probably knew what was coming, and there were no more up the road that I had seen and could expect to help me.

I hiked out the road, dancing across the rivulets that wove back and forth across it, the water laughing at the ineffective swales and continuing down the path of least resistance.

The flow of water increased as I descended the road, and parts of the desert were just flowing period.  There were a couple deeper stretches I had to cross, but it was only shin deep so not the end of the world.  At last the road started ascending and the water disappeared down a raging wash.

It was then just a short hike out to US 60 where I found a pullout to hitch into the town of Mountainair about 20 miles away.  A car passed me, then circled back to pick me up.  Driving to town, there was flooding everywhere with raging torrents of water being funneled through the few culverts under the road and adjacent railroad.  The locals driving me even circled back to watch some of the flooding because they were amazed by it.  A DOT truck pulled up to check the road, and they said it was nothing.  The storm a couple days ago when I was on Sandia Ridge had water flowing over the road.  There were still some piles of hail along the road leftover from that.

I got dropped off at The Rock Motel which is run by a great couple.  They quickly got a room cleaned up for me, and I had the requisite pack explosion to start drying my stuff.

I eventually had to head out into the rain to get some food which had me walk most of the town before I found the single restaurant open.   I got what I needed for the night and settled into my sheltered motel room to watch the rain come down continuously and wonder what I should do next.