12 Jun scoping cliff views in El Malpais National Monument
Thursday May 23 – Friday May 24 2024
We left the Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness and headed further south with El Malpais National Monument as our goal destination. We stopped for a quick diner breakfast at the adorable Lil’s restaurant in Thoreau, NM and a beer at the Junkyard Brewery on Route 66 in Grants, NM on the way. We arrived at the Joe Skeen Campground mid afternoon, surrounded by cliffs forming a massive shelf behind us, with another dropping off below us to the west. We hiked up the steep hillside behind our campsite for some evening hour views of the El Malpais National Monument.
Friday morning we headed over to the sandstone bluffs, one of the famed features of El Malpais National Monument. The bluffs towered several hundred feet over an ancient and massive, sweeping black lava field.
We took the highway further south into the monument, gazing at the miles of textured cliffs towering above. We pulled over at La Ventana Arch overlook to get a close up view of this naturally formed feature tucked back into the cliffs. Beyond the arch, the highway stretched on for another 40 miles through the lava fields and high desert before we came in sight of any other buildings. Onward!
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