Page 90 - Volume 3 - Walks In The Black Range

They had only gotten worse when I visited in 2016. Since then, and perhaps due to my prompting, work has been done although I have yet to go back out to see the improvements. At the bottom, cottonwoods, willows and alders line the banks of a wide section of the creek. In the early spring it will be flowing here with a few inches of clear water. The rest of the year it may not be so dependable, although as the valley narrows upstream, the likelihood of flowing water increases.
I have never hiked the northern portion of FT 307. Although I wanted to for years. I even talked to a neighbor about doing a through hike (with the southern portion) as shuttle
or key exchange hike, but because of the rough roads and distances, the driving times between the entry points, one of which isn’t even the actual trailhead, make the whole enterprise an impractical affair requiring at least two days to accomplish. Neither the southern entry point near Dumm Place (on Las Animas) which I’ve walked by four times, nor the northern one at Davis Well (on North Seco), where I did a bit of searching only recently, have standing (or perhaps any) signs. Portions of it are readily visible on Google Earth however, and I suspect it is part of an old wagon road route that ran from Hermosa to Kingston. It appears to be a
tough five and a half miles, going up and down dry, sparsely wooded ridges and in and out of three canyons that most likely only carry seasonal water. The truly rough drive to the parking area above North Seco Creek, still over a mile shy of the trailhead, and the treacherous drive to Cave Creek (discussed earlier) only further emphasize that this can never
be considered
a day hike and
may only be
accomplished
as a backpack
(in cool
weather) for
the young, fit
and hardy, or
with the help
of pack
animals.
Available on Amazon.
books at New Mexico Waterfalls.
See Doug Scott’s