Spring Hike on the Miners Trail

On this beautiful spring weekend, we headed up to Taos to spend the weekend with our grandpawrents. Taking advantage of the crisp blue skies and mild temperatures, we headed to the Miners Trail along the Rio Grande gorge in the southern part of the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument. Our grandpawrents live near the John Dunn Bridge, so we crossed the river, trekked up the switchbacks, and headed north down a narrow dirt road to the trailhead.

 

 

Roxie heading down the trail.

This hike is moderate to easy and begins at the rim of the gorge, winding its way down switchbacks for about one mile to the river below. At the rim, there are stunning views of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and the San Cristobal range. The trail carves through the basalt rock cliffs, giving away the area's volcanic history, with scattered pinon, juniper, and Ponderosa pine trees, as well as cacti and wild desert flowers.

Happy pups!

As the trail flattened to meet the flowing river, we passed by a rusting old Rumely tractor that was once used to flush water through the gravel of the river in search of gold! This trail is coined the miners trail, as it was once part of the gold mining district. Gold was found here originating in the Sangre de Cristo mountains and washed down from the Rio Hondo and other forging rivers to settle here in the gravel riverbeds of the Rio Grande. Just image what it would have been like during the gold rush!

We continued on to find a peaceful resting place along the yellow and green lush by a small sandy beach. The river is really flowing this time of year from the snowmelt and runoff, so our sandy beach was almost completely flooded away! But we found a nice place to enjoy the cascading rapids and play in the river before trekking back up to the rim.

I'm not as big of a fan of the river as my sister. It's a little cold for my tastes!

This was the perfect springtime, morning hike, just over two miles roundtrip, with roughly 700 feet of elevation gain to get the blood pumping. Plus, since this trail is in a remote area of the National Monument, we had the entire trail to ourselves! Woof, woof!

-Rosie