It's long been a dream of hikers in New Mexico to have a trail around the rim of the Valles Caldera in northern New Mexico. When the Baca Location became public land in 2000 and transformed into the Valles Caldera National Preserve (VCNP), the heartbeat of hikers quickened at the thought that soon this dream would become a reality. Well, nine years later, we are no closer but the dream lives on.
New Mexicans have in our own backyard 89,000 acres of land that tax-payers are being kept from fully enjoying in the futile hope that this public land will one day become financially self-sufficient. It's not only a loss to New Mexicans but also to the many people from out of state and all over the world who stop on the parking aprons along NM-4 and wistfully imagine what it would be like to explore the vast spaces of the Valles Caldera.
It's true that in a manner of speaking, the land is open to hiking but only where they allow you to go and only on their time schedule. Within the Preserve, there are a grand total of three reservation-only paid hikes for which you are dropped off somewhere and essentially told the party line of where you must hike and when you must be done hiking. It seems unreasonable to not only limit hiking venues within the Preserve but on the Valles Caldera rim too.
You can't walk in from the Valles Caldera rim without prior arrangements. You can't walk along the portions of the caldera rim owned by the Valles Caldera National Preserve. Yet, every year, hunters, after a lecture asking them not to pot-hunt on the Preserve, are set free to roam within their assigned hunting unit for a couple of days. As a hiker, I'd love to be able to do that but 9 years later, the VCNP remains largely a citadel fortress, closely protected from hikers except those who are thrilled with re-doing the three reservation-only, fee trails (and you'd better not stray away from circling around on those old logging roads because that's not part of the program!)
Recently, a proposal was made by a seasoned, Los Alamos hiker to the management at the Valles Caldera National Preserve to allow hiking on their east Valles Caldera rim, between Cerro Grande and Pajarito Mountain. Called the Cerro Grande to Pajarito Mountain Trail Proposal, it has been dismissed by the VCNP because of fear that poachers are entering the the Preserve from the east Valles Caldera rim, specifically, from Camp May (property of Pajarito Mountain Ski Area) and that to allow a break in the fence for hikers will only encourage more poaching. (Incidentally, in November, when Pajarito Mountain starts receiving snowfall, the road to Camp May is blocked to vehicular traffic until the snows are gone in the springtime. Must be those dastardly two-legged skiing and snowshoeing bunnies dragging those trophy elk out!)
I feel the refusal to consider this proposal is a chimera designed to keep the VCNP the exclusive preserve of those who are willing to pay for lovely but expensive interpretive programs that are useless to most hikers. What hikers want to do is hike, not go on a chaperoned van ride and attend a lecture while standing in place.
Anyway, what proof does the VCNP have that poaching of elk rather than innocent poaching of outdoor recreation is occurring from Camp May? As the proposal points out, the Santa Fe National Forest already has a public trail up Valle Canyon, Trail 289. How do they know that the poachers are not coming up Valle Canyon and hopping over their inviolate barbed wire boundary fence?
I believe that poaching occurs on the VCNP but why should their inability to effectively handle that problem be used as an excuse to ban hiking along their Valles Caldera rim? This seems unfair to hikers. The message seems to be that it's more important to protect their lucrative trade in trophy elk than to allow ordinary hikers to enjoy the Valles Caldera rim on foot.
Has it not occurred to the VCNP that if people were allowed to regularly traverse year-around between Pajarito Mountain and Cerro Grande, there would be more eyes to look for poachers and even act as a deterrent? One hiker pointed out that from when the elk hunts ended in November, until December 26, when the winter recreation program officially begins, the VCNP is closed to the public. (Is this how they plan to become financially self sufficient, just close down for a month and not allow anyone to get any use out of the place?) Maybe if people were actually allowed to use the place, poachers wouldn't have such an easy job of it. If I were a poacher, I'd go in right now because it's empty of visitors who could provide more eyes to spot a poacher.
Believe me, it can get really ridiculous in the Valles Caldera National Preserve. Cows are allowed to trample about in the summer (bathing themselves in the streams to the horror of fisher-people) while volunteers this summer in Alamo Canyon, who only planned to camp on disturbed well pads overnight to implement a project designed to help restore the wetlands in Alamo Bog, almost weren't allowed to because the VCNP nearly "had a cow" at the wildly imaginative thought of unbathed volunteers despoiling the already highly disturbed soil of Alamo Canyon. This is, after all, where Pat Dunigan had invited intensive commercial exploration for geothermal energy in the past.
Then there's the whole issue of how selling lift tickets in the summer to those who want to make the trip over to Cerro Grande would help the Pajarito Mountain Ski Area. The ski hill already provides a wonderful program in the summer whereby hikers and bicyclists can take the lift to the top and then go down the jeep roads and volunteer-built bicycle trails on Pajarito Mountain. Why not let them expand this program and allow people to travel up the ski lifts and then walk over to Cerro Grande? This would allow the local ski hill in Los Alamos to make a little money. Why shouldn't the VCNP be nice to its neighbors?
Isn't it time to throw the hiking community another bone by allowing hiking from Pajarito Mountain to Cerro Grande? This would help to make the upcoming glacially slow National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) planning process more bearable (more on that here).
I'm thrilled and grateful for the two unscheduled hikes that are available - the free Coyote Call and Valle Grande trails but it's so tremendously unfair to not allow people to make the trip over from Pajarito Mountain to Cerro Grande (or, for that matter, up Valle Canyon to either mountain). What would it hurt? People have been doing it for years anyway!
Why not, under the aegis of adaptive management and the umbrella of achieving financial self-sufficiency, start a whole new paradigm of interim hiking programs during the interminable NEPA process that allow hiking along the rim of the Valles Caldera or even hiking in from the rim? The VCNP's hiking program is badly in need of some variety in their offerings.
The VCNP remains for the meantime a sacred cow that tantalizes with its life-giving flesh but never allows anyone to sit down at the table to eat. Obviously, the desires of ordinary hikers like me who want a more spontaneous experience hiking along the Valles Caldera rim or even into the caldera from the rim will never be considered. The DOE land outside of White Rock is not treated like a sacred cow. Hiker's can freely walk there (and probably poachers hang out there too). There are loads of cultural sites and artifacts; yet, I'm trusted to walk that land.
I know there's a lot going on in the world that's a loads more important than gaining more hiking access to the Valles Caldera National Preserve, but maybe, just maybe, some of you could write or email your congressperson about what you would like to see happen regarding public access and use in the Valles Caldera National Preserve.
Another idea is to join an advocacy group like Caldera Action which will lobby on your behalf for sensible public access to the VCNP.
You may already be a member of a hiking group that's appalled at the present limited, reservation-only system of hiking access to the Preserve. What do your members feel about this situation? What do you feel about the present limited hiking access to the Valles Caldera National Preserve?
 |
| Quote from a visitor from Montana: "Why have they locked up the public land? Why isn't this place open?" |