Oh my god yes. I’m driving and shouting about the vistas. There is almost no one with us on this highway. The open space is so exhilarating. It’s not too hot and not too cold. The air is indescribable but you want it. To be a part of this!
About halfway between Cimarron and Rayado, it opens up and soars. I suppose we’re looking at someone’s ranch, but never mind. I mainly see the Earth. The peace and reassurance are overwhelming. My joy and satisfaction are complete. There’s nothing more to say or ask. This is what we’re given, mind you. Everybody wins the lotto. Most of us forget.
The road I shot that from follows the original Santa Fe Trail, which blows my mind. It must have looked much the same almost two hundred years ago, except for buffalo herds and wolves and different grasses.
John Hamilton Farr lives at 7,000 feet in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, U.S.A. As New York Times best-selling author James C. Moore tells it, John is “a man attuned to the world who sees it differently than you and I and writes about it with a language and a vision of life that is impossible to ignore.” This JHFARR.COM site is the master writing archive. To email John, please see CONTACT INFO on .png)
Great image…could be right out of a Larry McMurtry novel.
Just incredible out there. Very close to Philmont Scout Ranch, BTW. Pronghorns everywhere. Hardly any traffic, ninety minutes from Taos.
Yes! I grew up with these views and its too easy to take them for granted. One day on my way back to Taos, just as I was leaving Denver a group of pronghorns was looking over a barbed wire fence toward the other side of the road where a new hospital and several office buildings were going up. This is what’s wrong with Colorado and why I’m not there anymore. New Mexico is poor in cash but much richer in reality.
Wonderful post, John! They said from the Tooth of Time near Philmont HQ it was “Seven Days to Santa Fe.” I think of the old trail goers every time I’m that way! Driving west from Springer never gets old. Plus you had some snow-capped peaks. And now thunderstorms. Ahhhh… northeast NM.
Hi Kerry, thanks for stopping by! (An honest-to-god meteorologist and mountain climber, you guys.) “Seven days to Santa Fe” if you didn’t end up ambushed on the way. Where does the trail leave this highway? I’ve never driven west from Springer, which would take me to this exact spot from the other direction, but you can bet I’ll try it soon.
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