I have no problem with El Morro closing mid-week. But I wish I didn’t have to drive up to the sealed entry gate to find out that Tuesday and Wednesday were off-limits.
At least I had other options. The most important option came in Arizona, when I jumped off I-40 and its endless stream of trucks coming from the Port of Los Angeles and up from Mexico.
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| Note the closed sign |
I cut down through the Zuni Pueblo to escape the traffic, and found myself mostly alone on a journey through the reservation and crossed back into New Mexico.
Somehow it never occurred to me that El Morro might be closed, as the watering hole at its base never really closes. But they can seal the gates.
El Morro might protect a millennium of signatures of petroglyphs, but it lies next to El Malpais National Monument, which protects a vast region of recent volcanic activity that has reshaped this corner of western New Mexico. The names translates to “the badlands” in Spanish.
Given the impact the lava flows, lava tubes, and fields of debris have exerted upon this landscape, it’s fitting. One prime piece of land among El Malpais lies under private ownership, and it remains worth the visit. The Bandera Crater and Ice Cave, a private attraction adjacent to El Malpais National Monument’s vast volcano fields, sat just down the road from El Morro. Plan B went into action for $14. A school group crowded the visitor center, but I found myself alone a few yards onto the Bandera Crater trail.
The trail wound around the volcanic cone and ended at an overlook several hundred feet above the dormant volcanic vents and several hundred below the volcano rim. Unlike Capulin Volcanic National Monument in northern New Mexico, the Bandera rim is too fragile for hikers. Even standing at the overlook railing felt a little unsafe on this windy day. No one was there to know if a fierce wind carried me over the railing.
Once I ended my lonely vigil, I just stayed a little closer to the side of the trail that hugged the wall of the volcano. The overlook gave a stunning look into the work of lava and several thousand years of erosion.
Bandera is the largest volcano of the 29 in the region, and last erupted 10,000 years ago, which involved a lava flow breaking through the side of the crater. More than 8,000 feet above sea level, fall was in full swing. I wondered about snakes on this sunny afternoon. Bull snakes and rattlesnakes live in the crater area, but the wind and the air temperature were a little too cold for reptiles to emerge, even on sunny afternoon.
Descending on the scenic trail, I felt like I traversed the slopes of Mount Doom. Piles of rock thrown from the erupting volcano and remnants from the lava flows. A forest grew around the rock in the interim, but in many places the lava rocks almost look freshly cooled. At the staircase, the first glimpse of the ice cave emerges. It is not deep, not a place you can wander.
Seventy-two steps lead down to a landing on the edge of the ice. But in the course of walking down, the 70-degree fades with every few steps. By the time you stand on the landing, the 31-degree ice cave is a welcome relief. I didn’t want to leave around a mile-plus of hiking on the volcano rim.
The owners ended ice removal in the 1940s, and since then the depth of ice has increased from 12 feet to 20. The ice on the bottom dates back 3,400 years. El Malpais National Monument, which surrounds the private Bandera Crate and Ice Cave, has caves and lava tubes but no ice. Plus, you need a permit and a group of three or more to enter El Malpais’s caves.
Anyone can journey into the ice cave at Bandera. I made a comment to a woman standing at the bottom. She gave me an unpleasant smile and moved on. So it goes. I had the ice cave to myself. That is worth not dealing with other people. Even at the 31-degree bottom of the cave, I immediately shed a layer. It had been quite warm along the exposed trail.
Down here in the lava tube, I took the chance to cool off. Of course, I stayed behind the overlook, but I suspect I was the last guest of the day. I could have stood there as long as I wanted. The cold air from the ice was soothing. I couldn’t think of anywhere else where someone could go from a volcano rim so close to an ice cave, especially this south in the U. S.
When I returned from the zen moment in the cave, I mentioned the fair price to the people in the gift shop. They said not everyone agreed. I had to walk to the rim to see the crater and descend to the ice cave. I expected $20. The $14 I paid seemed decent.
It was a nice autumn afternoon on the volcano rim, and no one else spoiled the ice cave. That’s all I could ask for.
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