One of the things we did on our trip Santa Fe last month was going hiking. I asked a friend of mine who spends a lot of time there and hikes and he suggested the Dale Ball Trails. This is a public trail network of about 25 miles located right outside Santa Fe up in the mountains. So we decided to go do that. We weren’t going to do 25 miles, we went for 2.5 miles seeing how we are flatlanders Oklahoma where the elevation is about 400 ft compared to Santa Fe’s 7200 ft.
Heather near the start.
Son Logan who doesn’t really like hiking but is always up for anything.
The trail is very well marked and was in very good shape. Not very many technical areas at all.
Our merlin app was going crazy on all the birds here. There were the small extremely small and rude birds that hard to see and don’t sit still long enough to take a photo. So this is one of several photos I made of trees hoping that I could spot birds later. The laugh is on my because I can’t spot any birds in it.
Yucca cactus!! I’ve hiked a lot in Oklahoma and have yet to run across this cactus. I spend sometime growing up in Albuquerque, New Mexico and it was pretty popular there. Nobody could afford the cost watering grass so xeriscape landscaping (landscaping using plants and methods that require very little if any supplemental watering) was popular. Yucca plants were often planted underneath ground story windows as a security measure. If you have ever run into one of the “swords” of the plant you would understand.
I’m not a forester but the trees I think were pinon pine and juniper.
More cactus, prickly pear.
Even though the trail is adjacent to houses and close to town you never really see the houses. Also the trail was not that steep. There was a climb at the start but afterward he wound around at the same elevation.
So anyway, almost 2.5 miles at a pretty slow pace. We were taking our time and I was taking lots of photos.
This is a screenshot from the Dale Ball Trails website showing the trails. I added the red showing our approximate route. The Dale Ball Trails has about 25 miles but their trails interconnect with other trails including forest service trails in the Santa Fe National Forest. I would hate to guess how many miles of trails are on the total network.
A good time was had by all but we crashed afterwards.
I am linking with Through My Lens.
…I hope that you remembered your water!
We loved Santa Fe and — didn’t get to stop on our recent trip as the State was in between family visits. Looks like a great hike but I know what you mean about being flatlanders in the mountains. And can also relate to your description of those little birds –sometimes they will hold still on their branch until the exact moment when I get the camera focused. Rude for sure ))