Daisy, Taos, NM

Southbound thru-hike in July, 2025. Follow them on Instagram @dsylln.

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It was AWESOME, of course. I did 15-20 miles a day. The first night camped at one of the ATV pullouts in Drake Canyon, second night on a forest road in Rincon Canyon. All the beaver dams up Rio Chiquito were so cool. I think I only saw two people drive down the Rio on the second day, other than that was alone all day. Third day I ran in to another thru hiker! Bailey who owns Sincere Cycle in Fe, who I don’t know if you’ve spoken with, who was on day 3 and was doing 40’s and DM’ed me later that he got to Taos that night. End of Day 3 was very wet and the tendons in the back of my knee were on fire so I only did 15 and camped in the resupply storage unit (sorry if I should have asked about that!) There were bats in the rafters keeping me company. I couldn’t find the bottle of Ibuprofen mentioned on the white board so I grabbed what I could find from the first aid supplies. Also I left a bag of some small items in one of the totes that I’ll go retrieve tomorrow. 

4th day I was planning on doing the Divide Trail up high. Took a wrong turn towards Indian Lake and ended up doing 3 or 4 bonus miles before backtracking. A bit past Ripley Point, I saw a cub bolt off to my right and then saw its mom circling around to my right, I panicked, yelled at her, backed up (hoping the cub wasn’t behind me!) and sat down. After a couple minutes of catching my breath I heard her woof behind me and said ok ok I’m going!

The downed tree corridor up the north side of Jicarta is truly so weird as you mention in the guide. How were they felled, with their roots attached?? I do have a theory about their purpose though: was someone, a decade or more ago, planning on building a ski slope? That the downed trees would prevent other trees from growing in? The size and location of the corridor seem right for that. Anyway about halfway up Jicarta, I saw stormclouds rolling in, and figured the mama bear was enough of an omen that I should abort and head down to Santa Barbara CG. Just below the ridge, off to the south/left of the trail down to SB, there are too very ominous rusted metal crosses. Are they graves? At 11.5k?

SB CG was packed. I stealth camped by the Rio. Morning of Day 5 I hiked up Rio SB, saw a million cows, dodged a million cow patties, saw a few dozen day hikers. Got over the divide in the afternoon and was thinking of camping at Truchas Lakes but didn’t wanna stop once I got there so kept going over Trailriders in the evening with just an incredible sunset. Oh, saw a handful of marmots in the scree just before that. Camped at Pecos Baldy Lake. Day 6, I went through the burn area to Horsethief Meadow. What can I say, I am a sucker for Weird Trail and doing parkour on blowdowns. I love pink fireweed. Made me nostalgic for the PNT, where that landscape is common.

After Horsethief, back in the green forest, saw another bear. This one was just a huge blonde and cinnamon butt stumbling off into the forest away from me. Camped at Lake Katherine.

Last day, I beelined it all the way to Fe in a downpour lol. The sandy clay slopes of the neighborhood trails were so steep and slick with all the rain that I roadwalked Hyde Park Road for a bit. And then the Santa Fe River was sooo swollen that I couldn’t do the trail next to it either and took mostly sidewalks in to the Plaza. Devoured a double Lottaburger and fries and a shake. Did 26 miles for that burger and to get outta the rain and really messed up my knee with some tendinitis in the process. Went and got that checked out today and they said it’s fine and sent me home with prednisone.

That’s the short version:)