18 March 2019 Organ Mountain-Desert Peaks National Monument

It was a beautiful day and we decided to visit Dripping Springs Natural Area in Organ Mountains – Desert Peaks National Monument. This monument is run by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and it is obvious it is not as well funded as the National Park Monuments. But we collected our first BLM NM stamps for our book. We hiked the Dripping Springs trail (3 miles round trip) to the springs, the nearby Van Patten Mountain Camp and Boyd’s Sanatorium ruins. The spring was running very well and their was snow visable on the north slopes of the mountain tops. The uphill hike to the springs at the high altitudes definitely got our heart rates up. But the views were fantastic. We did have a critter sighting of some mule deers on the trail out, thanks to a dutiful father leading 3 small children and one papoosa on his back, who pointed them out to us.  Otherwise we would have missed them altogether. He was a brave and fantastic father on an uphill hike that takes a slow toll. We wished him a successful afternoon.

Entrance sign

Organ Mountains

Dripping Springs

Van Patten Mountain camp Ruins

Cactus growing out of the ruins

Dripping Springs

Leslie by the Boyd Sanatorium

David at the base of Dripping Springs