Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument

Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument preserves the cone shaped rock formations that are the products of volcanic eruptions that occurred 6 to 7 million years ago, and marks my 65th National Park visited. Not even knowing of this National Monument’s existence until arriving in the Santa Fe area, the plan to visit it became priority number 1 when we arrived.

A good three-quarters of an hour out of Santa Fe, we arrived to find a single Ranger staffing the entry gate. Here we were informed of the every-so-important “no-dogs” rule which was recently enacted thanks to previous pet owners not obeying the “pick up after your dog” rule. We were also informed of the locations of the two hiking trails we ha to choose from this day. From there we parked in the trailhead that lead us to Slot Canyon where we hiked out to explore the Tent Rocks and canyon.

The biggest surprise was just how crowded the park was. It seemed everyone from Santa Fe drove all the way out to hike this very trail. It was so overbearing at times, you can see in the photos that I had to aim up to cut out the crowds of people on the trail.

… here I am fighting for space on the trail among the crowd and at that  moment I realized that I actually consider myself a native. Not a native to the Santa Fe area, or even New Mexico, but to the National Parks. These people were in “my space”. Since I am more experienced (I presumed) it is they who were to tourists, while I was the native. It is weird how the brain works sometimes…

Nevertheless, the hike continued and we saw rocks, and people, and rocks, and people, and a cave, then more people, and finally our car where we gladly turned on the AC and got out of there.