A short hike up behind the river yesterday.

Hiked up on an old volcanic tube called Perdenal peak with my house guest, Paul, to find the large outcropping of agate.  We found some very nice red, black, white, and a little blue agate.

Hi everyone!

I live on the banks on the Rio Grande river in a small community between Santa Fe and Taos. I love hiking the mountians, rappelling and climbing, and floating in the river. A problem that has risen in the last few years is that I like to take a few comfort items. In '95 when my son and I hiked 70 river miles in the Grand Canyon we took only survival gear. Since I'm turning 60 this year I decided to draft a pack animal to help with the canned chili and dominoes. My first thought was to mules, since this environment is harsh on horses. Mules were eliminated because high investment and maintenance, harsh effedt on the environment and mainly because they cannot hike the rough country where I roam. Many people here have llamas to protect their sheep from coyotes. They have less environmental impact and can and adapt to packing in rough areas. Then I discovered goat packing. An adult goat can carry near half their body weight, about 50 - 60 lbs. They can go for days without water, they actually filter and recycle their urine, and require only a handful of grain a day as long as they can browse the native vegetation for an hour a day. They have the second most varied diet of any animal in North America, only to the Grizzly bear. In other words they can eat almost anything. The most compelling reason though is that they are perfectly adapted for climbing, almost dancing, through boulder fields and up cliff faces. Extremely low environmental impact and they can be as affectionate as a puppy. Well my goats are just over a year old now and weigh near a hundred pounds. While they were young they got to carry a training saddle with no weight. Now I have saddles for the three of them and training is starting in earnest.

I make pottery and woodcarve as well as a few other hobbies. (www.embudo-desert-rose.com) Since I am semi-retired, I am available to go on adventures without much prep. We have some class IV stretches of the river a few miles upstream and in the spring my friends and I shoot the rapids in the morinig and spend the afternoon lazily floating home. Pull out on the bank and BBQ. The Pecos Wilderness is about 20 miles from me and there is a million acres of public access land all around me a hike here is what is normally known as a walk in the neighborhood.

March 3, '08 It is still snowing here in NM, but my water finally thawed two days ago. The river rose nearly a foot yesterday. There must be some powerful thawing taking place up river. I have been exercising the goats and letting them get used to their saddles. Isis, my doe is pregnant and gets light duty until the end of April when she is due. I am planning a trip to near Bandelier National Monument and the Valles Caldera as soon as the weather warms enough to be comfortable on a day hike. Should be a great photo op.

March 12, '08 I am sooooo proud of my goats. The two wethers took their first real pack trip yesterday. They were real troopers. We only went about 4 miles, but there is 1000 ft elevation change there. They wore their cross buck frames and I jury rigged a small pack on each one. ( I don't have the panniers yet) While descending, Ramses, the youngest and roudy one, was springing from one side of a small canyon to the other,a distance of ab out 12 ft. instead of trekking the bottom with me. Climbing on the way back I heard a wheezing. The goats were panting like crazy. I guess we will have to take climbing slowly until they get used to it.