One Week Backpacking New Mexico's Gila Wilderness!
Hot springs, cliff dwellings, 121 Gila River crossings, and the biggest feast we've ever had on a backpacking trip!
Four years ago we walked from Mexico to Canada on the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) . The CDT has a lot of alternate routes and shortcuts, but we to stuck to the official trail the entire time (other than when the trail was closed due to fires). The Gila Alternate is an extremely popular alternate that probably 99% of thruhikers take. We promised ourselves we’d come back someday to experience the Gila. Well, that day finally came! Below is a day-by-day break-down from our journals on the trip. If you’d prefer to sit back, relax, and watch, this morning we posted a 52-minute video of the entire trip!
Day 1 – 13.2 miles, 1,700 feet of elevation gain
We got to a hotel in Silver City, New Mexico at 1am and there was rain in the forecast for the morning, so we decided to sleep in a bit. At noon we walked out of Silver City and into the Gila National Forest. We walked on the official CDT for about a mile, and it brought back tons of amazing memories! It rained lightly on and off during the day, and we even had small hail for ~1 minute, but we saw an awesome rainbow. New Mexico is beautiful, and we’re so excited to be back! -R
Day 2 – 17.1 miles, 3,400 feet of elevation gain
Our plan was to start early. But it was cold and we were enjoying the tent, so we got on the trail at around 8:30. Whoops. The day started out on jeep roads, and we started out wearing a lot of layers. As the sun rose it got warmer and before we knew it we had stripped down to just our sun hoodies. We left the jeep roads and spent a lot of time on single track trails climbing up to a relatively high saddle at 7,800 feet. On the way up we got enough cell service to post our first short video of this trip. But, cell service was very limited so it took a while.
As we started moving again we realized that it was already afternoon and we hadn’t walked very many miles. We picked up the pace, but it was obvious that because of the early sunset (5:10pm) we wouldn’t make it nearly as far as we had planned. We spotted lots of bear poop and some interesting tracks from a small mammal we couldn’t identify. When it got dark we started looking for a campsite. We found one a couple of miles before we are set to hit the Gila River and the many water crossings begin. It’s going to be a cooold morning, and we learned our lesson today — with the days so short, we have to start early if we are going to get this hike done! For dinner we had peanut butter pasta. Yum! -T
Day 3 – 20.6 miles, 1,500 feet of elevation gain, 62 river crossings
What an awesome day! We finally made it to the Gila River this morning! We started walking at 7:30am and everything was frozen. When we got to the river about an hour later, it was still freezing, and we were nervous about having to cross it 50+ times today. We took off our trail running shoes. We put waterproof socks on over our wool hiking socks and put on some hiking sandals. The first crossing wasn’t cold at all with the waterproof socks for insulation. We walked in our hiking sandals for the rest of the day. We followed the river upstream and counted 62 times that we crossed it! The river was gorgeous, and the waterproof socks and hiking sandals kept our feet happy. It was a sunny day and the temperature eventually got into the 50s. In the afternoon we spotted 5+ white-nosed coatis. This was our first time seeing them, so that was super neat! They ran up/down some trees and up some rocks, while looking back at us and hissing/barking. At 3pm we made it to a hot spring! We soaked for 30+ minutes, which felt great! It was warm-hot but not hot-hot (99 deg F according to my watch). In the evening we made it to “town” (a general store and RV park in the middle of nowhere with zero cell service), picked up our resupply package from Doc Campbells Post, and set up our tent at the RV park. Can’t wait to head back into the wilderness tomorrow for more Gila River! -R
Day 4 – 18 miles, 2,000 feet of elevation gain, 34 river crossings
It’s cold cold cold out here. We got out of camp at 7am and headed to the Gila cliff dwellings. Aside from the frigid air, they were really neat! On the floor of the dwellings there was 750 year-old corn cobs. After a 1-mile detour and 1-mile loop through the dwellings we headed back towards the Gila.
The trail took us high above the river and then we descended down to it. The descent was through a canyon and sandy creek bed with the canyon walls towering above us. When we got down to the Gila it was really cold and lots of the ground was covered in frost that didn’t melt all day. It seems like the cold air settles down here and with the high cliff walls the winter sun isn’t making it to all of the valley floor. At 2pm it felt like sunset and we could feel the temperature dropping. We called it a day at 4:30, before it got too cold, and had a fire at camp. Hopefully we don’t freeze too bad overnight. For dinner we had creamy pasta around the campfire. Yum! -T
Day 5 – 9.2 miles, 1,800 feet of elevation gain, 25 river crossings
Happy Thanksgiving! Today started with 25 river crossings over 3.5 miles. The scenery was beautiful, but the air and water temps were cold! Our feet were freezing! A few stretches of trail were a bit overgrown and frozen plants were cutting our legs (we wore shorts because of all of the water crossings). I think the river has been getting colder the farther upstream we walk. Day one on the river was a blast, and our feet were completely happy and not at all cold. But by day 3 (today), our feet were frozen and miserable. Our waterproof socks are fully soaked through, and we haven’t been able to dry them out yet because of the cold temperatures, so maybe they are less effective now?
After those 3.5 miles, we headed up a trail that took us up and out of the river valley. At the top we were rewarded with a beautiful view of the river, so we decided to stop early and make Thanksgiving dinner! Before the trail we freeze dried/dehydrated tofurkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, sweet potato pie, cranberry sauce, and apple pie. We had a camp fire and cooked up our feast, which tasted great. A hard 1.5 hours this morning turned into an amazing Thanksgiving day overall. -R
Day 6 – 20.4 miles, 2,100 feet of elevation gain
We took our time this morning. The campsite was soooo pretty that we were in no rush to leave. We started hiking at around 9am and decided to loop our way toward the Gila Cliff Dwellings (where we were two days ago) and exit the wilderness there. Our initial plan had been to go farther north, but we have really enjoyed the highlands above the river and this route lets us stay in them for longer (and in the cold river for shorter). We hiked past a TON of wildlife prints this morning: elk, bear, coyote, turkey. Unfortunately we didn’t see any of the animals. We made it to the road right after 4:30 and heard three cars drive by. Unfortunately we missed hitching with them by only a couple of minutes! There were practically no other cars for the next hour, so we made our way to an established campsite near the cliff dwellings and called it a night. Tomorrow we’ll try hitching again first thing in the morning. For dinner we had macaroni and “cheese”. Yum! -T
Day 7 – 0.6 miles
We enjoyed 3 coffees in our tent this morning. We were a bit nervous about the hitch because the highway dead ends at Lava Beds NM, where we were camped, so we figured there wouldn’t be traffic heading out towards Silver City for quite awhile. As we were packing up our bags, the first car of the morning drove by. Tim went out to talk to the driver, but she was headed to a trailhead to start a backpacking trip with her dog. About 30 minutes later, as we were walking the road to find a good spot to hitchhike, the same lady we talked to earlier pulled up. She suggested we take her car—she lives on the other side of the mountain, so if we drove her car to her house, she would be able to walk to her house rather than doing the out and back she was planning. Amazing!! Thank you so so much to Becky (and Cymba) for letting complete strangers borrow your car!! We drove Becky’s car to Silver City to pick up our rental car and went out for a big lunch. Then we dropped off Becky’s car at her house and started the long drive back to California. -R
If you liked this write-up, watch the whole video on our Youtube channel:
Absolutely stellar documentation of this route! The 121 river crossings is wild, I was dealing with maybe 20 on a Sierras loop last fall and thought that was alot. The waterproof sock liner strategy seems way smarter than constantly stopping to swap boots. Also the Thanksgiving feast sounds incrdible after a week of dehydrated meals, bet that turkey was perfection out there!
You two are amazing!! 😍