Backpacking the Santa Barbara Divide

This past weekend, Melissa and I did a 3-day, 25 mile backpacking trip into the Pecos Wilderness and the Sangre De Christo Mountains of northern New Mexico. It's a pristine landscape of spruce and aspen, with the Rio Santa Barbara, flush with snowmelt, rushing through the valleys. We camped at 10,000 feet and then took a dayhike to the Santa Barbara Divide, at 12,000 feet. On the second night I knelt before 13,000 foot El Chimayoso and the vast cosmos, enjoined in the usual wordless prayers I do when out in nature. Afterwards, I climbed into the tent to go to sleep and put my cochlear implant processor in its Advanced Bionics box. I can't really explain the strange, irreconcilable juxtaposition I felt. It was quite possibly one of the most powerful firsthand experiences of paradox I've ever had. It is what it is. Psychologically, the trip was important to me because it represents being back to "normal" after having cochlear implant surgery on May 7th.


Pumping it up by the Rio Santa Barbara. Every guy has experience with this hand motion.

A view of me hanging out with 13,000 foot Chimayoso from the sub-alpine meadow where we camped

The Truchas Peaks, including Chimayoso, from the Santa Barbara Divide