New Mexico Benchmarking (mon, 3/13)

[+BuckBrooke]

Greetings, all.

CallawayMT and I are meeting Monday morning, 3/13/2006, 8:00 AM at Exit 163 (San Acacia) on I-25 about 45 minutes S of Albuquerque to find EQ0807 Black Butte, but also the New Mexico Principal Meridian which should be on the same butte top. Anyone's welcome.

 

Edited: As a note, I really dislike the auto non-capitalization formatting in the topic titles. It should be (Mon, 3/13).

Edited March 11, 2006 by BuckBrooke

[+PFF]

Sounds like fun. Remember: We want a full report, with photos, when the expedition is over. :-)

 

By the way, how'd you get the way-cool PID map used on your profile?

 

-Paul-

[+BuckBrooke]

I originally saw it on Me & Bucky's profile, and he gave me this link for the picture. After that, it's hand editing in Paint.

[+GEO*Trailblazer 1]

I was there and it is kinda hard to get up there.

I did not make it to the mark before nightfall.

The people that live at the end of the road are kinda...kinda friendly.

 

It is up there.

This is zoomed in so don't let it fool ya.

Good luck.

 

Edited March 12, 2006 by GEO*Trailblazer 1

[+BuckBrooke]

Well, it was a good trip, without being perfect, which is almost more rewarding and keeps us honest. I don't have any good panorama shots; I hope Callaway will post one or two.

 

My two newbie-benchmarking graduate student friends who had wanted to come along bailed in the morning because it was 22 degrees (with the sun down). As soon as the sun came up, like a good desert it got very comfortable. Ah well.

 

CallawayMT and I met at EQ0814 3410635017, a NM State Highway Commission station at the I-25 exit for San Acacia. I hadn't found it in June 2005, but it's there in broad daylight. That's the keeping me honest part of the trip.

 

We then drove to the San Acacia cemetary at the base of Black Butte. A short comedy ensued while getting his rental car chased by the neighors dogs while we tried to ask for permission. We hiked around to the north-west side of the butte to climb up the side of the saddle evident in Geo's picture. After ripping my jeans on some random barbed wire, and crossing a barbed wire fence, we hiked up the butte (<30 minutes). It was rather pleasant weather, and clear skies.

 

Arriving at the top, Callaway's sharp eyes found EQ0807 BLACK BUTTE, which was in good shape, but the two RM stations had been chipped out. Proceeding across the butte's saddle, we easily found AI5439 INITIAL POINT, placed in 1956 over the pile of rocks that marked the original station. All around the station are mounded walls about 6 in. tall from a prehistoric pueblo dwelling.

The station has four reference marks, one in each quadrant, which are pipecaps and look very much the same. I'm listing the station and 4 reference marks as Waymarks.

 

After taking photos, we climbed down the butte. One the way down a witness post was spotted, and we found a non-PID US Dept. of Interior Fish and Wildlife Service disk marking the southern boundary of the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge. It's listed as a Waymark.

 

We then hiked around a bit, looking for two nearby PID stations. We found EQ0808 HILL, but found EQ0809 R 963.5 destroyed, with RM 1 intact.

 

Going back to the car, we drove down the dirt road a bit to a NM water diversion project dam, where some surveyors were using the disks on the dam. This is the first time I've seen a surveyor using the station I was going after. Nifty. In any case, we got to closely photo EQ0191 4676, a Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District disk, a new agency. It's used for vertical control on the dam; there's a line of Bureau of Reclamation disks across the dam that are used for horizontal control. EQ0191 4675, a nearby station, was not there, as part of a diversion channel had been built where it should have been.

 

Going on down the road, we stopped and looked for EQ0193 15, which is probably buried under branches and plant debris in front of its referenced fence. We chatted with the ranchowner, who was at the end of his driveway. Rattlesnakes, rain, dogs, barns, neighbors, ranching and changing ranches were topics of discussion.

 

Total time spent benchmarking: 3 hours 15 min. 4 found, 1 not found, 1 destroyed, one slightly searched for. 5 reference disks and two other disks found.

 

We then drove south on I-25 a dozen miles where we had lunch.

Edited March 15, 2006 by BuckBrooke

[+PFF]

AWESOME!

 

-Paul-

[+GEO*Trailblazer 1]

That's why they call it the

LAND OF ENCHANTMENT.

 

My stomping grounds as a youth.

And now I wish I would have got to this mark early in the day.

But it was already almost dark my first visit.

 

It looks like my 2-4 hour average was close.

 

Thanks for the updates.

 

I will have to go back now and walk in the Footsteps of my fellow benchmarkers.

[+Me & Bucky]

What a fantastic hunt! Hope to make it there someday.