On Walkabout On: The Road to Sierra Blanca Peak

Earlier this winter I took a trip to see the snows of New Mexico’s Sierra Blanca Peak.  During that trip my wife and I took County Road 532 up to the lookout near the Ski Apache resort.  To go along with that posting I figured I would go ahead and post some pictures of what the mountain looks like when driving up it during the summer time.  The most obvious difference between the winter and the summer on the mountain is how green everything is:

Since my wife and I live down in the deserts of El Paso seeing green like this is always a welcome experience:

Not everything is green though, there is plenty of wildflowers to see as well:

Here are some more examples of the wildflowers that can be seen covering the mountain:

As we continued up the mountain the views got better and better.  The drive up CR 532 has to be one of the prettiest drives in all of New Mexico:

Here is a view of Sierra Blanca while driving up the road:

We soon pulled into the lookout on the mountain with my wife’s little Hyundai that was backdropped by the massive Sierra Blanca Peak:

The views from the lookout of the surrounding Sacramento Mountains is just incredible:

In this picture you can see the winding CR 532 working its way up the side of the mountain:

The village of Ruidoso that lies at the base on the mountain could be seen as well:

A view of the Capitan Mountains could also be seen out in the distance:

It is in the Capitan Mountains that the legend of Smoky Bear began.  Anyway here is the view once again looking back towards the 11,973 foot summit of Sierra Blanca:

Here is a closer look at the summit of the mountain:

Finally at the end of County Road 532 is the Ski Apache resort:

The resort isn’t very big, but it has many ski trails for skiers to choose from during the winter months:

Here are some views from along the highway of the various ski trails that litter the side of Sierra Blanca Peak:

All in all no trip to the Ruidoso area is complete without a drive up CR 532.  Like I said earlier in this posting, this has to be one of the best drives in New Mexico and the lookout towards the end of the road may very well have the best view from a lookout in all of New Mexico.