Llano Cristóbal

Given the name of today’s trail, Llano Cristóbal, I’ve been scanning the countryside to the west of town for the last two days, looking for flat areas. Yesterday, from the fiesta plaza, I saw a good candidate: a big flat area down below the village surrounded by dirt tracks that looked like they would be very pleasant to walk on. To my surprise, when we got to the trailhead this morning, it was way up at the top of the village, and it clearly was anything but flat! It climbed steeply up the side of a rocky arroyo. Clearly a lot of trail maintenance had been done as there were stone walls to direct rainwater off to the sides and large boulders placed in patterns that allowed clambering over them.

The reward at the top was immense - just like the wonderful day from Yunquera when we climbed up to the tree line on La Blanquilla. Here we were almost at the tree line of the Sierra Prieta. We’ve always been seeing it from the other side and rather far away. Today it was right there in front of us, awesome and majestic.

This was totally unexpected, so I’m hoping in the next four days that we will be able to explore more of this beautiful territory.

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