After successfully hiking Two Buttes in Prowers County the night before, I spent the remaining daylight getting close to the Baca County highpoint, eventually camping at the Carrizo Picnic area about 2 air miles from the highpoint. The weather was nice and warm and the scenery was pleasant: rolling hills and mesas with scattered juniper. The next morning I took a brief hike of the area, down to a creek where there were hundreds of birds flying about. Then I got going.

Getting to the Baca highpoint is fairly easy. I found County Road Q and followed it to a track across a pasture and up a mesa, where the road got a bit rough. Once on top the mesa, I drove along an E-W fence line to a gate and a junction with a N-S fence line, which delineates the Baca-Las Animas county line. The highpoint is a single contour poking into Baca County, and the rise and fall of the fence posts made it easy to gauge where it was. I hiked south on the Las Animas side for a bit, then squeezed through the barbed-wire into Baca County and paced the highpoint area. Once satisfied, I returned to my truck and was on my way. Now onto Bent County.

Second visit, 9/20/02: As part of the Highpointers convention in Oklahoma, I came back up to Carrizo Mountain with about 20 others. We convoyed in 6 vehicles from Kenton via local dirt roads for about 30 miles through some incredible mesa countryside. It was fun to repeat the visit and snap a few photos!