I began today in Las Vegas, New Mexico, after driving up yesterday from the Phoenix area and managing a quick visit to Sandia Crest near Albuquerque. The morning was pretty cold, and I got an early start, hitting the road around 6 a.m. Today I'd be mainly hitting the flat eastern New Mexico counties, but first on the docket was Harding county's Sugarloaf Mountain, which is a volcanic plug of rocks amid some attractive, remote hilly ranchlands. Harding county is New Mexico's least populated county, at about 900 people roughly. It's a ranching county, with only two towns of any size: Roy with about 300 people and Mosquero, the county seat, with about 150. In fact, half of Mosquero lies across the county line inside Mora county. Go figure. There are no other towns in the county. Whatever place names are shown on the map are usually railroad sidings, or at most, maybe two or three homes or buildings in various states of disrepair, likely old ranch homes or barns.

From "Vegas", I took Interstate-25 north to Springer, then US-56 east for 35 miles to the "town" of Gladstone in Union County, which consisted of two buildings, one a general store. Union County Road 1 turns south between the two buildings of downtown Gladstone. I turned here, annoyed a local dog who ran after my truck barking all the way, and followed the dirt road for about five miles as it headed south, west, then southwest, then west again, turning into Colfax County Road 37 at a cattle grate. Another mile along CR-37 and I could see the dark top of Sugarloaf sticking up behind some lighter-colored foreground hills. I found a place to park alongside the road.

From where I parked, some old tire ruts crossed the scrubland, heading south toward a distant lonely tree. I followed these ruts, which in places had degenerated into erosion-fueled gullies, for roughly a half-mile. The ruts lead to a fence in severe disrepair. I followed the ruts paralleling the north-south fence south about another half-mile to a junction with an east-west fence in far better shape. Hopping this fence was not easy, but I managed to do so without getting caught up in the barbed wire. I continued south along the southerly fence, walking on its west side. The ground became progressively rockier, sprinkled with numerous football-sized volcanic rocks; the tire tracks helped. Here, one loses sight of the summit, but shortly, about a half-mile further beyond the "good" fence, I achieved a gentle rise, with Sugarloaf's top in full view about a half-mile to the southwest. It was an easy cross-country hike to gain the top. Although not a large mountain, it did have drop-offs of nearly 500 feet to the west down to the ranchlands that spread out below. The southern Rockies and Sangre De Cristo Mountains to the far west were still under a shroud of snow. Absolutely beautiful, and a surprisingly pleasant hike to gain this unheralded highpoint.

Access herein seems to be mostly open. Land ownership maps show a checkerboard of private, state and federal lands, with much of the federal lands being part of some National Grasslands. The hike is almost exactly 4 miles round trip, with about 400 feet of net gain. It took me exactly one hour round trip, walking at a steady pace. The weather was cool and crisp. Next on the agenda were three counties atop the Llano Estacado, with Curry County being first up.