The Red Skirted Valley (aka The San Ysidro Anticline)

One afternoon I happened upon a valley so stunning it took my breath away!

A couple of bike riders came along (this is also the White Ridge Bike Trails Area) and explained it’s an anticline visited by geology students from around the world...and only a half hour from our new home in Jemez Springs, NM!  This is where I began to fall in love with geology, and you may fall asleep.

Picture the white top layer as a continuous arch connecting with the white of the opposite side, with the red earth filling in beneath. This was at one time a solid elongated hill created when forces compressed an area and it popped up (slowly!) like when you push a rug with your foot. Then cracks along the top allowed water to begin eroding out the center so that, over a few eons, the hill’s center washed away, leaving unique beauty and a story in deep time.  (Google image)

The story continues on, though more slowly. The mound in the distance has many seeps where minerals precipitate from the water, building more mound. In the right foreground is a gorge where scant rains try to deepen the valley. I spent many wonderful days exploring all the nooks and crannies down in there. And from the Dragon’s Back you can see Cabezon Peak, a volcanic neck or plug, the hard basalt left after the earth around eroded away: 

Beyond the anticline to the east is White Mesa. The second photo shows how it’s gypsum is being eaten away for wallboard!

  

With the Sandias in the distance, above Albuquerque, 

I strolled into the dusk.