Terry and I spent a week out west chasing some of the early season snow-melt;   We found ourselves in Northern New Mexico, looking down a deep gorge of the Rio Grande!

We hiked in to the Upper Taos Box and were blessed with miles and miles of grade A whitewater. At first, Terry and I were working our way down this run by ourselves.   As the gorge walls continued to steepen, the rapids began increasing in length and difficulty.  With the overall nature of this riverbed being a sieved out maze, the pace was slow with a lot of in/out of boat scouting.

About midway through, Terry and I were scouting one of the bigger rapids on the run, with one of the nastier sieves I have seen.  The rapid consisted of a big boof over a ledge hole, and then driving right away from where all the water is pushing.  As we pondered the rapid and safety logistics,   we looked upstream to see a solo boater coming down!  As luck would have it, this solo boater proved to be “Mr. Taos Box”.

The rest of the day was far less stressful as we followed the ole’ local boy down!

After a thrilling run, my oldest brother made the long hike down from the rim to meet us at the take out. Rather than hiking both boats 1 mile out of the canyon, which was steeeepppp, two of us paddled 9 miles out on class 2/3 while Terry hiked out and drove shuttle!

All in all, a really neat area and a must do!

Enjoy!