El Capitan

El Capitan

Late in the afternoon, having only enough energy left in our sore feet to depress the accelerator and brake, we decided to drive the car out onto the highway around to the western side of the reef to get some pictures of El Capitan. This iconic landmark with its sheer south-facing cliff can be seen on approaching roads and trails from many miles away. It must have been a welcome sight for passengers of the Butterfield Stage Line (1858), because they knew they would soon find fresh cool water and rest at the Pinery Station on the slopes of El Capitan.

After making a long loop that extended approximately 15 miles to the west on US 180, we turned around at a large salt flat with a panoramic view of the west side of the reef. This salt flat was at one time the bottom of a 40 foot deep lake near the end of the Pleistocene epoch only about 12,000 years ago when the Guadalupe Mountains area received an abundance of rainfall. As the climate changed over the next few millennia, this basin and other areas like it ultimately evaporated and left deposits of salt, potash, and gypsum. However, the actual deposits were generated in a much earlier epoch several million years ago following the uplift that created the Guadalupe Mountains. The uplift of the mountains was accompanied by a downward drop of the Earth’s surface on the western side of the mountains creating a basin or “graben” from which water could not escape. Continual evaporation of the trapped water gave rise to the great wealth of salt deposits in this region.

Salt flats west of the Capitan Reef

The salt in this basin was considered sacred to the Native American inhabitants of the region, and it was a precious resource to later Spanish, Mexican, and American inhabitants. For many years, Mexicans from both sides of the border hauled salt in wagons from these flats to destinations as far south as Chihuahua, Mexico. The El Paso Salt War (aka The San Elizario Salt War) was started by Mexican inhabitants of the region in the late 1860s. Tensions peaked when Anglo businessmen from El Paso acquired title to the salt flats and began to require payment for any salt that was removed from the land. The Mexicans were slaughtered in 1877, the county seat was moved from San Elizario to El Paso, and ethnic tensions would persist for decades to come.

The potash from such basins in this part of the country has supplied the US with 90% of its fertilizer, and I wondered how much of the gypsum has ended up in the sheet rock walls of our houses.  After we reflected on the history of the salt flats, we slowly made our way back around El Capitan taking pictures. We had originally planned to get a shot at sunset, but we were too tired from the day and decided to make the return trip to civilization, a 55 mile drive back to Carlsbad.

R & R

The Chili’s Restaurant near the Inn in Carlsbad seemed to be the most popular spot in town. So having had our fill of Tex-Mex from the night before, we took a table at Chili’s and had a tall, cold Sam Adams on draught, a delicious salad, and lots of laughs about our new sport of "rock crawling". Back in our room at the Inn, a warm bath soothed the weary bones, and we looked forward to our adventure tomorrow on the McKittrick Canyon trail.

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