Great road passing through the Shiprock formation up close, up and over a very nice typically twisty Buffalo pass, and along the Canyon de Chelly with its great overlooks of the cliff dwellings. Paved all the way!
This will be pretty long day (or two), but well worth the ride. Camera is mandatory. The trip starts in the center of Old Santa Fe in the square at the Place of the Governors. If you're rich you stayed at one of the pricey downtown hotels, if not, well, you wanted to walk around the old town, rig...
This route starts at the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta Park in north part of the city, just off Interstate 25. If you can time your trip for the second week in October, this event brings up to 900 hot air balloons that can take off over a two hour period in the early morning; not to be m...
Fantastic scenary with green meadows and lakes viewed mostly from on high. This section offers a great selection of fast sweepers and medium speed switchbacks. Well worth a look.
This is a must-not-miss side trip from the Turquoise Trail trip. This road rivals some of the best hairpins in Europe as it winds up the back of the Sandia where one can look over Albuquerque and about 100 miles of central NM. I had a friend who wore grooves in the sidewalls of his Yamaha on this ...
From Interstate 40, take NM14 north through Cedar Crest that rises up the gently sloped back side of the Sandia Mountains above Albuquerque. To add icing to your biking cake, be sure to digress onto the Sandia Crest Road, also listed in BBR. There are some nice flats where you can let it rip, but ...
Turn north on NM 337 towards Chilili. This winds up and down the pine forests of the Manzano mountains and across the Estancia Valley, then back into the forests of the Cibola National Forest, dropping precipitously into Tijeras. Here, you can blaze a few miles down into Albuquerque, or stay away as...
This is a nice diversion to get off the interstate. The best part of this is that it's 110 miles of rugged desolate country and you're going to feel the isolation. With only a handful of people to be seen along the way, I don't recall there being any services to speak of so make sure you get gas.
A beautiful ride across Northern New Mexicos Sangre de Cristo mountains ending at the Four Corners region. The desert mountain scenery is hard to beat on this section of road along with light traffic make it a wonderful ride.
Youve seen the mountains of New Mexico, and the centerline of your tires needs some wear to catch up to the sidewalls. This is it. The badlands. You will pass alkali flats and the northern terminus of the White Sands Missile Range near the Trinity Site, location of the first atomic bomb detonatio...
From Silver City, go west on US 180. Some spectacular scenery, particularly to the east into the Gila Wilderness. Follow US 180 up to Reserve, NM. [Be careful in Reserve, I had a local State Trooper give me a hard time for rolling through the stop sign there. In general, rural NM enjoys the revenu...
Start in Apache Creek, you can either take 32N to US 60 at Quemado, or continue on 12 to US 60 at Datil.
US60 crosses some fairly desolate grasslands, but they are beautiful in their own way. In either case, once you hit US 60, go east, towards
Socorro. In Magdelena, there is a side trip up a dirt...
This route borders on the exceptional and consists of NM State Highways 32, 36 and 117. From Apache Creek to Quemado the road climbs at a good clip with lots of nice twisties and sweepers. It flattens out at the top but there are enough sweepers to keep you focused - really sweet at 80mph. The vi...
A pleasant ride through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains of Southeastern New Mexico. Cool pine tree forests line the road. At NM70, you can continue north to the ski resort of Ruidoso.
Artesia and Alamogordo themselves are nothing special, but
the middle is spectacular. US Route 82, Lovington Highway,
is the start of a very scenic route. As you transition
from the open grasslands youd think your leaving Texas.
The road gently climbs up into the wooded mountains of
the...
In the middle of the southern New Mexico desert rises the Sierra Blanca mountain range. This is the shortest distance between Texas and skiing. The Billy the Kid Trail is a lopsided trianglular route described by US 70 in the southern leg, US 380 in the eastern leg, and NM 48 in the west.
Featu...
In the middle of the southern New Mexico desert rises the Sierra Blanca mountain range. This is the shortest distance between Texas and skiing. The Billy the Kid Trail is a lopsided trianglular route described by US 70 in the southern leg, US 380 in the eastern leg, and NM 48 in the west.
Featu...
In the middle of the southern New Mexico desert rises the Sierra Blanca mountain range. This is the shortest distance between Texas and skiing. The Billy the Kid Trail is a lopsided trianglular route described by US 70 in the southern leg, US 380 in the eastern leg, and NM 48 in the west.
Featu...
The section between Roswell and Capitan is about 78 miles starting in the high desert with a distant view of the Capitan Mountains and ending in the mountains at Capitan. Not only no police but almost no traffic. Very pleasant ride with some good curves and then a nice ride in the mountains from Ca...
State Hwy 24 in New Mexico is not to be missed. I stumbled upon this on my GPS screen and decided to check it out. The eastern half is country roads through high desert landscape, and the western half (closer to Cloudcroft) is forest and curvy mountain road. Super fun for any type of bike, and go...
The road surface at the start is not so good, but as you come south on the 15 this road becomes prograssively more fun and the scenary nicer. The selection of bends is quite varied and the forest a noce environment.