I composed almost all of this before I saw you were planning on going south, but go back and read the last paragraph and the parts about the wind. I figure people would enjoy the link to the bob ride a few years back too.
If you get north of Albuquerque, you get really high really quick, I live in los alamos at 7200 feet and I usually take my studded tires off on Tax Day. Santa fe is also at 7000 feet. Just to give you an idea of what can go wrong. Here is the Santa Fe Mtb race in early May 2010: http://www.flickr.com/photos/targetsalad/4571133393/ Not in the mountains mind you, that is probably a touch lower than 7000 feet just outside of the city proper. Now often you can get some nice spring road biking as the sun keeps things warm. Nights can be rough. Santa Fe and Los Alamos date of last frost is usually 6/1 or so depending on exactly where you are. However, as patrick said, usually winter gives way to wind. Here are some photos of an ill advised bob-ride in Albuquerque on 3/16/2008: http://tsaleh.blogspot.com/2008/03/nm-ibob-ride-in-few-pics-and-video.html You can see pictures of Patrick " I never flat" Moore fixing a flat, Ryan Watson and me among other bob /RBW listers. So it was probably reasonably warmish in Albuquerque that day, but check out the movie and the picture of Ryan afterwards. While that was a really windy day, it was not atypically windy for spring riding. As Ray pointed out there is nice cold skiing at the higher elevations, Los Alamos's xc ski area is at 9000 feet or so, but usually by march you can road ride in the morning in town (the one good loop road ride in town is the bandelier loop which goes from 7800 feet to 6300 feet or so) and xc ski up on the mountain in the afternoon. I believe I did an Xc ski race in los alamos the day before the bob-ride linked above. Anyhow, June and early July are probably good, after that the monsoons come with severe thunderstorms. Then again in september, before winter comes in october (in higher elevations again).... I like to say there are months in which you will get snowed on, and the rest of the months you will probably get hailed on, so there are always challenges riding in the high country. Anyhow, plan carefully. Most of NM is above 4000 feet in altitude, even all the way to the border with mexico. The local bike racer list has fairly regular emails to house cyling tourists that gambled on Feb or October being good riding in Albuquerque, Las Cruces and Carlsbad and losing. Silver City and the Gila are also popular areas for cycling tourist and hikers to get caught by bad storms on the peripheries of winter. Good luck and plan well. Tarik > On Fri, Jan 7, 2011 at 10:43 AM, MichaelH <mhech...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Actually that's the part of the state that I have toured on two >> occasions for about a month in total. I was thinking about coming >> across the south - hitting New Orleans & San Antonio before landing in >> Big Bend, then on to Carlsbad, and Las Cruces, before heading back >> north. >> michael >> > > Latest forecasts for ABQ area, mid 40s high with low 20s low; Las > Cruces 12-15 F higher. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "RBW Owners Bunch" group. > To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bu...@googlegroups.com. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en. > > -- Tarik Saleh tas at tariksaleh dot com in los alamos, po box 208, 87544 http://tariksaleh.com all sorts of bikes blog: http://tsaleh.blogspot.com -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bu...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
