I used to live in an area near Lumberton (just west of Dulce off the Res). I used to know several ranchers in the area and my hobby at the time was
documenting projectile points (arrowheads) in the region. I used o get the land ownersa permission to hunt around their property for arrowheads.
Occasionaly I would drive around on Dulce - the Jicarillia are a very private people and do not allow hiking on their land. I would just stay on the
roads and photograph terrain features for my studies in archeology.
I can tell you I have been all over this area. I have to been all over the canyons in Carson National Forest (to the West), Valle Seco (Colorado) to
the North, and Lumberton to the East. I have been all over the North side of Archuleta Mesa documenting archeological sites.
I can tell you first hand there are some strange things in those areas. Hopefully the previous posters come back (that live in Dulce) to verify the
areas I am referring to. For those of you that have google earth, or google maps I will show you the coordinates I am referring to.
In Dulce, if you take Road BIA-8 (J8?) south a few miles (about 9 miles as the crow flies) the is a very bizarre runway in the middle of nowhere. This
class of runway is large enough to support large aircraft - the runway is more than 1 mile long! I should mention this is not the dulce municipal
airport, this is a few miles south of that. There are no buildings over there either...Quite simply the airstrip back right up to a bluff on the rear
side.
The coordinates are: 36, 49' 41.85"N & 106, 53'02.75"W
Those of you from the area know what I am talking about. Here s the link in Google Maps;
maps.google.com...,-106.89618&z=13&hl=en&t=h
In google maps in says "Jicarilla Apache Nation Airport", however, those of you from Dulce know that the airport is located just off of Airport Rd
next to the baseball park here;
maps.google.com...,-106.99232&spn=0.004254,0.007296&z=17&om=1
Any ideas?
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Okay... Next area I wanted to bring up was the area North of Archuleta Mesa. First of all you cannot access Archuleta Mesa from the South side - I
know the maps show access roads on the south near Dulce, but the are private gated roads - not open to the public. When I did research, I was given
permission from a land owner on the south side to access (the then) BLM area. Although there are pockets of BLM land up there - it is really confusing
how it has been divided up. To the South it is Jicarilla (BIA) Land - strictly forbidden. To the West is Southern Ute Reservation - again forbidden,
and then throughout there are BLM and private parcels. When I talked to the Chama BLM district they had informed me most all of the remaining land on
Archuleta Mesa was being turned over to the Southern Ute Tribe. Not really sure what kind of land swap is going on, but it is not too uncommon for BLM
to trade land. My main interest of the North side of Archuleta Mesa is the numerous Petroglyphs up past Cold Springs Rd (Cool Springs private
subdivision). Unforetuneately these areas are now off limits as the old Redding Ranch was purchased by the Southern Ute tribe. Those canyons are
amazing - although, I can tell you first hand very dangerous - teaming with Mountain Lions! A few of the old timers I spoke with a few years back that
lived near parcels of the Redding Ranch always had stories of all the 'crap' they would see in the sky in both Valle Secco & South side Archuleta
Mesa. I too have stories of all the weird stuff in the area.