Guadalupe Peak

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Guadalupe Peak, standing tall in Culberson County. Now settle in, because this one's a story the land itself has been keeping for about twelve thousand years. Guadalupe Peak.

Eight thousand, seven hundred and fifty-one feet of Texas. The highest mountain in the whole state. And if you're lookin' up at it right now, chances are it snuck up on you, because the peak actually sits behind and to the right of El Capitan, that sheer cliff face rising more than three thousand feet above where you're standin'.

El Capitan, at eight thousand and seventy-eight feet, marks the south end of the Guadalupe range, and it has a way of commandin' all the attention while Guadalupe Peak quietly holds the title. That's a Texas trick if I've ever heard one. This whole stretch has been called one of the most scenic and least-known hinterlands of the old frontier.

Least known. Think about that. All this time, all these people passing through, and the Guadalupes have held their secrets close.

And they have secrets, friend. Plenty of them. The first one is what the mountainside hides.

From the outside, it looks stark. Bare rock and hard sky. But tuck yourself into the inner folds of these mountains and the whole world changes.

Watered canyons open up, shaded by towering ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, juniper, and quaking aspen. McKittrick Canyon runs a four-mile trout stream. And somewhere in those canyons moves the state's only herd of wild elk.

Deer and turkeys abound. A whole lush world, hiding behind that stern stone face. Now.

About that gold. Because oh yes, there is gold in this story, and it has been in this story for a long, long time. Stories of hidden gold go back to Spanish days.

The conquistadors who rode north from Mexico wrote about fabulous deposits somewhere in these mountains. Geronimo, the Apache chief, said the richest gold mines in the western world lay hidden right here in the Guadalupes. And then there's Ben Sublett, a colorful prospector of the 1880s, who, legend holds, would slip off at night to a cave and return with bags of nuggets.

Bags of nuggets. He never told a soul where that cave was, and as far as anyone can tell, nobody's found it since. Somewhere up in those folds, if you believe the legend, the bags are still waiting.

The gold isn't even the oldest mystery here, though. Not by a long stretch. Excavators working these cliff caves have pulled up spearheads, pictographs, and human remains alongside bones of long-extinct bison, dire wolf, and musk ox.

At Hermit Cave in Last Chance Canyon, carbon-14 dating puts human occupancy at twelve thousand years ago. Twelve thousand years. The marker notes that probably less is known about the archeology of the Guadalupes than of any other area in the Southwest.

All that time, all those people, and we're still just scratching the surface. And underneath all of it, underneath the caves, the canyons, the elk and the gold and the bones, the geology itself is something to reckon with. The Guadalupes present what's called a spectacular exposure of the Capitan prehistoric barrier reef, said to be the most extensive fossil organic reef known.

A reef. This entire mountain range, built from an ancient reef. That stark cliff that's been watching over this road since before there was a road, it's the fossilized edge of a world that existed long before anything with two legs ever looked up at it and wondered.

Eight thousand, seven hundred and fifty-one feet of deep, quiet, well-kept Texas secrets. And it has been keepin' them a whole lot longer than we've been around to ask.

What the marker says

Guadalupe Peak, Texas' highest mountain at 8,751 feet, dominates one of the most scenic and least-known hinterlands of the old frontier. It lies behind and to the right of 8,078-foot El Capitan, the sheer cliff that rises more than 3,000 feet above this spot to mark the south end of the Guadalupe range. Starkness of the mountainside belies the lushness which the Guadalupes conceal. Tucked away in their inner folds are watered canyons shaded by towering ponderosa pine, douglas fir, juniper and quaking aspen. McKittrick Canyon, scene of a four-mile trout stream, is also the habitat of the state's only herd of wild elk. Seer and turkeys abound. Stories of hidden gold go back to Spanish days. The conquistadors who rode north from Mexico wrote about fabulous deposits. Geronimo, the Apache chief, said the richest gold mines in the western world lay hidden in the Guadalupes. Legend holds that Ben Sublett, a colorful prospector of the 1880s, slipped off at night to a cave and returned with bags of nuggets. Probably less is known about the archeology of the Guadalupes than of any other area in the Southwest. Excavators have found spearheads, pictographs and human remains together with bones of long-extinct bison, dire wolf and musk ox in cliff caves. At hermit cave in last chance canyon, carbon-14 dating indicates occupancy 12,000 years ago. Geologically, the Guadalupes present a spectacular exposure of the famous capitan prehistoric barrier reef, said to be the most extensive fossil organic reef known.