Cochran County High Point Trip Report

north of Bledsoe BM (4,005+ ft)

Date: March 12, 2001
Author: Scott Surgent

From the tiny town of Bledsoe, drive west along FM-2182 about 2 miles. The road will turn north for less than a mile, then where it turns west again at the Texas-New Mexico state line, stop and park off the road. There is a sandy depression off the road to the north of this last turn. As usual, in passenger vehicles beware of soft spots.

From the pullout, walk north along the sandy road to a gate that has no restrictive signs. However, this is a ranch and on the day I showed up there were cattle out and about. I chose to hop the fence just to the west of the gate; a north-south fence delineates Texas from New Mexico. I walked north along the fence, tripping once on a bunched-up pile of barbed wire, before coming up to the highpoint bluffs. The sandy road might be a better path but mud and standing water prompted me to avoid it. The cattle were not a problem.

The highpoint area is a set of sandy bluffs about 500 feet inside Texas from the state line. I scampered over to the highest one of the ones I could see and using my sight-level, immediately deleted about a half- dozen other bumps from contention while also determining the likeliest highest hill. The highest of these little hills is about another 500 feet east, toward another north-south fence line. I stepped on about 2 or 3 areas of contention, back-sighted to some other areas and was satisfied I hit the highest point. I returned to my truck, total time about 40 minutes and just a shade over a mile of hiking. These bluffs appear to be natural, but it also seems that the ranchers have taken advantage of these bluffs and have dug out some water catch basins within them.