| Seeing only light human visitation, the Cruces Basin Wilderness rolls across a mountain plateau cut by several streams. This wilderness is near the middle of northern New Mexico just south of the Colorado border. This is some of New Mexico's most pristine high country, with ridge tops covered in spruce, fir and aspen and reaching up to 10,900 feet, with grassland stretching across the lower elevations down to 8,600 feet, where elk graze in summer in large numbers (as many as 2,000).Most of the area is drained by northeast flowing Beaver Creek and its tributaries. Just to the southeast stands San Antonio Mountain, the largest free-standing mountain in the lower 48 states. |
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