Riding the Badlands of New Mexico

When singer/songwriter Marty Robbins sang about getting into a gun fight over a girl then fleeing on horseback from El Paso into the badlands of New Mexico, I know exactly where he is singing about or at least what likely gave him the inspiration for that verse. He reportedly actually wrote this song while traveling from El Paso to Arizona in an automobile - that would
be known to you as a car, Bob.


The verse that I'm referring to verse actually went:

Out through the back door of Rosa's I ran
Out where the horses were tied
I caught a good one, it looked like it could run
Up on its back and away I did ride

Just as fast as I
Could from the West Texas town of El Paso
Out to the badlands of New Mexico

You can listen to Marty Robbins' hit "El Paso", which hit #1 in 1959, in the video at the bottom of this post.

My wife and I trailered a couple horses out to the "badlands" of New Mexico, just West of El Paso the other weekend, meeting with a couple of our friends for a several hours of riding on the big flat mesa, which in other parts of the country may be called "buttes".   Coming off the mesa, required find a cut, like a small canyon and avoiding Prickly Pear cactus, Fish Hook Barrel cactus, Cholla cactus, Mesquite and Creosote bushes and the Ocotillo which is the bush in the picture at right.  

The picture at top is on top is on the Mesa where sometimes you can get miles and miles of nothing but Creosote and you can lope or gallop pretty safely.  

This part of the country is actually owned by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and managed out of their Las Cruces office. It's just gorgeous out there, offering miles and miles of great riding and good land to train horses on. I'm glad that most of the other people pursuing recreation out here don't trash it so much like you find in areas closer to, or directly on the border wilderness areas where illegal immigration has taken a severe environmental toll.

Anyway, enjoy the Marty Robbins' "El Paso".