SAN FRANCISCO

Run

TRAVEL: 15 MILES

Hit the Dipsea Trail (), a seven-mile, 2,000-vertical-foot thigh-burner, from Mill Valley to Stinson Beach. Then ease sore muscles with a deep-tissue massage at Sausalito’s Casa Madrona Hotel & Spa (bay-view doubles from $309; ).

Surf

TRAVEL: 114 MILES

Grab your board and head for Asilomar State Beach (), in Pacific Grove, for a consistent overhead break. Later, spend the night in the beautifully renovated Tradewinds Carmel (doubles from $325; ), an Asian-inspired luxury hotel in ultra-quaint Carmel-by-the-Sea.

Rock-Climb

TRAVEL: 123 MILES

Ascend a volcanic vent at Pinnacles National Monument (). Surreal spires and 80-foot walls with hundreds of routes (from beginner to 5.14a) make this one of the best sport-climbing areas west of the Sierra, especially during the cooler days of fall. Afterwards, pitch a tent at Arroyo Seco Campground (from $20; ), the most remote spot in the Salinas Valley.

Paddle

TRAVEL: 147 MILES

Raft Class V+ rapids on Cherry Creek. The one-day run on the Upper Tuolumne is the hairiest commercially guided whitewater trip in America, dropping an average of 110 feet per mile through slick Sierra bedrock, with 16 Class V rapids packed into just nine miles. The river is so unrelenting (the longest flatwater is a mere 400 yards), clients of Sierra Mac River Trips (one day, $290; ) must undergo a fitness test that includes swimming 140 yards midcurrent and running 70 yards uphill on one breath. Don’t fret: In 25 years of commercial trips, no one has died on Cherry Creek. When the excitement ends, stay just outside Yosemite National Park at the 17-room, Gold Rush-era Groveland Hotel (doubles from $145, including breakfast; ).

New York City

Mountain-Bike

TRAVEL: 9 MILES FROM DOWNTOWN

Ride gnarly trails without leaving Manhattan. Last May, the Fort George Trails, in Highbridge Park, became the city’s first sanctioned MTB trail system. Working with the city’s mountain-bike association and the IMBA, the parks department transformed undeveloped land into three miles of trails, including two knotty, experts-only singletracks. The new area boasts enough obstacles and variety to satisfy even the most jaded city dweller. Best of all, unlike everything else in Manhattan, it won’t cost you a dime (open daily until dusk; ).

Eat

TRAVEL: 50 MILES

Treat yourself at star chef Michel Nischan’s Dressing Room (), a timber-and-fieldstone-fireplace- enhanced, all-sustainable-all-the-time eatery on the grounds of the historic Westport (Connecticut) Country Playhouse. Then make it a weekend at the nearby Inn at National Hall, a 134-year-old former bank overlooking the calm waters of the Saugatuck River (doubles from $325; ).

Hike

TRAVEL: 88 MILES

Explore the Shawangunks (also known as the Gunks), where two new ridgeline trails add seven miles to what was already world-class hiking and climbing. The Lenape Ridge and Minisink trails pass crags and cliffs east of the Neversink River, taking in distant south-facing views of the Delaware River Valley below (). Your crash pad is 15 minutes away at the Inn at Cliff Park. Built in the 1820s, it has large rooms and 500 acres of trail-lined grounds (doubles from $129; ).

Surf

TRAVEL: 118 MILES

Ride the waves of Long Island’s break-blessed Montauk with Izzy Paskowitz. The California-based surfing champ will lead an all-day clinic on September 15 ($300; ). Or simply rent a board from downtown’s Air and Speed Surf Shop (rentals from $35; 631-668-0356) and tackle the waves any weekend you like, using the funky East Deck Motel (from $110; ), in Ditch Plains, as base camp.

Los Angeles

Canyoneer

TRAVEL: 20 MILES

Hook up with Alpine Training Services ($120; ) to rappel down 70 feet of cascading waterfalls in the San Gabriel Mountains’ Little Santa Anita, a bolted canyon located in the Angeles National Forest (). Or, for a bigger challenge, try tackling nearby Fox Canyon (natural anchors only), where the highest of more than eight waterfalls drops 100 feet.

Surf

TRAVEL: 66 MILES

Score some uncrowded waves on the back side of Channel Islands National Park (). Island Packers ($85; ) runs ferries from Ventura Harbor to Bechers Bay, on Santa Rosa Island. From there it’s a seven-mile hike past marshland and through Island Chumash archaeological sites to East Point, where a strong south swell can produce six-to-ten-foot waves. After a day in the surf, camp in the backcountry, less than half a mile from the action (reservations required; call 805-658-5730 for availability).

Mountain-Bike

TRAVEL: 156 MILES

Test your skills on Pine Valley’s Tour de Noble (), just east of San Diego. The three-trail network covers more than 30 miles of singletrack, including ten miles of Southern California’s classic Noble Canyon Trail. After conquering the grueling climb known to locals as “L’ Alpe d’Wheeze,” recover with beer, local wine, and homemade ratatouille (all complimentary) at the nearby Orchard Hill Country Inn (doubles from $195, including breakfast; ).

Eat

TRAVEL: 161 MILES

Nourish your soul (and kitchen acumen) at La Cocina Que Canta, the new farm-to-table culinary school at Baja California adventure spa Rancho La Puerta. The 4,500-square-foot school sits on a six-acre organic farm a two-mile hike from the resort聴the perfect setting for learning how to prepare seafood skewers in a curry corn sauce (classes from $125; doubles from $411, seven-night minimum; ).

Philadelphia

Rock-Climb

TRAVEL: 49 MILES

Trek through Tohickon Valley Park toward the 200-foot shale cliff known as High Rocks. The wall is craggy enough to give both experienced and newer climbers a workout and, once summited, offers expansive views of the Tohickon Creek valley. When the sun starts to dip, camp near the banks of the creek (campsites from $15; ).

Road-Bike

TRAVEL: 85 MILES

Spin through the sleepy countryside of Lancaster County. This 84-mile road ride () through the Susquehanna Valley features 6,000 feet of climbing and the chance to break at Susquehannock State Park (). Afterwards, roll into the Harvest Moon Bed and Breakfast, in nearby New Holland, where the innkeepers are also your personal chefs (doubles from $99; ).

Eat

TRAVEL: 130 MILES

Go green at Natural Acres, an organic farm in Millersburg that recently opened a five-room bed-and-breakfast serving raw-milk cheeses, farm-raised organic eggs, and homemade white spelt bread (doubles from $65, including breakfast; ).

Paddle

TRAVEL: 309 MILES

Canoe down the placid Clarion River in Cook Forest State Park, a sprawling 8,500 acres of woodsy goodness that features some of the tallest and oldest trees in the country聴including white pine and hemlock. Then step ashore to explore the park’s more than 30 hiking trails, or cast a line in the Clarion, chock-full of trout, bass, and catfish, before sleeping in one of 22 cabins or at one of hundreds of campsites (campsites from $15; ).

Seattle

Seattle

Mount Rainier

Relax

TRAVEL: zero

Escape reality without leaving the city at Hotel 1000, Seattle’s newest and plushest urban resort. Packed with high-tech amenities like ambient-heat sensors that warn maids not to knock when you’re in your room and golf simulators that allow you to “play” St. Andrews and Pebble Beach, the hotel is within easy walking distance of Pike Place Market and the newly expanded Seattle Art Museum. It’s also the perfect base camp for kayaking on Lake Union or cycling the Burke Gilman Trail. Plus the resort is home to Spaahh (the name says it all) and BOKA, a hip oasis of blown glass, bamboo sculptures, and modern American cuisine (doubles from $225; ).

Mountaineer

TRAVEL: 81 MILES

Climb 14,410-foot Mount Rainier with the help of the experienced mountain guides at Rainier Mountaineering Inc., an outfitter with 38 years’ experience leading clients up America’s tallest volcano. Over a three-day summit bid along the Disappointment Cleaver Route, clients will bunk in huts at Camp Muir and learn skills like traversing glaciers, route-finding, cramponing, and self-arresting (from $805; ).

Paddle

TRAVEL: 166 MILES

Sea-kayak among seals, sea lions, and even the occasional orca with Cathlamet-based Columbia River Kayaking ($125; ), in southwestern Washington’s Willapa Bay (). Then go ashore to walk or run 24-mile Long Beach before turning in at the 111-year old Shelburne Inn (doubles from $139; ), with its antique furnishings and Shoalwater Restaurant.

Mountain-Bike

TRAVEL: 221 MILES

Rip along Whistler Mountain Bike Park’s125 miles of trails, 6,000 feet up WhistlerBlackcomb, Canada’s premier ski resort (). Or try West Coast Freeride Guides’ Floatplane Biking 国产吃瓜黑料 ($280; ), which airlifts clients to Warner Lake, feeds them lunch, and leads them along 24 miles of advanced singletrack through the Southern Chilcotin Mountains. When the riding ends, downshift at the Fairmont Chateau Whistler, with its new Wine Room restaurant ($159; ).

Denver

Drink

TRAVEL: 30 MILES

Sample local wines at some of the Front Range’s 20 wineries (), including award-winning Viogniers at Boulder’s Bookcliff Vineyard tasting room (), on Pearl Street, dry, rich merlots at the Boulder Creek Winery (), and honey wine at Redstone Meadery (). Then pass out at Boulder’s Briar Rose Bed and Breakfast, where the next day you can relax in the meditation room or enjoy an organic breakfast before heading home (doubles from $149; ).

Fish

TRAVEL: 70 MILES

Cast a line for the kind of fish that keep fly-fishermen up at night. Nursed back from the brink of extinction, greenback cutthroat trout are vibrant Front Range natives now fishable in Rocky Mountain National Park (). Hike or ride a horse in with Wild Basin Outfitters (from $250 per day; ) to Odessa Lake, where cuts salivate over Parachute Adams. Later, spend the night at the 90-year-old Baldpate Inn (doubles from $100, including breakfast; ).

Relax

TRAVEL: 164 MILES

Soak in the buff at Valley View Hot Springs, the San Luis Valley’s secluded wilderness resort. The natural pools have seen heavy traffic since at least 1873, when local iron miners came here to bathe. These days, visitors come to experience the tranquillity of one of the state’s unofficial spiritual centers. Call in advance to reserve a tent site, historic cabin, or room in the communal lodge (from $52, including use of hot springs; ).

Paddle

TRAVEL: 228 MILES

Boat the narrow channels of the 22-mile-long Blue Mesa Reservoir, Colorado’s largest body of water, with Alan Bernholtz, Crested Butte mayor and owner of Crested Butte Mountain Guides. CBMG leads overnight sea-kayaking trips (camping gear provided) on the reservoir, taking you past eerie volcanic formations in the high desert ($240; ).

Boston

Paddle

TRAVEL: 40 MILES

Rent a boat from North Shore KayakOutdoor Center ($20; ), in Rockport, paddle almost three miles to Thacher Island (), and climb to the top of one of the twin lighthouses where, on a good day, you can see all the way to Provincetown. Back on the mainland, enjoy the view of Rockport Harbor from an oceanfront deck at the Peg Leg Inn (doubles from $145; ).

Relax

TRAVEL: 75 MILES

Land a suite for the weekend at the Winnetu Oceanside Resort (doubles from $260; ), on Martha’s Vineyard, then hit the beach with your rod and reel. Try your luck with stripers in the surf at South Beach聴only 250 yards from your door聴or bike over to Menemsha and fly-fish for albacore.

Mountain-Bike

TRAVEL: 89 MILES

Roll over 15 miles of new and refurbished singletrack inside central Massachusetts’s Wendell State Forest. The three-mile Hannah Swarton Trail skirts past rock ledges and laurel thickets and down switchbacks (). At the end of the day, quench your thirst with a Red-Headed Stepchild at the Northampton Brewery Bar and Grille before heading to the nearby Hotel Northampton (doubles from $175; ).听

Hike

TRAVEL: 189 MILES

Work your legs in Maine’s Mahoosuc Mountains on the new 13-mile addition to the Grafton Loop Trail (). Unveiled this summer, it traverses some of the most rugged and, until now, inaccessible land in the state. Follow the Appalachian Trail from Grafton Notch State Park and climb up 4,180-foot Old Speck, the third-highest mountain in Maine, then connect with the GLT and make your way up to Sunday River Whitecap for one of the best views of the Mahoosucs. With 39 miles of trails and eight campsites in the area, multi-day adventures abound, but after a long day you may crave a little TLC, so make tracks to the spa at Sunday River Resort (doubles from $115; ).

Chicago

Kiteboard

TRAVEL: 51 MILES

Stick your feet in the sand and feel your city stress fade at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore (), a 15,000-acre park on the southern shore of Lake Michigan. Or get your adrenaline fix by signing up for kiteboarding lessons with Chicago Kitesurfing ($150; ), then pitch a tent at one of the park’s 78 campsites.

Bike

TRAVEL: 99 MILES

Hammer the 30 miles of singletrack that lace the glacial hills of Wisconsin’s Kettle Moraine State Forest (). The John Muir trails are the most popular, so skip them. Instead, ride the 8.4-mile Emma Carlin loop and the ten-mile Connector, which are more technical (steeper, with more mini-boulders and roots) than the Muir but see only a fraction of the riders. And bring your road bike, too: features printable, user-friendly guides to two dozen popular paved routes throughout the state forest. Bed down beneath stands of old-growth hardwoods at one of two walk-in car-camping sites at the Ottawa Lake campground (), or head to Lake Geneva’s Bella Vista Suites for fluffy robes and a private balcony overlooking the lake (doubles from $189; ).

Relax

TRAVEL: 145 MILES

Book yourself an Immersion Suite at the Kohler Waters Spa (doubles from $663; ), in Kohler, Wisconsin. With plasma TVs, whirlpool baths, and a dozen in-room treatments to choose from, you’ll never want to leave your Eastern-influenced pad. Bonus: This December, Kohler will open a satellite spa in Burr Ridge, Illinois, a scant 19 miles from downtown.

Fish

TRAVEL: 210 MILES

Nymph, single-hand fly-fish, or learn to speycast (it’s an artful, two-handed technique) for 20-pound steelhead on Michigan’s wide-open Muskegon River with local expert and Gray Drake Lodge owner Matt Supinski (doubles $500, including guiding and lessons; ).

Washington, D.C.

Paddle

TRAVEL: 45 MILES

Kayak Class III rapids on the Mirant Power Plant’s 16-year-old artificial course with Tsangpo veteran Tom McEwan’s outfit, Liquid 国产吃瓜黑料s ($110; ). Located in Dickerson, Maryland, the course is a training center for the USA Canoe/Kayak National Whitewater Slalom Team.

Rock-Climb

TRAVEL: 136 MILES

Send the Narrows, a 1,300-yard cliff band of sandstone from 20 to 200 feet high, full of ledges, horizontals, and imposing roofs, just outside Cumberland, Maryland. Nearly unclimbed until 2002, it now has close to 100 established routes ranging from 5.2 to 5.10+, including multipitch and some top-roping. While there, stay at the Stonebow Inn, a bed-and-breakfast in nearby Grantsville, where you can cast for trout on the Casselman River ($135; ).

Hike

TRAVEL: 147 MILES

Explore Assateague Island National Seashore’s backcountry, a sublime 48,000 acres of wilderness on the Atlantic seaboard. There’s the pounding Atlantic surf on one side, Sinepuxent Bay on the other, and, in between, rolling sand dunes, pine forests, and green salt marshes where wild ponies and sika deer roam. With no potable water available, chances are you’ll be one of the few at any of the waterfront’s six first-come, first-served backcountry campsites (from $5; ).

Mountain-Bike

TRAVEL: 241 MILES

Tear up the 100 miles and 1,500 vertical feet of doubletrack, singletrack, and fire roads spread over 11,000 acres at WestVirginia’s Snowshoe Mountain. Or tackle the four-year-old bike park, featuring ladders, jumps, and drops ($37; ). At night, recover in the hot tub at the Rimfire Lodge (doubles from $154; ).

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SPLASH

trail running socks

trail running socks

1. Wigwam Merino/Coolmax Trail Runner
These softies make feet feel like they’re bundled up inside cozy slippers. $11;

2. WrightSock Merino TRL Quarter
Wicking synthetic and insulating merino work together to decrease blistering friction. $12;

SPEED
3. DeFeet Levi-T-Ator No See ‘Em
The toe seam is tucked under your piggies, where it is less likely to chafe. $12;

4. powerSox Power-lites Running Lo-Cut
Wicking fabric over the Achilles tendon helps keep these socks dry. $10 for two pairs;

SLOP
5. Fox River
AXT Wick Dry Off Road Quarter Fox’s merino-polypropylene blend is engineered for durability. $10;

6. SmartWool Running Medium 3/4 Crew
Generous cush around the midsole and heel helps stabilize your stride. $15;

The Arch of Progress
Your new trail shoes sure feel nice and squishy, don’t they? That’s the ethylene vinyl acetate working—the foamy layer under the manufacturer-supplied footbeds. But while EVA delivers decent shock absorption, it offers not a lick of motion control for overpronators—those of us who roll our feet inward while running. Neither does that bare-bones footbed. Avoid rolled ankles, shinsplints, and blisters by dropping extra coin on an aftermarket insert, like Shock Doctor’s new UltraRunning ($30; ). A rigid cup locks your heel in place on impact, a plastic frame combats overpronation by lifting your arch, and a raised area over the midsole improves stability on off-kilter landings. Other good options are Superfeet’s thickly cushioned Performance ($35; ) and Montrail’s new Enduro-Soles ($35; ) plastic footbeds, which bake in your oven for a heat-molded custom fit.

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Feel like your crawl is more of a creep? Don’t hire a coach just yet—it could be a simple nod that shaves time off your laps. Olympian Michael Phelps let the Speedo R&D guys use his dome for their new Hydralign goggle design, which coaxes you into the correct position to stroke most efficiently. Here’s how: Slanted, frosted lenses blur the lower half of your vision, forcing you to look through the top half of the goggles. This counteracts any tendency to angle your head above the water in order to see. And because proper water posture prevents the spine and hips from sagging, you’ll be slicing through chlorinated water like an eel on an oil slick. Neck strain is banished, and your shoulders stay relaxed. Another critical benefit: The Hydraligns don’t leak.

Speedo Hydralign

Speedo Hydralign

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Entrust your bicycle to cardboard and bubble wrap on your next overseas trip and your precious cargo could arrive at the other end looking like an Alex Calder sculpture. Hey, ship happens. Cue the rackmeisters at Thule, who have brilliantly applied their gear-conveyance expertise to the question of—God bless ’em—luggage. The company’s new Road Trip offers a hard polyethylene shell and squishy foam innards to shield your disassembled bike from harm and comes with nylon bags to organize clipless shoes, tools, and skewers. There’s even a wrap for your chain. Included roller wheels expedite concourse dashes, and if you spring for the optional mounting kit ($35), you can even throw your fully packed Road Trip up on your car’s roof rack—deleting one more hassle in the home-to-airport logistics loop.

Wheels Up Thule Road Trip

Wheels Up Thule Road Trip

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From the red-rock vistas of Abiquiu to the dunes of White Sands鈥攚ith a few shots of tequila mixed in鈥擭ew Mexico is another world. Try these 12 perfect days in the Land of Enchantment.

Horseback Riding into the Sunset

Cerrillos

Twenty miles south of Santa Fe, where the southern Rockies peter out into desert, the landscape turns iconic. This is Hollywood-western terrain—films like Young Guns and The Hi-Lo Country have been shot in the sandy washes and scrub-covered hills. Appropriately, it’s also the setting for the Broken Saddle Riding Company, a 22-horse operation in the pleasingly forlorn former mining town of Cerrillos. The stables’ low-slung paddocks and metal ranch fence strung with rogue mementos—requisite cow skull, spurs, and old bridles—suit the scene: At the sound of your car, the lanky and laconic Harrold Grantham will amble out of the tilting tack room in his Wranglers, give you a small but genuine smile, get you situated on a drowsy Tennessee walker, and lead you out for an hour (or two or three) in the pi帽on-and-juniper country of the Cerrillos Hills Historic Park.

Though I’ve ridden with Harrold plenty of times over the years, it seems like we never take the same route twice. There are dozens of trails looping through the hills—past fenced-off turquoise mines and panoramas of five mountain ranges and the high desert. Down in the steep-walled Crooked Hat and Devil’s canyons, your horse will ease into a canter so smooth you’ll find yourself whooping with crazed delight.

After the ride, the movie script sends you 12 miles east to the Galisteo Inn’s 1703 adobe hacienda, in the village of Galisteo. Refurbished in late 2004 with an uncluttered Santa Fe design—plaster walls in saturated shades of turquoise and cream, wide-plank pine floors polished to a high luster, deep windowsills, kiva fireplaces in nearly every room—the inn and its 12 guest rooms exude the perfect blend of style and substance. Out front, a portal is shaded by 100-year-old cottonwoods, and a quiet road winds past art galleries to a narrow bridge over the Galisteo River and the high, open lonesome beyond.

BONUS: At the Mine Shaft Tavern (505-473-0743), a classic shoot-’em-up saloon just south of Cerrillos in the outpost of Madrid (pronounced MAD-rid), order a Bud and a green-chile cheeseburger at what’s rumored to be the longest stand-up bar in the West (40 feet of lodgepole pine). The place is dark, moody, and cheap—definitely the real deal.

DETAILS: Horseback riding at the Broken Saddle (505-424-7774, www.brokensaddle.com) costs $50 for a one-hour outing, or $85 for three hours. Doubles at the Galisteo Inn (866-404-8200, ) start at $99 per night.

High-Art Experience

Lightning Field

Lighten Up: The New Mexico Lightning Field

Four hundred stainless-steel poles, each about 20 feet tall, spread over a mile-by-kilometer expanse of high desert wouldn’t seem to have the makings of a fun-filled getaway. Yet art aficionados come from all over the world to experience The Lightning Field, a land-art installation completed by Walter De Maria in 1977. The sculptor scoured the Southwest looking for the perfect spot to erect this influential contribution to contemporary art. Decide for yourself during an overnight stay at the secluded log cabin that looks out on De Maria’s labor of love.

Lest The Lightning Field become some roadside amusement for the traveling hoi polloi, visitors are required to follow a precise routine—and to make reservations well in advance. Your art adventure begins in Quemado, a wind-scoured west-central town. Here, you and up to five companions (the cabin has three bedrooms) are picked up midafternoon by the caretaker, who drives you 40 minutes to the cabin—dropping you off with enchiladas, breakfast food, and snacks. You’re on your own until he retrieves you the next morning.

While the cabin is comfortable, with hot showers and Wild West furnishings, there are no games, books, or TV; you’re here to experience “the work.” And it doesn’t look like much at first. But then you walk the vast field—looking, feeling, sensing. If you’re lucky, thunderheads sweep in, lightning flashes, and the poles glow pink, orange, and blue. Love it or hate it, you’ll never take in art like this, and that alone is worth the trip.

BONUS: After all that art appreciation, treat yourself to dessert in Pie Town, east of Quemado on Highway 60. The Daily Pie Cafe (505-772-2700) serves 25 varieties. Or stop to ponder some other big objects at the Very Large Array, 27 giant radio dish antennae clustered west of Socorro.

DETAILS: Visit The Lightning Field (), maintained by the Dia Art Foundation, from May to October for $110–$135 per person, with meals.

Whitewater Thrills

The Rio Grande

Rapid Descent: The Rio Grande near Taos

In a climate as dry as New Mexico’s, it seems slightly sinful to spend a day immersed in cool, flowing water. But as you raft the Rio Grande through the 800-foot-deep canyon known as the Taos Box, you’ll be too busy issuing Hail Marys (and yelling “Holy Crap!”) to think about guilt. The 17-mile-long Lower Box, with its Class IV rapids, is home to some of the wildest whitewater along the 1,885-mile river.

The scarcity of water makes trip timing critical. So last May, when I noticed the online river-gauge graph leap from a barely floatable 600 cubic feet per second to more than 1,000, I mustered a six-person crew and headed to the put-in, six miles north of Taos at the John Dunn Bridge. Our first 12 miles were gentle, but the Rio Grande spoke up as we approached Powerline Falls, where the cacophony of water reached a thunder. We parked to have a look at the 14-foot drop—we’d have to drift into a slot guarded by boulders, with no chance of paddles touching water until we hit the pool at the bottom. Then we got back in, cinched up our PFDs, and let the pushy current have its way.

Everyone howled at the tipping point, where the tongue of water carried us over the edge and ricocheted us off rocks on our way down. Nervous laughter led to high-fives as we realized we’d made it through the first of many formidable drops. Then the rapids came in succession: Pinball, Rock Garden, Boat Reamer, Screaming Left, Screaming Right, and, before the take-out at Taos Junction Bridge, the appropriately named Sunset. As the sun drew an inky shadow across the canyon, we stepped back on land, reeling from the adrenaline buzz. We kept the thrill alive by driving across the bridge to the BLM campground and cracking beers.

BONUS: Kick-start a river day with a hearty cup of joe and a breakfast burrito at the Bean (505-758-7711), with locations on both ends of Taos.

DETAILS: Kokopelli Rafting 国产吃瓜黑料s (800-879-9035, ) leads Lower Box trips from $95 per person. Camping in the Orilla Verde Recreation Area (505-758-8851, ) costs $7 per vehicle.

Eco-Friendly Escape

Taos

Eco-Sensitive Bliss: The Courtyard at El Monte Sagrado

Morocco is an inferno. At least, that’s how it feels from my cushion next to the fire as the masseuse pretzels my legs into “healing” Thai massage positions. When the contortions are over, I slide my eyelids open, prop my elbows on gold pillows, and look out the window. No camels. No bazaar. Instead, steep peaks meet clear skies, and gnarled cottonwoods tower over a low-slung cluster of adobes with signs that read TEXAS, BALI, and MOROCCO. But instead of North Africa, I’m at El Monte Sagrado resort. No matter—both places have a knack for suspending reality.

El Monte Sagrado, 36 suites and casitas circling a luscious green “sacred circle” east of downtown Taos, is all about suspended reality. Half its mission is to propel the notion of luxury escapism to new heights; the other half is to serve as a model of sustainability. On the luxury side: Merge scrambled eggs with the sublime while breakfasting under a priceless Warhol, a Picasso, and multiple Basquiats, part of owner Tom Worrell’s private collection. Get fully buffed with the spa’s High Altitude Adjustment massage or High Desert body polish. Then, after a couple of hours of hiking and yoga, the rich-with-cinnamon Mexican chocolate cake in the De la Tierra restaurant doesn’t seem like a vice.

On the sustainability side, the resort, finished in July 2003, is a 3-D manual on living right. Worrell built El Monte Sagrado to showcase his other business, Dharma Living Systems, which designs eco-friendly wastewater-treatment systems. So as you listen to the splash and trickle of water running from one goldfish-stocked pond to the next, remember: All the nonpotable water is recycled effluent.

BONUS: For unsustainable culinary debauchery, hit Antonio’s (505-758-9889), a cozy Mexican restaurant on Taos’s south side, for chiles rellenos with walnut-and-brandy cream sauce.

DETAILS: One-bedroom casitas at El Monte Sagrado (800-828-8267, ) start at $345 per night; two-bedroom suites start at $1,495.

Splendid Isolation

The rich colors and textures of the canyons and mesas near the village of Abiquiu are nothing short of perfect. This is Georgia O’Keeffe country—the painter first visited in 1917, and more than two decades later she moved here permanently. One look at Abiquiu’s 70-year-old adobe church—its bell tower and wooden cross towering against a brilliant blue sky—and it’s easy to see why she left New York for these more contemplative environs. I’m tempted to stay here, too.

O’Keeffe had a summer house at Ghost Ranch, 14 miles north of Abiquiu, a 21,000-acre property that is now a Presbyterian retreat center and the gateway to spectacular hiking. I’ve chosen a five-miler that starts in a cottonwood-filled valley but quickly gains altitude. I hike alongside the trail’s hulking namesake: Kitchen Mesa, a 600-foot-high sandstone mass. I negotiate a tricky chimney to the flat mesa top and am rewarded with 360-degree views of Abiquiu Reservoir and the Jemez Mountains.

Later, I ease my pickup down the deeply rutted 13-mile road from Highway 84 in Abiquiu to the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, where Benedictine monks keep beehives. The monastery opens its 16-room guesthouse to visitors, who can stay for silent retreat weekends. When I arrive, a smiling Father Bernard gets up from his rocking chair and encourages me to visit their church. I sit in the sacred space, listening to my breath go from shallow to deep. I wonder if O’Keeffe ever spent time at this peaceful place. Somehow I think she could have.

BONUS: Step inside O’Keeffe’s winter home, a 5,000-square-foot adobe in Abiquiu ($25, reservations required; 505-685-4539).

DETAILS: Ghost Ranch (505-685-4333, ) provides hiking info. Rooms at Christ in the Desert () run $70–$125 per person, with meals.

Smokin’ Road Trip

Highway 4 has a story to tell, a real whopper, and I’m driving through the middle of it—the Valles Caldera, a bowl of grass, forest, and streamlets that’s a dozen miles wide and boxed in by the 11,000-foot Jemez Mountains. The massive crater and the region’s volcanic tuff are the fruits of blasts from a ring of prehistoric volcanoes that were 100 times more destructive than Mount St. Helens’ 1980 eruption.

More than a million years later, here I am on a twisty 58-mile road that leads visitors from the sheer canyons of Bandelier National Monument to the yawning meadows of Valles Caldera National Preserve and on to Jemez Springs, where the earth’s interior, although quiet, is far from cold.

For four centuries, Bandelier’s Frijoles Canyon was home to cliff dwellers who lived in (yes, in) its 400-foot-high bluffs. On the mile-long Main Loop trail, you’ll peek inside caves carved into the chalky rock and reflect on what life was like 500 years before the monument was made accessible by road, in 1935.

After leaving the park, Highway 4 skirts Los Alamos and climbs west through a forest of cinnamon-red ponderosa pine before spilling into the remarkable 89,000-acre Valles Caldera National Preserve. Purchased from private owners in July 2000, the preserve is managed by a trust that plans to make it self-sustaining by 2015. Climb halfway up Cerros del Abrigo, a fir-covered volcanic dome that bulges from the crater, and watch a herd of elk graze in the basin some 800 feet below.

Now you’re ready for the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it town of Jemez Springs (whose geothermal hot pools are steamy indications that the mountains remain volatile) and the end of the road: the charmingly cowboy-kitsch Jemez Mountain Inn.

BONUS: Twelve miles south of Jemez Springs, sample Ponderosa Valley Winery’s award-winning 2004 New Mexico Riesling (505-834-7487, ).

DETAILS: Arrive early at Bandelier (505-672-3861, ); reserve online to hike Valles Caldera (877-851-8946, ). Jemez Mountain Inn (888-819-1075, ) doubles run $85–$125.

Secrets of the Ancients

Much of New Mexico’s vivid character seems to come in the middle of nowhere, but nothing in the state feels quite as nowhere as Chaco Canyon. Stretching through the San Juan Basin, about 100 miles northwest of Albuquerque, this lonely valley, a beneficiary of nine inches of rain per year, seems an unlikely place in which to base a major civilization. But a thousand years ago, this nowhere was a bigger somewhere than anywhere in the Southwest.

Between 850 and 1250, the Chacoans, ancestors of the Hopi and of Pueblo peoples like the Zuni, constructed a dozen “great houses”—multistory stone dwellings unlike anything on the continent before them, the largest comprising more than 600 rooms—and scores of smaller structures throughout the canyon and the surrounding mesas. Archaeologists, astronomers, and the metaphysically inclined have yet to get to the bottom of why this spot was chosen, or to explain the buildings’ eerily accurate alignments along paths of celestial importance. So they still come, over bouncy dirt roads (the route from Nageezi, northeast of the park, is easiest—four-wheel drive usually isn’t needed), to tread lightly among these ancient, expertly constructed walls, which have stood for centuries with the help of the dry climate. Six of the major structures can be accessed easily from the main driving loop, but having ventured all the way here, you’ll want to pick up a free permit at the visitor center and hike some of the 20 miles of backcountry trails to overlooks and more remote sites, such as the massive, ninth-century Pe帽asco Blanco.

Chaco Culture National Historical Park—one of three UNESCO World Heritage Sites in New Mexico, along with Taos Pueblo and Carlsbad Caverns—can be done as a day trip, even with some backcountry exploration, but leaving before dusk to get to a hotel would feel sacrilegious. To get the whole, timeless experience, you’ll want to be here for a day and a night, which means after-dark astronomy lectures and camping under the stars as coyotes yelp on the cliffs above you.

BONUS: In Cuba, about 90 minutes from the park on Highway 550, you’ll find some of the state’s best carne adovada (pork in red-chile sauce) and stuffed sopaipillas. El Bruno’s (505-289-9429) happens to have held the first Guinness World Record for longest burrito—7,856 feet in all, with almost two tons of pinto beans. (No pressure: It’s been eaten.)

DETAILS: The 48-site campground is the only place to stay in or anywhere near the park; claim your spot early, on a weekday if you can. Park admission is $8 per car; camping, $10 per site (505-786-7014, ).

Spins and Spas

I’m crawling up the Chamisa Trail in my mountain bike’s lowest gear—the one affectionately called “granny”—though right now I’m wishing I had a great-granny. Maybe it’s breakfast from Cafe Pasqual’s, a 13-table Water Street institution in Santa Fe, that’s throwing a cog out of my cogset. My choice, selected from 25 menu items during a three-coffee deliberation, was a jack-stuffed chile relleno buried under two eggs over easy, which narrowly edged out the smoked-trout hash.

Both my breakfast spot and my spin are New Mexico classics—the Winsor Trail network, including links like the Chamisa, is a must-ride. You can pedal eight miles on the Winsor, from the village of Tesuque to Santa Fe’s small but cherished ski area, for a net gain of 3,100 feet (or a net loss, if you’re a gravity freak with a car shuttle). My hour-plus climb today brings rewards—a tangent on the Borrego and Bear Wallow trails, a glorious rolling descent—and a question: Do I ride too much?

Considering that my town is home to hundreds of great restaurants, 200 art galleries, 11 museums, an opera, and a rich, four-hundred-plus-year history, not to mention ashrams, teahouses, art barns, and Wiccans, I think a change is in order. So I trade sandy singletrack for basalt and marble, letting a massage therapist at Ten Thousand Waves, Santa Fe’s most serene spa, apply 65 stones to my body. The 130-degree black rocks supply heat, while the cool white marble removes it. This stone saut茅 is like regression analysis—as in past injuries, not past lives.

The new, fluid me drops back to La Posada de Santa Fe, a cottonwood-canopied downtown hotel with 157 “casita” rooms (Spanish for “don’t pack tons of stuff”), some with a kiva fireplace and a porch. Then it’s off to Canyon Road to catch the Friday-evening gallery openings. The sun is dropping below the somewhat expressionistic Jemez Mountains, the clouds above the Sangre de Cristos are an imperial violet, and I walk through nearly 20 galleries without spotting a single bandanna-festooned coyote howling at the moon.

BONUS: The palette at El Farol (505-983-9912), amid the galleries on Canyon, is 100 percent blue agave. A Hornitos marg or two is best consumed with creative tapas like the crispy avocado (battered and flash-fried).

DETAILS: A 70-minute Japanese hot-stone treatment at Ten Thousand Waves Japanese Health Spa (505-982-9304, ) is $139. Rooms at La Posada de Santa Fe (888-367-7625, ) start at $209. New Mexico Bike ‘n’ Sport (505-820-0809, ) rents demo cross-country bikes, like Specialized Stumpjumpers, for $35–$45 per day.

Fishing on the Fly

San Juan River

In the parched and wind-abraded sandstone desert northeast of Farmington, the San Juan River is not only wet but surprisingly profuse with aquatic life. Well known to fly-rod-waving diehards but obscure to the masses, the four-mile, mostly catch-and-release section below the Navajo Dam is stacked fin to fin with up to 75,000 wild browns and stocked rainbows—some as plump as Oprah’s thigh. The fish attain such super-salmonid size by slurping a never-ending buffet of gnats the way whales devour krill. Best of all, you don’t need a master’s in entomology to hook in.

My girlfriend, Lisa—who’d never fished—and I signed up for a day on the San Juan with John Tavenner, a guide there since 1991. John showed her the basics and tied on her flies. While I tried to coax a wily one to eat a No. 24 dry fly, Lisa landed lunkers as fast as John could dance around netting them.

After spending a sun-baked day under bluebird skies, you’ll need someplace dark to sleep. Very dark. For the erudite troglodyte with a flair for the quirky, there’s Kokopelli’s Cave, a bed-and-breakfast an hour from the river on the outskirts of Farmington. With love, care, and plenty of dynamite, geologist Bruce Black blasted a plush, 1,750-square-foot, one-bedroom cave into a sandstone cliff 200 feet above the La Plata River. The cavern, 172 steps below the clifftop, features a waterfall shower and jetted tub, as well as a kitchen and two balconies for watching the sun set while spinning outrageous fishing yarns.

BONUS: Stop in Aztec for a Bus Driver (hash browns smothered in cheddar cheese and green chile) at the Aztec Restaurant (505-334-9586), about 15 miles east of Farmington at the junction of highway 550 and Main Street.

DETAILS: A full-day float with Tavenner’s Sandstone Anglers (888-339-9789, ) costs $315 for two; Kokopelli’s Cave (505-326-2461, ) rents for $220 per night.

Send Me to Climbing Heaven

El Rito

Midway between Espa脙卤ola and no place, really, hides El Rito, little more than a general store, a pint-size restaurant, and a handful of adobes clustered on Highway 554. It took me seven years of living in Santa Fe to discover the village, its gorgeous climbers’ playground, and the serene Rancho de San Juan resort nearby. El Rito’s restaurant, El Farolito, couldn’t look less assuming, yet its rich green chile, studded with hunks of pork and tomato, is a three-time winner of the state’s chile cookoff. (Have it atop the pork tamales: true New Mexico comfort food.)

A meal at El Farolito handily fuels a visit to El Rito’s sport crags, a wonderland of about 60 bolted routes ranging from 5.7 to 5.13c/d, all a four-mile drive north from town on Forest Road 44. The area’s appeal is its conglomerate rock, found in perpendicular, cobbled walls that look like they’ll crumble at your touch脗鈥攂ut don’t. Instead, the enormous ocher-, brick-, rust-, and chestnut-colored faces脗鈥攑unctuated with electric-green lichen脗鈥攑rovide generous holds. As I blasted up Walt’s Wall Waltz, a 72-foot 5.8 (superfun for a novice), the calls of circling ravens replaced the fading voices of my chatty girlfriends below.

国产吃瓜黑料 takes a turn for the cush at Rancho de San Juan. The main hacienda is flanked by a dozen casitas, each with saltillo-tile floors and handsomely outfitted with reading-friendly rattan chairs, a kiva fireplace, and a jumbo bathroom with a jetted tub and views of the pi脙卤on-dotted 225-acre property. Walk to a shrine that an artisan carved out of sandstone, or the top of Black Mesa, which looms above the resort and U.S. 285, ribboning in the distance.

You’re meant to bring an appetite to this Relais & Ch脙垄teaux property, which attracts diners from Santa Fe and Taos, in addition to hotel guests. The prix fixe dinner is limited only by what’s fresh at the market. One fine meal might include seared king salmon with braised fennel. And then it’s lights out.

BONUS: Authenticity rules at Ojo Caliente Mineral Springs (800-222-9162, www.ojocalientespa.com), an unpretentious spa catering to “cultural creatives” that offers hot iron- and arsenic-rich pools, plus apricot facials, just a hot rock’s throw from El Rito.

DETAILS: El Farolito (505-581-9509) is open every day but Monday. Collect climbing beta at . Doubles at Rancho de San Juan (505-753-6818, ) start at $225; dinner is $55 per person.

Cycling in the High Country

God bless the mining industry. Without man’s lust for wealth, how would anyone have settled the remote southwest corner of New Mexico around Silver City? The mountain town of 10,500 people, nestled at 6,000 feet in the southern foothills of the Pinos Altos Mountains, is closer to Mexico than it is to the nearest U.S. city (El Paso, Texas). And with hundreds of miles of lightly traveled blacktop and a seemingly endless network of high-country trails, it’s one of the country’s best destinations for spring and fall biking.

The quintessential roadie tour is the Gila (pronounced HEE-lah) Inner Loop, a challenging 75-mile ride that crosses the Continental Divide twice and passes a best-of roundup of New Mexico landscapes: striated sandstone cliffs, ponderosa pine forests, streams lined with cottonwoods, and alpine lakes. The route heads north from Silver City on Highway 15, winds through the mountains, and descends into the Mimbres Valley. Sure, there are 3,800 feet of climbing involved, but the visual rewards more than compensate.

Knobby fans will savor the miles of marked singletrack that loop up 7,275-foot Gomez Peak. You can access the network—a spaghetti bowl of technical sections and whoop-de-do downhills—off Little Walnut Road, four miles north of town.

Stay at the Bear Mountain Lodge, an 11-room bed-and-breakfast three miles north of town that’s owned by the Nature Conservancy. The 178-acre converted dude ranch is a bird-watcher’s nirvana. Binoculars and a library of birding books are at your disposal, and every day a naturalist leads hikes or activities. For cyclists, the best parts of Bear Mountain are the jetted bathtubs and Robin Hodges, the cook. My dinner—sirloin tips covered in a light barbecue sauce with a casserole made from cashews, mushrooms, hummus, and rice—may be the state’s best $12 meal.

BONUS: Soak in the hot springs near Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument (505-536-9461, www.nps.gov/gicl), 90 minutes north of Silver City.

DETAILS: Doubles at Bear Mountain Lodge (877-620-2327, ) start at $125. For free biking maps, stop at Gila Hike & Bike (505-388-3222), downtown.

Postcards from Beyond

The sand beneath me glistens almost as brightly as the stars overhead as I summit another 30-foot dune and look out over the rolling, nearly treeless landscape. It’s just as I’ve always imagined life on the moon鈥攁nd while White Sands National Monument is not the final frontier, hiking here can be an otherworldly experience. White Sands’ 73,600 acres of windswept gypsum dunes, surrounded by the Chihuahuan Desert and, beyond, by the San Andres and Sacramento mountains, are as desolate as nuclear winter鈥攁nd eerily quiet. The silence is broken only when a jet from nearby Holloman Air Force Base thunders overhead.

You could easily spend a day riding a sled鈥攜es, sledding鈥攄own the soft hills, basking in the sun, or wandering the park’s six miles of trails. But White Sands is best at night鈥攅specially during a full moon, when the reflective sand helps illuminate the landscape and midnight hikes are bright and Nikon-worthy. The cosmic ambience, coupled with a good bottle of Patr贸n tequila (no Tang on this trip), makes camping surreal.

For a nearly-as-fantastic encore, head 175 miles southeast to Carlsbad Caverns National Park, a 100-mile-long cave network and UNESCO World Heritage Site. Guided tours into less traveled sections are offered, but I opted for the popular self-guided walk through Carlsbad’s main corridor. The paved, well-lit path descended 100 vertical feet to the Big Room, one of the largest cave rooms in the world. Despite my claustrophobic tendencies, I was relaxed enough to admire the stalagmites, stalactites, and other rock formations, which seemed to evolve with every water droplet that fell sloppily from the 200-foot ceiling.

BONUS: Practice landing the space shuttle (via a high-tech simulator) at the New Mexico Museum of Space History, in Alamogordo, between White Sands and Carlsbad.

DETAILS: Camping at White Sands (505-679-2599, ) is $3 per person per night; register at least an hour before sunset (no advance reservations). Admission to Carlsbad Caverns (505-785-2232, ) is $6 per person.

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