Stuart Wilde has spent a couple hundred days each year of the last 25 trekking into the canyons along the Rio Grande, where burnt-black volcanic rock soars for hundreds of feet overhead. Often, pack teams of rescued llamas trail him, and he’s pointing out petroglyphs for tourists hiking along.
These desert canyons descend from the gnarled piñon and prickly pear at the rim, into an increasingly verdant landscape laced with ponderosa pines and frequented by great blue herons and bighorn sheep. The natural landscape is riddled with Native cultural sites, remnants from Spanish settlers and conquistadors, even traces of settlements from Dust Bowl-era homesteaders.
“You can’t have a natural experience in Rio Grande del Norte without having a cultural experience,” he says.
For four years, he’s been able to say that his work—showing people the place itself, as well as driving loops around the Enchanted Circle’s highways near Taos to talk about the area’s historic and biological significance—helped secure the gorge protections for generations to come.
That preservation came into question at the end of April, when the president announced a sweeping review of national monuments from the last 20 years, including Rio Grande del Norte, designated by former President Barack Obama in March 2013.
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I am Jeff Clark, founder of Internet Brothers, producer of this blog, and passionate about hiking. I live in Western NC near the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky Mountains. Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests are just out my door, so the content will focus on these areas, but let me know what you would like to see on the site. 
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