Organ Mountains - Desert Peaks National Monument is a beautiful park in Southeast New Mexico managed by the Bureau of Land Management. Just 25 minutes from Las Cruces, this park makes for a great day trip from the city or a stop-off on your way to or from White Sands National Park. I enjoyed a wonderful 7 mile round-trip hike up to Baylor Pass, a saddle with wonderful views out over the Chihuahuan Desert. In the afternoon, I made a 3 mile round-trip hike to the ruins at Dripping Springs. This area, which contains a natural spring deep in a hollow, was once home to Boyd’s Sanatorium and Van Patton’s Mountain Camp. The sanatorium catered to tuberculosis patients while the mountain camp was a fancy hotel and resort. Opened in 1897, the hotel had 15 guest rooms, a dining hall, a concert hall, a gazebo and a roller-skating rink and hosted the likes of Pat Garrett and Pancho Villa. The resort fell on hard times during World War I and Eugene Van Patten sold it to Dr. Boyd who ran the sanatorium. The Great Depression would be the final blow to the resort and it closed for good in the 1920s. Today it is maintained in a state of arrested decay and makes for a cool walk in the late afternoon. There is so much more to this park than just these two hikes, but they were all I had time for during my visit. I hope you enjoy these photos from Organ Mountains - Dripping Springs National Monument.