The Abiquiu plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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11° on Nov. 17, 2000, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1957. Next is 12° in 2018.
Abiquiu’s center stands about 6,180 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 5,940 ft to 7,630 ft, a difference of 1,690 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Chicoma Mountain, about 11,540 ft, 14 miles south-southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Lower Santa Fe Group (conglomerate-sandstone, coarse-detrital, fine-detrital), from the Late Oligocene to Late Miocene, 5.3 to 28 million years old.
The section below crosses 8 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 4×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Conglomerate-sandstone, coarse-detrital, fine-detrital. Age: Late Oligocene to Late Miocene, 5.3 to 28 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Dacite, rhyolite. Age: Miocene, 5.3 to 23 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone, shale. Age: Tertiary Paleogene, 23 to 66 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Conglomerate-sandstone, coarse-detrital, fine-detrital. Age: Late Miocene to Pleistocene, 0.1 to 7.2 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Dacite, andesite, rhyolite. Age: Tertiary Neogene, 2.6 to 23 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 2 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Abiquiu reaches the Gulf of America by way of Abiquiu Creek, the Rio Chama and the Rio Grande: about 1,660 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Paz Ramirez Lake, Amistad Reservoir, Elephant Butte Reservoir and Caballo Reservoir.
760 miles of the trip are on the Rio Grande.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Abiquiu; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Abiquiu has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 88° in July; winter nights fall to about 18° in January. A normal year brings about 10 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 10 inches of water.
On November 14 Abiquiu normally reaches 54° and falls to 28°. The record high is 70°, in 2019; the record low 12°, in 2018. The most rain on this date, 0.41 in, fell in 1991.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1957 at Abiquiu Dam, 6 miles west-northwest, 200 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
