You’ve heard of Shark Week, but wait till you get a dose of Monumental Loop Week! I just got back from a weekend in Las Cruces, NM attending the inaugural NM Bikepacking Summit and it was such a blast I’ve decided to dedicate a whole week to it. Well a full business week, I’ve got plans with my bike this weekend. Each day we will be highlighting different aspects of the event, so check back for updates!
Morning: Makers Market
The weekend started with a Meet and Greet + Makers Market at Outdoor Adventures at 8:30am. I got there a little early and was surprised by how many folks were already there. Over the course of the morning Matt Mason provided breakfast burritos to an estimated 75 bikepackers and cyclist that attended. New Mexico frame builders, bag makers, artists, fabricators, community organizers, etc were also there representing some of the great work coming out of NM. Walking around chatting with vendors and fellow bikepackers on Friday morning was actually one of my favorite experiences from the weekend. I guess that’s not surprising coming from a podcaster focused on bikepacking. There were basically 75 interesting and likeminded folks roaming around to chat with, and before I knew it it was 12:30, the meet and great ended an hour ago, and I was late for lunch!
NM Vendors in attendance
Adventure Bikepacking – Spreading the stoke of bikepacking and building the community in NM and beyond.
Farewell Designs – manufactures, and ships out of a small shop based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Nestled within this sleepy mountain town under the Sangre De Christo Mountains, we have unlimited access to terrain to test all of our products. Personally, I bought one of their Baked Potato tool bags.
Doom Bars – Custom handlebars bent by hand in Albuquerque, New Mexico
Buckhorn Bags – Buckhorn was started as an endeavor to create intentional, functional designs to get you outside. Our products are at home out in nature, exploring the beauty that surrounds us. We hope to inspire and support your adventures with high quality gear made right here in the land of enchantment.
Baphomet Bikes – Each Baphomet frame is handmade sustainably, in a facility run on solar power, using traceable materials from companies we hand-selected for their quality & ethics.
Tribulus Limited – The foundation of our design experience is informed by over fifteen years of building gear for ourselves and others. From daypacks to panniers, simple tarps and catenary-cut multi-panel pyramid shelters, internal and external-framed load haulers and traditional offroad bikepacking kit, we’ve designed from scratch nearly every kind of modern outdoor adventure gear under the sun.
Mone’ Bikes – Monē Bikes is a single man bike fabrication operation based out of Silver City, NM. I am Cjell Monē, the owner/operator designer fabricator and janitor of Monē Bikes. My shop is located in a 1990 Wonderbread Truck making it fully mobile and keeps the processes light and efficient…literally. My focus is on keeping overhead low and quality high.
Southern NM Trail Alliance – The Southern New Mexico Trail Alliance was formed by hikers, trail runners, and mountain bikers that are enthusiastic about trails and the lands where they exist.
Night Bird – At the heart of Collette Marie’s artistic practice is the weaving of her life experiences, her identity as a Latinx woman of Indigenous descent, and her home in the Chihuahuan Desert.
Send it Safely – Selling sweet swag based in NM
Lunch was at Habanero’s with some fellow bikepackers. No pictures, but worth noting because the food was the bomb and you should go if you find yourself in the area.
Afternoon: Panel Discussion and Presentation on Bikepacking
In the afternoon we were treated to a panel discussion and presentations about bikepacking in New Mexico. I’m happy to report that this was very well attended with standing room only, which showed how engaged this community is.
First a panel discussion, lead by Representative Angelica Rubio, discussed the obstacles to and importance of getting kids, especially kids of color and disadvantaged kids out on public lands. Included on this panel was Mateo Ortega with Families & Youth Incorporated, Sarah Randall a former intern at Friends of Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks, and Patrick Nolan Executive Director of Friends of OM-DP.
Next Axie Navas, Director of New Mexico Outdoor Recreation Division, presented on the ways the State and the Office of Outdoor Recreation are investing in the outdoor community. Including many different grants, their recipients, and the meaningful impacts those programs have.
Bailey Newbrewy, owner of Sincere Cycles and ultra endurance cyclist, shared about his a new route he’s developing in NM which will be about 700-800 miles of predominately singletrack along the CDT. He is actively working with BLM and Continental Divide Trail Coalition to hash out which sections are legal to ride on. Look for more details about this route coming out soonish.
The bikepacking community, culture, and State of NM are building something truly unique, and in many ways it could be used as a blueprint for other states looking to host their own bikepacking summit.
After the Summit, I sat down with Cjell Mone’ on a park bench for a chat about how he got into cycling, framebuilding, and how he landed in NM. That episode drops on Wednesday!
Come back tomorrow for Day 2 of Monumental Loop Week!
