Discovering an Bone Yard - Near Taos, NM

Ok so here's the story:

Last summer a friend and I were traveling across the United States in her pick up truck. There was a hard shell cap over the back of the truck and a built-in platform over the wheel wells with a sleeping pad on top and storage space underneath. We spent the entire journey staying on friends couches and sleeping in the back of that truck (mostly in National Parks and camp grounds).

Following Google Maps directions blindly in urban environments has, too date, never sent me to the wrong or incorrect location. It even figures out how long it will take me to get there and is pretty spot on. This is not, however, the case when you have spotty service and are out in the middle of nowhere (nowhere in this context can describe pretty much any unfamiliar location where other people are few and far between). That is when Google Maps will start to play interesting and adorable little tricks on you.

One such occasion happened to us as we were leaving Taos, NM in search of the Carson National Forest, a lovely looking place where it is legal camp anywhere inside the park without paying an entrance or camping fee. Score!

We were driving down a two lane highway searching for our destination with a large, open field on our left side and the fenced in forest on the other (at the time we theorized this must be the National Forest and we just needed to find the entrance). Suddenly, our trusty navigator began insisting 'In 2 miles turn right' and 'In 1 mile turn right'. At the time we were hungry and ready to cook some dinner so this sounded like monotone music to our ears, we were excited to reach our destination and get out of the car for a little while.

Finally our navigator announced 'Turn right'... But neither of us were able to identify a road to turn onto. We scratched our heads and our navigator rerouted us and announced 'In 3 miles make a u-turn'. I looked through the handy list of "alternate routes" and noted that they amounted too: 'In 9 miles make a u-turn' or 'In 16 miles make a u-turn'. Skeptical but getting hungrier with a rapidly descending sun we executed a graceless u-turn to search for our ghost turn again.

Sure enough our navigator chimed in insisting 'Turn left' and we noticed the slightest evidence of a dirt road leading into the forest through a almost hidden, although unlocked, gate in the fence. There were absolutely no signs present or indications of what we should do next... So we decided to push open the gate and see where this road would take us. The website did say we could camp anywhere inside the park for free so why not just get inside the park.

Within 1000ft the road had become bumpy and borderline impassable for our little truck so we gave up and parked it in a nearby clearing that had just enough room for us to fit. The clearing was close to the road but we were only staying for a single evening before carrying on and we were, as previously mentioned, hungry.

Settling in my friend began cooking dinner while I snuck off into the woods to relieve myself. As I was walking around I found some bone fragments scattered on the ground. Excited by this discovery I collected the fragments, which to be honest were not entirely impressive, and eagerly showed them to my friend.

We began hunting around the area to see if we could find more 'souvenirs' of our trip and almost immediately stumbled upon the skeleton pictured above. It lacked a skull but was very well intact. Of course, we wanted to see if we could find the skull and as we looked we uncovered another easily identifiable skeleton. Then we found another. And another one after that.

(Sorry this image is of the same skeleton again with a skull we found from another skeleton. We, apparently, did not photograph the other less well-preserved specimens)

We decided to stop looking around since the sun was almost completely set and we were beginning to get really creeped out by all these morbid discoveries. After it got dark we only stayed up for a short period of time before retreating into and locking the truck. To this day, we still cannot figure out exactly why this location was full of intact, old skeletons. Of course, as is the case with all great unsolved mysteries, we have developed a few theories.

1. We had stumbled upon some sort of graveyard or space where animals of a specific species go to die. This seems pretty unlikely too me.
2. Some predator preferred to kill prey and bring it back here to eat. Again, seems unlikely.
3. We were camping overnight in the area where road kill are thrown into the woods and "disposed of". This is the theory I subscribe too myself.

What do you guys thinking might have been the cause of this?

Anyways, thanks for reading! Follow @lipshitz for more photographs and stories and whatever else I think of posting!