Palo Flechado Pass ( Spanish: "tree pierced with arrows"), [1] also called Taos Pass and Old Taos Pass, [2] [3] is a mountain pass located in Taos County, New Mexico, United States [4] on the Enchanted Circle Scenic Byway. [5]
Palo Flechado Pass is 9,109 feet (2,776 m) in altitude. [6] It is located 3.5 miles west of Aqua Fria Creek [2] on U.S. Route 64 in the Carson National Forest. [7] A tributary of Agua Fria Creek, Palo Flechado Creek, is near the pass. [2]
Comanche, Kiowa, and Apache used the mountain pass on a trail from the plains to and then alongside the Cimarron River (also called La Flecha) before the arrival of the Spanish. [1] [7] It continued to be used by Native Americans, Spaniards, and Europeans on journeys to Taos. [2]
According to the historic marker placed at the pass, a band of Apaches, the Flecha de Palo, lived in the plains east of the mountains in 1706. [1] A common theory for the name of the pass is based upon a Taos Pueblo tradition for shooting arrows into a tree at a mountain pass following a successful buffalo hunt. [2]
There are two hiking trails within a mile of the pass that go into the Palo Flechado Meadow and alongside a stream. The Elliot Barker Trail leads to a pond and then a dense spruce-fir forest. The La Jara Trail at Forest Road 5 parallels a stream in the Rio Grande valley. [8]