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He’s bushwhacked up 4,000 feet of vertical gain, backpacked more than 30 miles to the middle of the Pecos Wilderness, forked over cash to Ted Turner and even spent two years volunteering for a Boy Scout troop to gain access to the Philmont Scout Ranch.
The efforts paid off in September when Phil Robinson, 66, trudged to the top of Mount Phillips, completing a roughly 16-year quest to reach the summits of the 184 tallest peaks in New Mexico. Robinson, a retired Albuquerque Public Schools science teacher, is believed to be the only person to tag the summits of that many tall New Mexico mountains.
Phil Robinson, a retired Albuquerque Public Schools science teacher, stands on the top of Mount Taylor near Grants.(Courtesy of Phil Robinson)
There is a small caveat to his accomplishment. Despite his best lobbying efforts, Robinson hasn’t been able to get permission from the Taos Pueblo to climb to the top of two mountains on tribal land. Robinson did climb as high as he could on the mountains without trespassing.
“My goal was to do it as respectfully as possible,” Robinson said.
That meant there were times when he backpacked for days to get to a trailhead without trespassing.
Robinson started on his project at age 51 in 2006. He hiked to the top of Wheeler Peak, the tallest mountain in the state, with his son, Garret. Then Robinson got the idea of climbing more and more summits, with the goal of doing something that hadn’t been done before.
“You hear everybody hiking Colorado 14’ers, but you never hear that about New Mexico,” Robinson said, a reference to mountains in Colorado that stand taller than 14,000 feet. “New Mexico has incredible peaks.”
He hiked the tallest 13,000- and 12,000-foot peaks in the state, then cast a wider net and started climbing 11,000- and upper-10,000-foot peaks.
His endeavor forced him to cut red tape and summit unnamed peaks with no established trail system.
Eight of the peaks were on land grants, and Robinson had to track down landowners and pay for access.
About 10 of the peaks are on Ted Turner’s Vermejo Park Ranch. Robinson said he paid a “cruise ship price” of about $3,000 to be a guest at the ranch and hiked the peaks during his stay.
“We spent five days on his land,” Robinson said. “They treated us like we were on a cruise ship.”
Garret Robinson has accompanied his dad on about 50 of his summit climbs. Some of the lesser-known peaks, Garret said, were “horrific” because they didn’t have hiking trails. So getting to the top required hours of inching uphill while navigating fallen trees, boulders and cliff faces to reach the top, where his father would use GPS to ensure he stood on the true summit.
“For me, I guess I just put up with this misery to make sure my dad comes back safe,” Garret said.
Robinson said his son, wife, daughters and grandchildren have all joined him at times on his hikes.
His late dog Daisy, a wire fox terrier, was Robinson’s primary hiking partner until her death. Daisy was the subject of a front-page Journal article in 2014 when Robinson completed hikes of all the 12,000- and 13,000-foot summits.
His favorite mountain? Truchas Peak, the second-tallest mountain in the state, which requires a round trip of more than 30 miles deep into the Pecos Wilderness.
“I kind of think in one way the highest peaks in New Mexico are harder to get than the highest peaks in Colorado because they are not plotted out,” Robinson said.
Robinson’s final peak on his list, which he hiked Sept. 18, was Mount Phillips, on the Philmont Scout Ranch, home also to several other tall peaks.
A former Eagle Scout, Robinson had asked for permission to hike the peaks but was denied because he wasn’t a member of a Boy Scout troop.
So Robinson rejoined Troop 166 as a volunteer. He spent two years doing occasional work for the Scouts and then led group hikes up the peaks at Philmont each year.
Robinson says that over the course of his project, he probably took 25,000 photos, plus he writes meticulous trip reports and shares his GPS data on a peak-bagger website.
“It’s been such a joy to see every corner (of New Mexico),” Robinson said. “As I drive around New Mexico, I’ve pretty much been on every high mountain peak that there is. What is exciting for me is … every peak I see isn’t just a peak. It’s got a whole story behind it for me.”
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Peak season for vertical victories - Albuquerque Journal
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