Cloud-Climbing Railroad

The railroad that cut timber also sold the cool air. Its company built a lodge at Cloudcroft in 1900 and 1901 to draw El Paso's summer crowds to what it called the roof garden of the Southwest, and laid the town out in separate villages so tourists need not mix with loggers. When that lodge burned in June 1909, the railroad rebuilt higher up for $100,000, opening in 1911. Summer excursions from El Paso ended in 1930, passenger service in 1938 and freight in 1947.

What the plaque says

Official Scenic Historic Marker Cloud-Climbing Railroad In order to provide timber for the construction of his El Paso & Northeastern Railroad north of Alamogordo, Charles B. Eddy in 1898 built a spur into the Sacramento Mountains. The line operated as far as Cloudcroft until 1947. The Cloudcroft Trestle is all that remains.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• White Sands National Park — 28 mi
  The largest gypsum dunefield on Earth, a national park since 2019, surrounded on all sides by military ground whose missile tests close its only road for hours at a time.

More markers nearby

• Mexican Canyon Trestle — 0.8 mi
• New Mexico School for the Blind and Visually Impaired — 13 mi
• Commission for the Blind Orientation Center — 13 mi
• La Luz — 13 mi