White Sands

 A little background information might be helpful before we get to White Sands. As the crow would fly it is about 12 miles, as the car drives more like 16, between Cloudcroft and Alamogordo. In those 16 miles you drop 4000 feet in elevation, or climb, depending on direction. Today that change resulted in a 17 degree temperature change. Alamogordo and White Sands are in the Tularosa basin, formed in part by the Sacramento mountains.

 We had visited White Sands before 10 years ago but came again just because. It is pretty impressive to see.

Maggie at rest

carpe diem

Dos Cloudcroft

 Just did a little touring and wine and artisinal cheese tasting today. Cloudcroft is a popular place for Texans to spend the summer. Just as surely as the northerners come to the valley to escape cold winters, Texans come here to escape the heat. At 8000ft elevation summers are quite mild. In fact we will get near freezing before the week is out. Neat little village, touristy in some ways, quiet and comfortable in others. We have been here before and will return again. Also drove out to Bluff springs and ended the evening with friends around a campfire and the obligatory marsh mellow roast. Tomorrow we plan a return to White Sands National Monument, Maggie wants a new magnet.

acting silly with Jim and Renee

carpe diem

Cloudcroft

 We have made it to Cloudcroft safely. Staying at a small camground owned by a nice couple. They bought it as part of their retirement plan. Like the way they think.

 To wrap up Carlsbad we had a nice lunch with John and Pam. They are friends from Decatur and live in Carlsbad. If I had known about John's deep roots and history knowledge of the area, we would have drug him around. They want to meet us in DC so will work the plans together and try and make that happen.

 Enjoyed our stay at the ranch inspite of the hail cannons on two days.  They shoot them off during storms.Loud, probably propane, cannons used to accustically disrupt hail to protect pecan groves. Shaky sceince at best, but damn are they loud.

 We will be here in Cloudcroft for a week. Jim and Renee will be here and we will visit with Wes and Lee in Alamogordo. Cool temps at our 7927 ft elevation, highs in low 60's, lows in 40's and 30's.

Travel map


 More from this area tomorrow



gathering some high rosebuds,

Carlsbad

 It was funny on our way into the caverns when a couple near us said what we were thinking..."I don't remember this..." That thought was to be repeated several times. We agreed not to blame it on advancing age.

 We have been inside several caverns or caves: Carlsbad, Caverns of Sonora, Longhorn caverns, Onyx Cave in Eureka Springs, Ruby Falls in Chattanooga  to name a few. They are alike, yet different in many ways.

 We did make the hike in from the natural opening. Glad we did but boy were our knees and hips talking to us by the time we left. Lugged my DSLR camera along to try and get some photos. As luck would have it the best shots came from Marys phone grrrr, could have saved myself a lot of trouble.

 At any rate a good day to be alive

my hero's. Bob, Mary's Dad was in the CCC's and built a park in Phoenix

cabins built by CCC's still looking good

wire ladder used by early explorers, oh hell no!

On to Cloudcroft tomorrow after lunch with friends today. We do have our modified itinerary on the way home worked out. Believe I like it better than the original.

 Forecast for the RGV tomorrow: 96 for high, mid 70's for low. Cloudcroft forecast tomorrow 62 for high, upper 30's for low.

 What a difference 8000 feet can make.



carpe diem

Tourist day

 Nice not having to load up and drive 300 plus miles. Decided to play tourist and visit places and things we have not seen before.

 They call it Sitting Bull Falls although he never came close to being here. The Apaches call it gostahanagunti which means hidden gulch. Seeing as they are the local native tribe and it is at the end of a box canyon, I prefer their name. Interesting to find a waterfall out in the desert and otherwise barren land. Also did quick tour of Artesia. It has a nice little downtown area that you drive thru. Probably should have stopped and walked around a bit but a thunderstorm was closing in.

 Random shots of the Ranch and the misnamed Sitting Bull falls.

love the work these guys did. My ongoing tribute to them.

Plan is to revisit the caverns tomorrow. Also plan to eschew the elevator and walk the mile plus distance using the original entrance. Hope these old knees can hold up...



"...gather ye rosebuds while ye may..."

We saw miles and miles of Texas...

 And the road from HELL!

 First off how about a few views of the South Llano river

 Texas covers a lot of ground. I always remember a comment from then Senator Phil Gramm when discussing the 55 mph speed limit. To paraphrase his comment, "...do that trying to cross Texas and you will get discouraged and turn back...). No truer words have been spoken. And in SW Texas those are miles and miles of nothing. Just when you think it cannot get worse, the vegetation gets more sparse and smaller. The only reason the settlers stopped in Fort Stockton and Pecos was because the wagons broke and they were too poor to replace them. God forsaken country, and I love Texas.

 Luckily they found oil in the area otherwise the area would have died long ago. The oil "boom" went bust a few years back but even so a lot of activity in the area. In fact Pecos was a nightmare. What should have been a quiet drive up 285 turned into the road from HELL. To the extent we are re-planning our return to avoid the road and the area. Extensive oil related construction plus road construction mad for a night mare drive.

  We are north of Carlsbad, 3300 feet in elevation in the desert. The club we belong to, Escapees, have a stake in this park. As members we can stay here very cheaply.

 A couple of views for you

Travel Map May 2017


 We are here till Friday. Will meet up with some friends and do some tourist stuff. Came to Carlsbad 25 years ago. Time to see what we missed and probably revisit the Caverns.



another day on the road

On the road again...

Thanks Willie for the words, and maybe we are like a band of gypsies. While it has only been since January 22, to us it seems like years since being in Maggie. Happy to be road warriors again.

At any rate we made it to Junction. One of our concerns with making the RGV our base was that it would take two days travel to leave Texas. Well we drove all day and made it to central Texas. If we were on a time schedule, or limited vacation time, it would have been a bad idea. But as a friend reminded me we are not and have no where to go and all day to get there. Two days out of months of travel is pretty trivial.


 We are in Junction Texas. We have been to Junction twice before but those trips were 25 years ago. In previous visits we stayed in the State Park, this time we are in a commercial RV park. Nice people running it and will stay again on our return trip.

The trip today looks like this

May 2017 travel


 Me and the camera had a disagreement and photos I had taken were lost. Effort to retake them led to another problem, now a "hell with it" attitude as settled in. Maybe better luck tomorrow.



back to gathering rosebuds...