Texas and into New Mexico

Hoping to spend time at Guadalope National Park we prepare for a long travel day staying on the smaller roads where the speed limit is in the 70 – 75 mph range and not the Interstates where it’s 80 mph. Traveling along on the faster roads is a balancing act where we don’t wish to slow traffic down where they then pass at almost anytime no matter if passing is permitted or not and us traveling at a relaxing pace. Therefore, we keep our speed in the lower 60’s. With luck most of the roads we travel have little traffic, but the traffic that is there moves right along. The day is spent on these unpopulated highways until we reach the Permian Basin where there is a oil boom underway. It’s the land of fleet white trucks and heavy equipment carrying big trucks. Here the driving is not as relaxing.

Only our last five miles to Monohans Sand Hills State Park is on the Interstate. The State Park is an oasis of sand dunes near an oil boom town. Camped for the night at a location that makes Guadalope National Park a doable drive tomorrow we settle in the for evening enjoying walking around the campground and capturing photographs. Oh and the most important task of keeping as much sand as possible out of the camper. This is no easy task.

The next day we finally drive out of the oil fields and arrive at the national park to find it so crowded there is no room for us to even park and check out the Visitor Center. Add to this the campground is full. We decide to head north towards Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We check it out and decide to plan to explore the caves tomorrow. Now it’s on to Carlsbad, NM for gas then to find a campsite. It takes a while to find a campground that has space but we end up at a free camping location close to the park. It’s a BLM Campground with no amenities other than a big gravel lot to park where there are maybe 25 campers. We meet people from Texas, Syracuse, Vermont, Albany, and other places. Of course we are keeping our social distancing but we all feel safe. In fact most feel safer in their campers than if they were elsewhere.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park

In the morning we head to the Visitor Center and purchase our tickets. The guided ranger lead tours are books ahead for several days but here is the only National Park where one is allowed to enter the caves without a guide. We sign up and since we are seniors the ticket cost is free. First decision, walk the half mile to the natural cave entrance or take the elevator down 700 feet to the caves directly under the Visitor Center. We opt for the natural entrance. We pass by the bat viewing arena where thousands of Brazilian  Freetailed Bats exit the caves each evening all summer long. It’s too early in the season so the bats are not here yet. The entire trail into the caves is a four foot wide blacktop trail sloping downward almost the entire way until we reach the elevators to exit at the end of the walk. It’s early in the day and we encounter only a few other people. It’s a special journey throughout the caves along this trail. There is enough light to see features and walk the trail but that’s about it. Wells spends time photographing and hopefully will be shared online here. All total from the Visitor Center to the Natural Entrance and back to the elevators is close to two miles.

It’s time to continue our travels westward. Well, in order to head westward we first must go north. Traveling  the twenty miles north to Carlsbad, NM we enjoy a meal at a small café. After another 30 miles north along flat flat roads we turn west. Here we are at roughly 4,000 feet in elevation and the temperature is 71 degrees. 80 miles to the west the road peaks at 8,650 feet in the community of Cloudcroft, NM. We take guesses of what the temperature will drop to from our pleasant 71 degrees. Between us our guesses are 58 and 51 where we are not even close. As we climbed rain begins and we wonder if we’ll see snow falling. There’s snow in patches near the road but none falls. The temperature in Cloudcroft drops to 40 as we then head down the mountains to a comfortable 68. We locate a RV park where we pull in for a two day stay.