Westward to the Rio Grande (Again!)

Saturday, February 2, 2013

Goodbye Roswell! We kept a lookout for more aliens as we left town and headed west. We could see snow covered peaks on the horizon and were excited to be leaving this part of the desert. As we drove farther from Roswell, it turned hilly and the vegetation changed. We drove into the foothills of the Capitan Mountains and then the mountains themselves , and into the Lincoln National Forest. We passed through the towns of Lincoln, Billy the Kid's home, and Capitan, which is the turnoff for the snow covered mountains and the ski resort. On the other side is Ruidoso with the horse racing track and casinos. We continued on to Carrizozo. We grabbed a quick Mexican lunch at a crossroads restaurant. Two Mexican meals now, and neither was very good. Hopefully we'll find a good one soon.

Past Carrizozo the road cut through the Valley of Fires. This is a fairly recent lava flow, perhaps 8-10,000 years old. It runs north-south and the road cuts east-west across it for several miles. We had an over 60 mile stretch of road to travel across. Part of it bordered on the White Sands Missile Range. “Trinity Site” where the first atomic bomb was exploded in 1945, was about 14 miles south of us. Sobering to think what that area experienced during the explosion.

At San Antonio, NM we reached I 25 and the Rio Grande again. Apparently the best green chile burgers are here on the Green Chile Burger Trail. New Mexico has lots of designated trails! We were still full from our mediocre Mexican lunch, so we passed on. We headed south on I 25 for Elephant Butte Lake State Park outside of Truth or Consequences, NM. We traveled along the El Camino Real, which was the road connecting Spain and Mexico with New Mexico starting in 1598, 20 years before the Mayflower. This area contained a stretch of road known as Jornada del Muerto, the Journey of Death. It was a 90 mile waterless shortcut, that shaved several weeks off the journey, but many people and draft animals died.

Arriving at Elephant Butte, we discovered a nice state park, and a lake that is 100' below it's normal level. The campsites used to be lakefront. Now it is a long hike to get there. They have positioned porta potties along the lake, because the original bathrooms are too far away. We chose a site in the Lion's Beach area on a bluff, so we had a nice view of the lake. Gambel's Quail were living all around us, scurrying around and making kind of chirpy noises. We also heard the doves mostly in the morning and evening. They have been everywhere we have camped in the Southwest. We were calling them mourning doves, but after consulting the bird book, and finding doves, doves and more doves, we are just calling them doves!

We paid for two nights with the agreement between us that we would stay longer if we liked it. We have been moving too much, but hadn't found a campsite that we wanted to spend more time in. We are still in the desert, but now we have topography and water to look at. But, everything else is very dry dusty fine sand. We took a walk before dusk, and watched the sunset in the east in front of our site! The sky was more spectacular where it was refracting the light of the setting sun. At dusk it turns blue along the ridges with a beautiful pink above, and eventually the lake reflects a violet color.