Everything Pokes and Stabs in the Southwest

Last night we found a cute little state park (Red Rocks Canyon - different than the one outside Vegas) to have dinner at. There was supposed to be swimming - but apparently we are the only crazies looking to swim and it's not open yet. We did have a lovely dinner and also got free showers - added bonus! We were treated with a lovely sunset as we drove through the rest of Oklahoma.

We slept blissfully last night - in the Portales, NM, Walmart parking lot. This is our second night in a row utilizing the vast and free parking lots box stores provide, and surprisingly we were one of many doing the same. The morning started with me taking out the dog in bare feet - note the title for the lesson I learned. We hit the road and drove through a very windy New Mexico on our way to Roswell. For those of you (like me) who have never heard of this place, apparently a rancher found unique metal scraps on his property and attributed it to a crashed alien spacecraft. There is now an entire museum/ research center dedicated to UFOs and aliens. Hilarious.

From Roswell we headed onto Carlsbad Caverns, still in New Mexico. There we were able to do

a tour of the Kings Room and learn a bit more about the formations from a guide, as well as take a self-guided tour of another room in the cave. Apparently this is the largest and deepest cave in the western hemisphere, and was formed when sulfuric acid formed and carved out the cave system. Since then the cave has drained (all the sulfuric acid was neutralized with the limestone deposits in the cave), and "decorations" have formed in the cave in the thousands and thousands of years since. One of the pictures below is little tiny nubs off a tunnel roof - those are stalactites that have formed in 77 years... the rest of them must be really old. One of the neat things about this national park was that they had a kennel right on site for Piton while we explored the cave.

We are now headed on to El Paso, Texas where we will camp for the night near Hueco Tanks. We may do some climbing in the morning, or we may just hike in Hueco - we'll have to see if we are able to get a climbing pass in the morning. There are only 10 walk-in passes available, so our odds aren't great though.

We are looking forward to seeing my friend Jamie Asti in Phoenix and relaxing in that area for a little more than a week! Life in the van is going well and we really seem to be getting the hang of life on the road. We'd love to hear news about what's going on in your neck of the woods, so drop us an email and keep us in the loop.