White Sands National Monument

Day 10 - White Sands National Monument

After leaving Roswell we headed to White Sands National Monument.  The ride there was beautiful! The mountains were impressive sitting off in the distance.  They are so different compared to the ones here in Georgia. 

  

As we made our way to White Sands we passed through several small towns, one of them was Ruidoso.  There we found a unique restaurant called Disco Taco, and that was a wonderful find!   Pulling into the parking lot was simple being that we were in our class B, I would not have tried doing that if I was pulling my travel trailer.  We had tasty tacos with the special green chili salsa that we dipped them in.  We also stopped at a place that sells metal yard art and Debra bought a whirl-y-gig with red Cardinals on it.  The whirl-y-gig broke down into two parts, the pole it sits on and the revolving part that is very sharp on the edges.  Traveling in a class B has it's drawbacks when buying souvenirs along the way.  I was able to place the pole under the bed, but the spinner is going to be a little bit of works making it's passage home.  For now, it is sitting on the bed behind the pantry.

Ruidoso is perched on a mountain at 6,729 feet above sea level.  What I thought was amazing is that they have a dual duty ski resort there that has both skiing and zip lining!  It is called Ski Apache and this is a quote from there website:

Take your zip-lining experience above and beyond with this three-span zip tour. This beautifully stunning adventure begins and rises above 11,000 feet. It is also complete with parallel cables so riders can glide down the mountain side-by-side. The adrenaline-pumping, three-part zip tour reaches over 8,900 feet in length, making it one of the longest in the world while offering a thrilling and unforgettable experience.

ELEVATION: 11,489 ft. at the top of Ski Apache

LENGTH: 8,890 feet

SPEED: up to 65MPH

DURATION: Total tour estimated time 1.5 hour

VIEWS: Most spectacular view in southern New Mexico

There is also a horse racing track in Ruidoso called Ruidoso Downs and Billy the Kid Casino.  We did not stop there, we were wanting to get to White Sands with time to enjoy our first time there.  

About 60 more miles to White Sands National Monument and the closer we get the more little glimpses of it we can see.

As get even closer we can spot wisps of white sand rising probably 100's of feet into the sky as the wind constantly blows over the sands.  

White Sands has a very soft sand, on a scale of 1 -10 it is rated at 2.  It is gypsum sand and that is why it is soft.  Talcum sand is rated at 1 and common granite sand is rated at 7, that is what we learned at the visitor center.  It is very cool to the touch, walking in it barefoot was very nice.  It is also very windy there, the sand blows everywhere and the dunes are always moving.   We were going to drive all the way in, but the pavement only goes in a short distance into the dune area.  After the pavement ends it was a very washboard road and it felt like it was beating our RV too much.  

 If you visit there make sure your windows are up and be quick opening and closing your door.  Otherwise, you will be finding sand inside your car or RV for quite awhile.  

After our visit we made it to the Walmart Supercenter in Deming, New Mexico.  I had found about it on my RVParky app, a very useful app, and it said they even had nighttime security!  As we pulled into the lot I spotted the security guard talking to a trucker.  The guard is responsible for making sure everyone parks properly, this is very important at this Walmart.  I pulled up and waited for to finish with the trucker, when he came over to me I greeted him and asked where should I park.  He started to tell and then stopped and said, "Your RV is small so You can park anywhere you like".  Another plus in my book for the class B!

I picked a spot near the front by an island end cap, a great place to walk Spike when needed and protected on one side by the island.    Shortly after I parked another class B pulled up along side us, a nice Roadtrek 210.

The parking lot at Deming is a very popular one for over night truckers and RV'ers, there is about 20 semis and 20 RV's in the lot!

Day 9 - Roswell New Mexico, UFO's and more!

We made it to Roswell and saw a UFO in a field with the aliens talking to some Earthlings.  

Thinking Roswell might fun!

We drove into town and stopped for some coffee and donuts at a little place that caught our eyes.  The donuts were pretty tasty and the coffee good, can't say it was out of the wold though.

We made it to the UFO Museum and proceeded inside leaving Spike in the Roadtrek with the AC running on batteries, a nice feature.  Once inside we found out they were dog friendly, and also many other businesses in that part of town are as well.  Debra went out to get Spike and bring him in with us, he was much happier at first, but then saw the aliens!  He did not like them to much, they were kind of strange looking, and when they moved and made noise that was it for him.  

After an interesting stay learning about the Roswell incident and other stories from around the world it makes you wonder what really happened.  

We left the museum and walked around a bit before starting a drive around town.  Stopped at a car wash to try and remove the mass of insects that were covering the front end of the Roadtrek.  Debra took a lot of photos of many of the aliens around town, here are some of them.

 

When then drove to Cahoon Park to enjoy a picnic finishing off the rest of the steaks from the previous day's purchase.  After our late lunch we drove around some more to see Roswell, it is a much larger city than I was expecting.  I liked how the McDonalds looked like a UFO, that was neat.  

After all the driving and sightseeing we made it to Walmart to spend the night in their parking lot.  We were surprised to see a bunch of other RV's there, seems it is a popular place to spend the night at.  

Day 8 - Desert Willow RV Park & Margie's Bakery (Van Horn), Carlsbad Caverns and Cottonwood Wine and Brewery.

Woke up from a great nights sleep at Desert Willow RV Park in Van Horn.  Using my Passport America membership we paid only $12.50 for the night!  A steal for a full service campground.  With clean laundry, a full freshwater tank and empty black and gray tanks we are ready for another 4 or 5 days staying cheap somewhere.  One little tip to remember, keep plenty of quarters in your RV for laundries.  We checked in after hours and luckily had enough to do our laundry.  

One other little tidbit of advice, be careful spraying aerosols in a small RV, the propellant might set off your propane detector.  We found that out today the loud way, our detector works!

All loaded up and ready to go we are going to stop in town at Debra's favorite 

little restaurant in this part of Texas, Margie's Bakery.

After a wonderful meal we set our sights northward to our next destination, Carlsbad Caverns.  We did

not see the bats, that would have been really exciting!  We did have a blast walking through the caves, we did take the easy way down and rode the elevator.  It is a strange experience going into the cavern if you have never done it before.  It is kind of cool, but the humidity is high, it is dark even with all the lighting.  But that helps you see all the cool shadows and odd shapes.

 

After leaving the Cavern we continued our path north to Artesia and pulled into the Cottonwood Wine and Brewery.  They are members of Boondockerswelcome and welcomed us to spend the night at their winery.  We bought a bottle of  Chardonnay from them to enjoy later on.  They told us were we could buy some steaks to cook for dinner, a local store called Gregg's Food.  We headed there and picked up two steaks.

Day 7 - Fort Lancaster & Fort Davis and Marfa, TX

Left the Sonora TX Safety Rest Area at 7:50 am with Fort Lancaster in our sights.  Had a great nights sleep, woke up to bunch of other vehicles that also spent the night there.  We stopped at the scenic overlook and our way to the fort, here is a short video showing the fort in the distance.

Driving down the mountain we reached Fort Lancaster, it is just ruins now, but it is easy to visualize the way it once looked. The Ranger gave us a golf cart to ride around on and see the ruins.

After touring the ruins we headed to Fort Davis to tour some ruins as well as some restored structures.  Fort Davis is an amazing place to visit, the restored structures are very well done and show how life was back then.  

I will have to create some videos for both Fort Lancaster and Fort Davis at a later date, my PC is having some video editing issues now.

From Fort Davis we headed to Marfa, TX and enjoyed lunch at Mando's Restaurant & bar, it was very good.  We drove around Marfa and here are some of the photos we took.

Back on the road and heading to our next stop, Van Horn, TX.  I found the Willows RV park on Passport America and will have full hookups for $12.50!  We arrived in time for Debra to a much needed laundry visit!  After a couple of nice, warm showers and dinner Debra made it time for bed.

Here is a video I made about my receiver hitch so I can use a locking hitch pin.

Day 6, still in Texas!

Being in this part of Texas and not stopping by Luckenbach would be crazy, especially for me!  It was a really unusual place to see, kind of what I expected but at the same time not really what I expected.

On one of the door frames bar/post office/general store were a bunch of law enforcement shoulder patches, one of them really caught me attention.

From there we headed to Johnson City to see Lyndon B Johnson's childhood home.  We had a guided tour of the home that was very informative.  It was nice to see the home restored to how it would have looked when LBJ lived there.

This is an interesting print, look really close and what do you see?

I like the chamber pot under the bed, that is how it really was for
many people in our country not that long ago. 

From here we visited Lyndon B Johnson's ranch.  Here is Debra standing next to what they call "Air Force One-Half", it's very small compared to what the president flies in today.  But then again, those were much different times.

Our Roadtrek looks a wee bit tiny when sitting next to a bus.

We left the ranch and started westward again, we were in the hill section of Texas and started seeing many wineries and garden stores.  We stopped at Wildseed Farms and stretched our legs some.

We parked next to another Class B that was in the lot,.  We met them a little later on, nice folks.

This cat was extremely happy resting in a bed of Catnip!

We returned to I-10 and drove until dark, not many choices to park for the night.  We saw on one of our apps, RVParky, the Senora TX Safety Rest Area around mile marker 393.  We pulled in for a safe nights sleep along with several other RV's

 and a bunch of 18 wheelers.