11/29/14 White Sands

My boondocking spot near White Sands looked waaaay better in the daylight, as they always do. I need to stop getting there in the dark as I'm terrified getting there then uncomfortable the whole night because I'm unsure of my surroundings.  The "lake" was more like a pond, but it was clear and reflected the sky beautifully. The bad thing was, the entire area was carpeted with those awful stickerbushes. Ah well.



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Living room view this AM Alamogordo NM
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View out the front window. Alamogordo NM
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I took some pics, had coffee, and headed to White Sands.  What an astounding place! Even though it was in the 60's I felt cold, probably because it looked like I was driving through huge snowdrifts.



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White Sands Nat'l Mon.
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White Sands Nat'l Mon.
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Sledding at White Sands
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Even the roads look wintry
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The only problem was, it was a Saturday on a holiday weekend and the park was full of people. It was very difficult to find dunes without footprints. And I got there a little late, the sun was too high. But I'll be back for sure. I enjoyed a lox sandwich in the picnic area & then headed to Alamogordo for gas. I had sorta planned to go east through Cloudcroft & then down through Carlsbad again. I was having second thoughts after a guy at the gas station said he thought it had snowed up there. Not sure if that was true, but after spending 10 minutes getting through 3 traffic lights and seeing lots more ahead, I said screw this, turned around & headed south towards El Paso. I'm not sure what was going in Alamogordo but I had had enough traffic.

I thought I might stop in El Paso, but I wasn't that tired and and it was still a bit early. I figured I'd find somewhere east of El Paso. Turns out there's about 200 miles of nothing east of El Paso. Now I was doing the mental math on the gas vs the miles to go to Ft. Stockton and I thought it might be close. I was tempted to fill up in Van Horn, but they have a rep as the most anti-RV town in Texas so I really didn't care to give them any of my money. I was pretty sure I could make Fort Stockton, and if not, I had my 5 gal gas can I bought after my last brush with fuel exhaustion in Texas. I made it with no problem and settled in for the night at the Fort Stockton Walmart, which is a popular spot. I parked near a nice Born Free that looked to be about 22' as well, but they were towing a car too. I ended up doing over 300 miles, which was way more than planned. I was tired but was still up till midnight. I guess I'm just a night owl.

11/28/14 Puerto Palomas Mexico to White Sands.

I had a really nice time at the fire with the LOWs (Loners on Wheels) folks, and after some thought, decided to join. They're not as "busy" as the WINs, and the Solos don't seem to be mostly Solos, so I thought it might be a better fit for me.  While I joined the group, I just couldn't bring myself to sit there very long. I guess I'm just not much of a 'parker' as of yet. One thing they told me about was that every Tues they carpooled to the border 30 miles south & walked across for lunch, shopping, meds, etc. That sounded great to me but I wasn't waiting till Tues. So off I went to the little town of Columbus, NM and walked across the border to Puerto Palomas MX.

   
Parked near the Duty Free store on the US side of the border. I walked across to Puerto Palomas, Mx

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Apparently the golf cart is to pick up the lazy gringos who won;t walk the half block from the border to the store.
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The LOWs show up Tuesdays, I guess the SKPs show up some other day, and so on. Me, I went by myself. I'm just not that into the herd mentality.
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Gorgeous door!
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In the Pink Store
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Ok, these were weird
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Gorgeous glass. Stuff here was pricey though. Palomas Mx
11/28/2014 2:24:39 PM


$135! This place was not cheap. I guess since most folks going here have never strayed far from the border towns, they don't know how overpriced stuff is.

You know you're in the wrong place when you try to pay with pesos and everyone is all stymied by that and no one has change. It took at least five minutes for the gal at the Pink Store to come up with change.  The guy at the liquor store blinked when I asked for the total in pesos, then told me, "That's Mexican money" as he wrote down the new total. I smiled and pulled the exact amount out of my wallet, and everyone around sighed, "Ahhhhhhh!" like I was David Copperfield and pulled a rabbit out of my bag instead of some pesos. LOL!!!


I made it back across the border with no problem, then did something dumb. I went into that duty free store I had parked by and saw they had Sheridan's. It's not available in the US. Well I had to have it. Problem was, I now had to go back into Mexico. They made sure you did, escorted you to the border.  I didn't want to go back through & talk to the same surly guy again so I walked around a little more thinking shift change might not be that far off.  Problem was, I was losing daylight, but I reasoned that I could always stay in Deming again if I wanted.


Eh....that's kind of a creepy painting. :-) Palomas, Mx
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Ok, a peeing dog statue. Not high on my wish list LOL Palomas, Mx
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I finally had enough and went back across the border and got a different surly guy. These were the crankiest border guys I've ever seen. Not sure why, it certainly didn't appear to be a busy post. I guess when he swiped my passport it showed I'd been through earlier so I got my backpack and jacket searched, down to kneading the padding in the straps. He didn't like my SPOT locator, not sure why. If he'd looked in the front pocket he'd have found my ACR beacon and probably been even more cranky.  Ah well.

It was my turn to be cranky when I had to go through another border patrol checkpoint north of Columbus.  These things make no sense to me. They're permanent, everyone knows where they are, and there's a million roads through the desert that would get you around them. I just don't get what they're meant to accomplish.


Things that make you got WTF?? A dust storm beginning. One reason why I decided not to stay another night in Deming.
11/28/2014 4:58:30 PM


The wind put the kibosh on stopping in Deming. I decided to head towards Alamogordo & see where I ended up. I knew of a cool boondocking site a couple miles from White Sands but I had promised myself no more off-roading in the dark. I went through Las Cruces, where I should have gassed up. then through White Sands Missile Range. And another stupid checkpoint. It just makes me bristle. Anyway.......I decided to try for the boondocking spot. I had checked it out on Google Maps, and thought it looked easy enough to get to. And there was nothing else so close to the Monument. Sigh........ Holy smokes....nothing is quite so terrifying to me as turning onto a dirt track in the pitch dark. Especially when it starts out with a blind curve. And when the dirt road you're looking for is in a little strip of no-mans-land between a missile range and air force base, so a turn down the wrong road could be...bad. Yeah, I know....get there in daylight. :-( Obviously I'm a slow learner. I believe I'm set up in the legal camping area. People who camp here say they often get a visit from Border Patrol or other gov't peeps. If they're going to show I hope it's soon...I'm tired and don't need someone waking me up.

11/27/14 Thanksgiving on the Road

It was a quiet night at Hot Well Dunes. While there were a bunch of ATVers, by and large they were pretty respectful, not roaring through the campsites and really not doing much after 9pm. Someone started blasting a stereo at 9:15am, but I think a few other folks told them to turn it down as it went away quickly. I made a big breakfast of eggs, potatoes, mushrooms, and fried Alaskan lox.  I'm not thrilled by the texture of raw lox though I do like it on a bagel with cream cheese & onion, but I find dropping it in the frying pan for just a few seconds on each side makes it a great side dish, almost like ham with my omelet. I hit the hot tub one last time, got changed and hit the road around noon. I neglected to ask about the state of the road south from the dunes when I talked to BLM. It turned out to be paved most of the way. But the last 7 or 8 miles were utter torture, all washboard with some sections that were just awful. I hate that. I wonder if the road to Tanque is as miserable.

Anyway, I got on I-10 and headed east. I got to Deming around 4pm and looked up the LOWs (Loners on Wheels) RV Park. I had planned to spend Thanksgiving alone.  It was my dad's big holiday, so it's the day I grieve for him the most, but the 4 hours on the road had worn me out and I did feel like maybe I wanted to be around people. Especially people I didn't know, where I could walk away at any point and be sad if that's what I wanted to do.

Of course the park office was closed, but one of the staff talked me through the self check-in. I chose an electric site which would be $15 with the Passport America discount. They were pretty close to full. If they had been full there's about a dozen other parks in Deming but I would have just boondocked somewhere. I was a little intrigued by the idea of a Loners RV park so that's why I chose it. :-)

As I was walking back from the bathrooms, my next door neighbor flagged me down to tell me about the card games and bonfire tonight, and that Monday was potluck and Tues was a trip to Mexico, etc. Apparently there's a lot of scheduled stuff here. The trip to Mex sounded good tho I don't plan on spending a week here. I may drive down tomorrow though.

I made my Thanksgiving dinner of posole with mashed potatoes and a pumpkin pie parfait. Oh, and eggnog with black rum. Good stuff. Of course when I was done all I wanted to do was curl up with a book but I dragged myself out to the fire. It was nice. About 10 people hanging out & chatting. Now I've got my little fake fireplace going and am thinking about some more eggnog. Life is good.


For my friend Cathy Butterfield :-)
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Parked at LOW-HI ranch in Deming
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10/29/14 Tent Rocks Nat'l Monument

Today was the kind of day I dreamed of when I first thought of the great road trip. I got up with the idea that I was continuing north to Chaco Canyon and then on to Shiprock. As I sat in the driver's seat looking at the map, I noticed Tent Rocks Nat'l Monument was not THAT far away. I remember being told on my last trip I should have gone there. I thought about it for a minute and said, why not? And programmed in the GPS. Wow, what a day! I hiked about 5 miles, spent about 5 hours, took almost 500 pics, and changed lenses and cameras about 50 times. What a great place!

 
Trying out the new Olympus OM-D 1 And 8mm fisheye at Tent Rocks Nat'l Monument
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Slot canyon at Tent Rocks
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Tent Rock Nat'l Monument
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Tent Rock Nat'l Monument
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Moonrise over Tent Rock Nat'l Monument
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The Lovers. Tent Rock Nat'l Monument shot in infrared.
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I have a lot more pics from this place, but will upload them as a separate album when I get to some wifi. I really had a great day here. Unplanned and unexpected.....that's what I need more of.

I asked at the entrance booth if there was dispersed camping nearby. I thought not but it doesn't hurt to ask. There isn't, but he directed me to a nice campground run by the Corp of Engineers, Cochiti Lake Recreation area. $12 for dry, $20 for w/e. Good news was, with my annual National Parks pass that fee was halved. Nice!!  The only real gripe I have about this place is the hours the office is staffed. I screwed up and told her the wrong site # when I checked in. This morning, after a welcome shower, I went up to tell them to find the office closed. They're open 7am-9am, then 3pm to 7pm. Check-in/out time is 2pm. What's wrong with this picture? I guess if you decide you want to stay another night, you'd better know by 9am.  It's no biggie, there's no one scheduled for this site tonight, and it's not like they could show up at the office & be given it. But not being open for check-in/check-out time.....never seen that before.  I might try to stay another night. I don't really feel like driving. Or not. we'll see after a second cup of coffee.