Saturday morning we left Terlingua and headed north on road 118 toward Alpine and then west on US90 to the town of Marfa and past the center for the "Mysterious Lights of Marfa" It is said that every evening at dust there appear several mysterious lights to the south over the mountains. No one has been able to explain their existence or source. Just a few miles the US Air Force has an installation where they study weather, etc. There was a Blimp that was gas filled flying over this USAF installation, apparently tethered there. We had been watching it for some 15 to 20 miles but did not know what it was. We traveled on to Van Horn where we got fuel for the motor home ($2.55/gal) and them picked up road 54 north toward New Mexico. Our destination was Guadalupe Mountain National Park. Just before you get there you see a sign that says you have just entered the Mountain Time Zone, so there is another hour we have to contend with while our bodies gets acclimated. We will be in this time zone for most the winter so we will adjust alright I am sure.
The photo is of El Captain, the mountain that is visible for many miles in all directions as it is the highest point in Texas at 8,749'. The park is very nice. There is a campground for tenting as well as a parking area for RV's. The cost to camp is $8.00/night but with the Golden Access card it is only $4.00. There are no hookups and it got down to 38 degrees this morning, so we hooked up our electric blankets to the inverter and kept warm with the house batteries and then turned on the furnace when we got up to warm the coach. Worked out well, but we sure missed our electric hookup. Oh well, that is why they call it dry camping. We toured the Visitors Center and saw a 12 min. slide presentation on how the mountain was formed as well as the other mountain ranges in the area. They have an extensive display of wildlife in the area as well as plants. There are even Maple trees growing on the top of the mountain in a basin that has water. The RV parking area is at the trailhead for most of the hiking trails. There are trails that take 1 hour and others that take up to 10 hours for the average hiker. They even have passes for hikers that want to spend a night or more on the trails. Being Sunday, there were a lot of hikers coming in early to hike the trails. They were putting on several layers of clothing as the daily high is in the 70's, but the wind is another factor and they were expecting winds to 30mph during the day.
We picked up US 62/180 a couple of miles south of the park. We continued on north on 62/180 to Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We had been there many years ago, but wanted to go again to see how it had changed. It is still the same beautiful drive up the mountain to get to the entrance to the cave. The Golden Access card got us in free and we found it had changed a lot since we were there. They have redone the main building and added a nice restaurant and other aminities. They still have the restaurant in the cave, but they do not have the selection they do up on the surface. We took the elevator down the 754' to the cave and toured the main room. It is breathtaking in its display of stalagmites that stand tall and mighty and the stalactites that hold tight to the ceiling. There are thousands of stalactites that hang from the ceiling and those they call "soda straws" that are hollow. The cave is tastefully lighted to further show its grandeur. The paths are paved with a blacktop type material with metal hand rails. Most of the area is wheelchair accessible however some of the grades would be difficult for a manual chair. My power scooter handled the trail with ease. There are some areas that are too step for a chair and they are marked and off limits to wheelchairs, but you can see probably 80% of the displays. It seemed to me that there was more lighting this time than the last time I was there. You can not imagine how long it must have taken to form these monstrous formations by dripping water and yet some are so delicate they look like lace. The areas that were not available to wheelchairs made you retrace your route and it certainly looked different from the other direction and you see things that you did not see or missed the first time. Truly an experience you could do again and again.
We left the park about 3:30 and headed north to our destination for the night at Lakewood, NM at the Escapees SKP park where we arrived about 5pm. We will be here for some time, not sure just how long but we will see how it goes and our plans work out.