New Mexico--Again! September 19-27, 2008

Friday we drove all day--very unusual for us! At first the plan was to stop at Sugarite Canyon State Park near Raton, New Mexico. As we exited at Raton in northern New Mexico, we decided that we would not stop except for gas and we would continue south toward Las Vegas, New Mexico.



We stopped Friday and Saturday night at Storrie Lake State Park north of Las Vegas. Saturday we drove around Las Vegas, saw the old buildings, and geocached. One geocache took us near Montezuma castle. It was originally a railroad resort, but now is Armand Hammer United World College of the American West. There are hot springs on the grounds which made it a popular resort in its day. The campus is not open to the public so we weren't able to get any pictures. It was an interesting place.

We relaxed for the rest of the time--recovering from our drive the preceding day. The campground was the first that we had visited in New Mexico that had spaces right next to each other with no ramada (shade structure over a picnic table).

From Storrie Lake State Park we were back to our normal way of driving a short distance before stopping! We drove to Santa Rosa Lake State Park. This park was like no other in that the state of New Mexico leases the campgrounds from the Army Corps of Engineers. We chose a spot at Rocky Point Campground. Usually we would dry camp, but the weather was actually warm and we wanted to run the AC.

The clouds rolled in and we experienced and afternoon thunderstorm. After the storm, there was a double rainbow! The first one is easy to see, the second one is to the right of the first and much fainter.

Santa Rosa is famous for its sinkhole lakes. One is called The Blue Hole and people come from all over to scuba dive in it. The water was a clear blue and we could see far into the hole.
Someone even put decorative fish in the hole!
From Santa Rosa, we drove to Ft. Sumner to visit the real authentic grave of Billy the Kid. It seems he is as duplicitous in death as he was in life. There are at 2 different places that advertise having his grave!We enjoyed our stay in Santa Rose. We even ate at one of their Route 66 restaurants. One thing we noticed about the small town---there were enough motel rooms to house the entire town!

Wednesday we left Santa Rosa Lake State Park and headed south to Alamogordo, New Mexico. We stayed at Oliver Lee Memorial State Park when we passed through last spring. This time we opted to stay at Holloman Air Force Base. Alamogordo is less than 60 miles from El Paso.

After arriving on base, we checked into the Fam-Camp. Our first stop was the commissary since we needed to stock the refrigerator again. It was also time to do laundry since the last time we had clean clothes was at Malmstrom AFB, Great Falls, Montana.

Friday night--tonight--Bobby and Cathy are bringing Christopher and DeAnna to stay with us for a week. We will return them to El Paso in time for the air show next weekend!