New Mexico - January 14 - 20, 2008

We left Texas and arrived in Carlsbad, New Mexico where we stayed for a few days. While the nights were chilly (down in the 20's & 30's), the days were sunny and warm (50's & 60's). Of course, everyone who stays in Carlsbad has to make the drive up to Roswell to visit the UFO Museum and Research Center. I think this will make the top 10 on George's lists of neat places we visited this year! Even though George was convinced that we should wear aluminum foil helmets, we decided to be daring and walked around the town without them on! The museum was interesting with a lot of newspaper clippings to read, but I'm not sure about their "research center". But unfortunately for George, we did not see any UFO's nor did we meet any aliens (at least, not the kind that come from somewhere other than Earth!).

The day after our visit to the UFO Museum, we put on our hiking shoes and went to Carlsbad Caverns. We chose to enter through the Natural Entrance which meant we walked down a steep path that descended 750 feet below ground. I was almost backed out when we reached an area they called the "twilight zone". That's when we left all natural lighting & could no longer see the outside world - my claustrophobia just about kicked in! However, we stuck to it & walked the mile down to the Big Room. It was incredible and so beautiful! I was just glad that the Mexican Free-tailed Bats were not around - they don't arrive until March! Luckily, after walking the mile around the Big Room, we took the elevator up to the surface. Thank goodness, they no longer let you walk back up - we never would have made it. Both of us had sore legs the next day, but it was worth every ache & pain!

We left Carlsbad and headed for Las Cruces, New Mexico on the 17th. On the way, George decided to stop at a wayside rest to check on the car and suggested I take Mr. Bailey out for a quick walk (cats are so much easier!) so I did. We were not more than 4' from the RV when I looked down & saw what appeared to be a "dead" snake not more than 6" from Bailey and me! It was big and all curled up, so I grabbed Bailey and ran for the RV screaming as loud as I could. George couldn't figure out what I was saying & when I could finally tell him, he decided to go see for himself. He got out of the RV, camera in hand & took a picture of the snake. When he got back inside, he decided to throw some rocks at it to see if it was alive and it was! It slithered off like nothing ever happened. George got a good picture of it so we could identify it. It was a Western Diamond-back rattlesnake. So much for my carefree days out in the grass in New Mexico!

Lucky for us, Las Cruces held their Hot Air Balloon Festival the weekend we were there and the view from our campground was perfect since we overlooked the city. It was fun to see them go up in groups of a dozen at a time. They said there were about 70 balloons total.

We spent one day visiting White Sands Museum and Missile Park. It was incredible to see all the missiles on display. I never knew we had so many different missiles of all shapes and sizes. After touring the park, we decided to drive out to White Sands National Monument (which is actually a huge park & not just a monument!). Now this place really is something else! It was incredible when we got out of the car & hiked through all the white sand. It looked like Minnesota in the middle of the winter except the temperature was in the 50's! In fact, people were sledding down the dunes on saucers just like we do on the snow in MN, only without having to wear all the winter clothes! The white dunes just seemed to go on forever. It was one of the most beautiful sites I've ever seen.

Tomorrow we head for Tucson, Arizona!