We had a pleasant, mostly uneventful drive from Sedona to the Grand Canyon.  Yes, of course, we labored up the 7% grades, but the wide four line highways precluded us from holding up traffic, and it was nice to see we were not the only ones struggling with the grade: we played leap frog with two older motorhomes playing the “I think I can I think I can” game up the hills just like us. Low on supplies, we pulled off in Williams, a tourist town working the Route 66 and throwback retro advertising hard all over town.  It was actually kinda nice, if we had more time we might have stayed for a stroll down their main street and a meal in one of the diners.

Panoramic of the GC

We pulled into the multi-lane Grand Canyon entry station just behind one of the older motorhome’s we had been alternatively following or leading since Sedona.  Our national park annual pass covered the $25 per vehicle entry fee, thus crossing the threshold of having paid for itself after only one month of use.  We passed by Mather Campground, the dry camping area limited to rigs 30′ and shorter, and pulled in to our assigned spot in the full hook up area.  Given the nightly plummeting temperatures and our ongoing potable water challenges, we were glad to have the full hook ups, but at $36 a night this was the most expensive place we have stayed since early February.

One of many many fantastic overlooks

We did a quick set up and bolted for the visiter center and canyon rim.  I have previously mentioned that national Parks can pose a challenge to those travelling without a tow vehicle since everything is so spread out.  The Grand Canyon National Park eliminated this issue with the three free bus routes running continuously during daylight and even into the evening to all the rim viewing and historical areas.  We were thus able to have a great end of the day with a stroll along the Mather Point overlook, getting our first view of the extraordinary, overwhelming Grand Canyon.

There really is no way to adequately describe it, and pictures from the rim only capture small pieces. Simply put, the canyon is a must see if you can possibly make the opportunity.  We were quite fortunate in that the two days before we arrived were rainy with temps dropping below freezing at night, but during our stay we had glorious blue skies for two of the three days and no freezing.  On day two we hit the visitor center to watch the 20 minute presentation on the formation and history of the canyon before taking the red line bus west along the rim, visiting every overlook and point of interest on the way.

I am Jack, ruggedly contemplating the great canyon

This is Rose, camera ready, fearlessly dangling feet over the precipice

Together we are Jack & Rose, crime fighters.

Day 3 we took the orange line east for the remaining overlooks, and did some light hiking part way down the into the canyon itself.  There are three trails from the South Rim that lead all the way down to the Colorado River, all of them requiring two days to run in both directions.  We satisfied ourselves with the moderate upper section of the South Kaibab trail so as to avoid the number of people and mule trains on the more popular Bright Angel trail.

Upper South Kaibab Trail

We were also fortunate enough to catch close sight of the endangered California Condor, a herd of elk that roam the park without much fear of humans, and the even more common mule deer.

Tagged California Condor from the captive breeding and release program

Elk, one of several

Mule deer. Apparently they can read signs now.

A few more overlooks and vistas of the Grand Canyon below:

Sedona is a pilgrims’ town with a heavy emphasis on eco and “spiritual” tourism, so you have a wide mix of people coming in from out of town: rock climbers, off-road drivers, wealthy shoppers, those seeking some sort of supernatural phenomenon from the vortexes, it has it all.  As such the campgrounds were almost all full, and the first come, first serve campground I was trying to get to may not even exist, at least not where I thought it would be.

Why Sedona is famous: absurdly beautiful red rock formations

We had survived the steep twisting downhill run on 89A and had continued a touch south of downtown looking for Chavez Crossing campground. (We have since learned it was in a different place and only for group camping reservations, not individual rigs.)  As we hesitated before heading down an unimproved road, we decided to ask directions from a woman parked there about a campground up ahead.

Now, imagine your town.  What are the odds of just asking a randomly selected resident about a campground nearby, and not only do they know the answer to that basic question, but can also advise you on multiple alternative free camping sites suitable to your vehicle size?  That just doesn’t happen, except it did.  This Sedonan woman is probably an outdoor and hiking enthusiast as we spotted back packs in her trunk while we were speaking.  She advised against proceeding down the road ahead as there was no campground that way, and sent us south of town on the lookout for a small, barely marked road, which turned out to be Forest Road 525.

Forest Road 525 leading to our boondocking site

We turned off the highway onto this dirt and gravel washboard road, and almost immediately spotted a couple of camper vans and an airstream trailer at a circular pull off.  One of the guys camping there told us there were a dozen more spots capable of holding several rigs each down the road.  We continued and selected a nice, relatively level, and unoccupied spot on a hill.  It even had a fire ring already prepped.

Two day boondock site, fire ring included

Within the RV community people debate the specific definitions of “dry camping” vs “boondocking” vs “overnighting” with a few additional terms thrown in.  Some see dry camping and boondocking as exactly the same thing.  I tend to side with those that make a distinction:

• Overnighting: staying in a parking lot, e.g. Walmart, for a night, no hook ups. Usually free.
• Dry camping: staying in a campground without hook ups. May include small campground fee.
• Boondocking: staying in wilderness area, not a campground, with no hook ups. Usually free.

Using these definitions, this was our first actual boondocking stay. We had dry camped and overnighted numerous times, but this was our first instance of just setting up camp out in the middle of nowhere.  It was fantastic, free, and liberating.  We would not be having a typical Sedona visit: no jeep tours or aura readings, just a couple of days in the outdoors alone.

To be sure, we had some challenges: When we had our potable water system repaired last week they apparently removed a spring operated check valve.  The system works perfectly if you are hooked up to a pressurized water hose, but if you are relying on your own freshwater tank and pump, it just shoots the water out of that now unused water hook up point and won’t maintain system pressure sufficient to supply the faucets.  I will either have to install a check valve, an isolation valve, or perhaps just a screw in plug for the hose connection point.  For this trip we were down to using a one gallon jug carried in from outside for all our needs.

Different angle of our boondock site. Ghetto leveling system (putting front wheels up on local, organic, free range rocks) might be visible to keen observer

After two nights we headed out towards the Grand Canyon, where we had luckily managed to get a three night reservation at the full hook up campground despite doing so with less than a month of notice.  Rather than take the never-to-be-driven-again 89A back north, we elected to drive into Sedona and turn south on 179 to intersect I-17 after a short drive through one of the most scenic areas of the region, and then take I-17 North towards Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon road.

Panoramic with Church of the Holy Cross a bit left of center and low. Built here perhaps to remind the hippie spiritualists of the One True God or something.

This allowed us to get some of those breathtaking views of Sedona without the white knuckled driving experience, and probably took us no longer to run since The Big Kahuna would almost certainly have been in first gear for the entire 89A uphill climb.  Additionally, we passed an art fair in Oak Village just a few miles south of Sedona, and they had designated bus and RV parking.  I should have known that we could not escape Sedona without spending some money.  I purchased a nice high quality hat and a wedding band while Rosie got a hand crafted necklace made from mesquite thorns.

Oak Creek art festival

Mesquite thorn necklace

This is my hat

and this is my ring. Don’t be jelly.

The rest of the trip was relatively uneventful: yes we spent a lot of time struggling up some of the 6% and 7% grades on I-17 in first gear, but the down hill sections were nice and wide with no hairpin turns so I could let Kahuna have his head without needing to pump the brakes more than occasionally.

Sedona was to be a real unknown for us since we were headed there with no reservations or plan at all.  I hoped to score a first come, first serve campground site just south of town, but our phone inquiries were not reassuring.  Undeterred we pressed on, and since we were already completely winging it, upon passing signs for Meteor Crater, we felt free enough to spontaneously turn off on the exit and drive the six miles to the crater.

Very difficult to capture the entire crater from the rim.

It was pretty astounding; the worlds best preserved major meteor crater, nearly a mile across, resulting from the collision of a nickel iron meteor 150 feet across about 50,000 years ago.  The crater is on private land, so our National Park pass didn’t help at all.  The entry fee was a bit steeper than we hoped, $16 per person after the $2 discount for retired military, but they do a nice job of providing multiple look out points with mounted telescopes and the short movie in the museum is high quality and very informative.  All in all it was a nice two-hour diversion.

We pressed on towards Flagstaff with The Big Kahuna complaining about the elevation increase for much of the journey; once again we were frequently down to 28 mph in first gear while watching the oil temperature climb up to 230 degrees from the normal 180.  Whatever complaints we have about going uphill would soon be utterly eclipsed by the terrifying down hill run into Sedona.

Panoramic

Seriously, they didn’t call it Death Highway or Screaming Twisty Downhill Road, they named it innocuously State Route 89A.  Soon after leaving I-40, and without warning, we hit major elevation changes and grades leading directly into cliff side hairpin turns.  It was not the turn radius that concerned me, it was my rapidly overheating breaks while I tried to keep my speed down leading into those turns.  In addition to overheating, since the brakes are compressed air activated and I was using them so often, my compressor was losing the battle in keeping up with the air demands. Fortunately when the low pressure alarm started screaming we were already near the bottom. On two occasions I had to use the emergency hand brake to feel comfortable heading into a couple of hairpins, and a third time when one of those Cruise America RVs backed out from the side road in front of me at the steepest part of a downhill run.  Idiot.  

We survived without hitting anything, but it was a major wake up call on the need to check the elevation changes for some of these roads before risking them with our ludicrously heavy bus running on decades old brake and drive train technology.  More on Sedona next post.

Owing to the Big Kahuna’s intransigence earlier in the morning, we pulled into the Petrified Forest National Park visitor center after noon.  We toured the museum and gift shop before snagging a park map and heading out.  Other than back country hikers, the park is mostly enjoyed by driving the 26 mile north-south road and stopping at the fifteen or so points of interest.  There are entry points at both the southern and northern ends of the road, and when planning your trip, particularly if doing so in an RV, you want to give consideration as to which entrance you start and exit as it will affect your route and overnight stay plans.  More on the later, but know that we started from the south entrance

Collage of petrified wood cross sections

The ranger at the entry station was experienced enough such that she specifically warned us off of two of the scenic overlooks due to difficulty in turning a rig our size around once we got in, at least if there were any other vehicles in the respective lots.  Once again our annual pass covered the $10/vehicle entry fee. The park is visited by 600,000 people each year, but you sure would not have known it on our visit; even the most crowded points only had a dozen or so people and often we found ourselves alone on the overlooks and road.  We even got to visit one of those two overlooks the ranger warned us about since no other vehicle blocked the turn around point.

80 ludicrous feet of triassic era life

We started with the short hike near the visitor center, which took us through many of the largest specimens of petrified trees, some of them enormous by any tree standards, much less something still intact after 200 million years.  After this we took the Kahuna up the road and stopped at each station, some with short hiking trails, such as Blue Mesa, and some with just pull out overlooks such as Newspaper Rock, one of several large rock faces covered in petroglyphs from pre-Columbian Pueblo tribes.

No railings. Ideal for unsupervised children.

As the day grew short and temperatures dropped our stops at each site grew a bit shorter and more frantic, eager as we were to see everything.  We abandoned our original plan of running the 26 mile road in both directions to stay at the little RV park right outside the southern park entrance.  This decision allowed us to relax a bit and make it to every point of interest before dark.  The geological overlooks and sites were indescribably fantastic, but the highlight of the run might have been the pronghorn that crossed our path near dusk.  This is the fastest land animal in the western hemisphere, capable of 55 mph bursts.

Uncooperative photo target, apparently unimpressed with our bus

The park is bisected by I-40, and once across the overpass you enter the Painted Desert section. We thought we were done being astounded, but this aptly named area blew us away.  Ever look at other people’s online photos and wonder how much they have been altered, particularly possible exaggeration of color?  I don’t mean Kim Kardashian’s airbrushing or the extreme alterations to every single professional model to ever grace the cover of a magazine; I’m talking nature photos that seem just a bit too awesome to be real.  That is a healthy attitude to take about anything from the internet, but the Painted Desert might make you reassess your skepticism, as it really is that shockingly colorful. You can see videos of some of the impressive views on our facebook page.

We finished the park at sunset, exhilarated but a bit concerned as we had no place to stay and it was getting dark.  The Kahuna is many things, but a night ranger is not one of them; the headlights are particularly weak and he is stressful to drive after dark.  We had the choice of driving back south through the park to the known quantity of a very cheap (free or $10 for electricity only) park at the southern entrance, or heading west on I-40 towards Holbrook and find something on the way. The first option would take nearly an hour as the park road had us down in the 35 mph range for much of the trip.  The second had the advantage of moving us closer towards our next destination, but was an unknown.  Given how many parks exist along the interstates in this part of the country, we went with the latter choice, confident we would find something without difficulty.  

Sure enough, about 10 miles down the road we saw signs for Root 66 RV Park (no, that is not a typo, I suspect trademark issues effected their name choice.)  We pulled in to this roadside, bare bones looking park and were pleasantly surprised to find very warm and friendly owners, full hook-ups (power/water/sewage), clean shower facilities, a choice of parking spots, free WiFi, and a Passport America rate of $16.50 a night.  Sold!  We did a quick hook up and celebrated St Patrick’s Day as best we could without access to cornbeef and cabbage.

After our more than pleasant two-day stay in Datil Well campground, we really did expect to get up early, well, early for us, break camp and get on the road towards the Petrified Forest National Park by 9 AM, 10 at the latest.  The Big Kahuna, however, had other plans, having decided that it was far to cold, particularly at this altitude, to start, much less drive.

A cold and wet morning when we finally got on the road

Ah yes, have I mentioned our rig’s reluctance to start in freezing or near freezing temps?  We were actually warned of this when we first picked him up in North Carolina last year.  Many modern diesel engines have block heaters, while others might have glow plugs, both these things aid in cold weather starting.  The Big Kahuna has neither.  With our nearly new high cranking battery we have not had much of an issue: we started without difficulty in temps in the upper 30s.  This morning he wouldn’t catch, just billowing forth a cloud of smoke.  I suspect the altitude, near 7000 feet, complicated the physics and chemistry at work.   Since we were reasonably confident that it was just temperature and altitude, we broke out the generator, made coffee and breakfast, and waited a couple of hours for the day to warm up.  Sure enough, by 11 it was 50 degrees out and Kahuna fired right up.

Pie Town, NM.: Overrated

We headed up the road towards Pie Town, a little place that is apparently semi-famous for… pie.  Let me be blunt: unless you are dead set on having pie in a place called Pie-Town, you can give it a pass. The Pie Town Cafe was the only option that morning, their pie, served cold, was nothing to write home about.  We experienced an unusual amount of drama while paying in that they require all card payments to have a pin, round the debit card transactions up to the nearest $5 increment, and add a $1.50 charge for any card.  None of that was explained before they handed me the $11.50 bill for our $7 pie and coffee.  So don’t go, but if you must, keep your expectations low and pay cash.

The pie was just OK but this elk horn Christmas tree was fantastic!

Onward!  We started a series of major uphill struggles along Highway 60, the earliest parts in light drizzle, passing through 10,000 feet as we crossed the Great Continental Divide.  The Big Kahuna did admirably considering the grade and altitude, but my patience was tried as we were frequently down to first gear and topping out at 25 mph. The Continental Divide is the set of mountain ranges that divide North, Central, and South America’s river systems by which flow into the Pacific and which flow into the Atlantic, Hudson Bay or the Gulf of Mexico.

Eventually we were on the predominantly down hill leg of the journey into Arizona, and relished the almost dramatic change in scenery once across.  We did a minor resupply stop and coasted into the Petrified Forest National Park visitor center shortly after noon.  We will save that for the next post.

Blue skies, on a downhill and crossing into Arizona: what could be better?

We left the Roswell Trailer Village RV Park at our usual leisurely hour of 11 AM and headed into the north part of town to restock supplies and fill up on diesel and generator gas.  As we had built up a bag of donation clothing and other items, we took the opportunity to drop that off at a conveniently located Goodwill along the way.  Remember the ABC rule?  Always Be Clearing Out and “one in, one out.”  We bought a couple of clothing items in our continuing effort to fill in some wardrobe gaps, but we left far more than we took.

Heading towards the mountains and our half way stopping point in route to Petrified Forest. Don’t let the picture fool you; it was mostly up hill.

We were headed towards the Petrified Forest National Park across the Arizona border to the northwest, but since that entailed a 384 mile journey through several mountain ranges, far more than I like to do in one day, we researched options for a half way, one night stopping point.  I looked for possible spots in the Cibola National Forest before remembering that Wheeling It spends a lot of time in this section of the country and always manages to find great low-cost or free spots.  A quick check of their site revealed a jaunt along our exact route with a stay over at Datil Well, a Bureau of Land Management campground just a bit further along our route than I had planned, but at $5 a night and with a solid review from an established and experienced full-time RV blogger, we had to take it.  Due to our late departure from Roswell, we were unable to completely follow in Wheeling It’s tracks by stopping at the Very Large Array along the way, but we nodded sagely at it as we passed.

The Big Kahuna lounges in one of the larger sites at Datil Well

Datil Well is half a mile up a firm packed dirt road just off highway 60 a mile or so north of the small town of Datil, NM.  Shortly before we arrived an SUV pulling one of those cute, retro-styled, tear drop-shaped Tab trailers passed us on the highway, and as we pulled into Datil Well we spotted them setting up camp.  We were the only two rigs in this campground with 25 sites.  We picked one of the larger, mostly level spots, #8, made payment via the honor system envelope at the front of the camp, and settled in for what we thought would be a one night stay.

Rocky Point overlook

There are no hook ups at all, just a nice site in a beautiful, juniper dominated mountain forest. The campground has clean pit toilets, and each site has a table, fire ring, and grill.   After getting our little Honda generator going, we met the Tab trailer owners, Craig and Mary from Iowa, who were kind enough to give us a tour of their remarkable little trailer.  We reciprocated and ended up trading stories and jokes for an hour or two in the Big Kahuna.

Trailhead for the 3.3 mile circuit

After a near freezing night we slept in to our usual hour, finally rousing ourselves with full intention of breaking camp and heading towards the next adventure.  But damn!  This place looked so beautiful, and we had it all to ourselves!  Which brings us to one of the greatest advantages of full-time RVing: you can change the plan any time you want.  So we did.  I mean, really now:  we had only been in this marvelous campground for 17 hours, we had not gotten to explore any of the hiking trails, and the Petrified Forest, after 225 million years, had firmly demonstrated that it wasn’t going anywhere.

We did not hunt or gather this food at Datil Well. But it was delicious.

So we settled back, cooked a brunch, prepped our day pack, and took a 3.3 mile hike along the mountain trails and beautiful, 6800 foot elevation overlooks.   As evening approached we got a fire going in the pit, roasted hot dogs, and hit the hay early so we could defy our usual pattern and get down the road earlier than our typical, nearly noon start time.

The album cover for our imaginery alt-folk band

Since leaving Odessa we have pushed forward pretty hard: two days without water hook ups in Balmorhea sledding the sand dunes, one day drycamped in the Guadalupe Mountains to hike the Devil’s Hall trail, and a half day parked in the visitor center lot in Carlsbad for cavern hiking.  Simply put, we were tired and needed to stop for preferably three days of recharge, in every respect: we needed full hook ups to get our batteries, water tanks, and black water tank charged, topped off, and emptied, respectively.  We were way behind on laundry and needed to catch up on this blog as well, but on a more basic level, we just wanted to settle for a couple of days after a very fun but hectic schedule.

Abduction in progress

While we normally prefer nature to cities and towns, if it is a particularly interesting “people place” then we can certainly be lured in.  Since our next major destination was generally north-west, and the famous town of Roswell was only 90 miles or so north, it fit the bill perfectly.  We checked the RV reviews and our favorite bloggers for park recommendations.  If we possessed a tow vehicle we likely would have opted for one of the state parks on the outskirts of town, but lacking a tow we needed something close to the action within bicycle or walking distance.  We called our tentative top choice, learned they were completely full, then called Trailer Village RV Park and got one of their last available openings.

The park is clean, well maintained, nicely decorated and landscaped (allowing for the general browness of New mexico in winter) fully equipped for 50 amp service, has inclusively priced cable and WiFi (very good by RV park standards), with coin laundry rooms available.  The no-nonsense co-owner, Debbie, checked us in, gave us the run down on the park, secured our 10% military discount (also honored for Good Sam members, must pay cash to receive this discount) and got us situated in short order.  After discussions with several of the longer term park residents, we feel we lucked in to the right park.  One of the other options has theft and security issues, and our other top choice was described as an empty lot behind someone’s house, regardless of how good their customer service reviews are.  Besides, Trailer Village RV Park is the closest to downtown Roswell: 1.4 miles.  Bottom line: if heading to Roswell, don’t let the somewhat typical and uninspired name fool you, this is the best bet for a full hook up park in town.

Best of all, Trailer Village had three other rigs from RVillage.com present, our first ever encounter with people for that group after several near misses in Florida.  RVillage is sort of a Facebook for RVers, but without the drama and predatory data mining.  You register, check in to campgrounds, see who else is present, send them a message to plan a get together, etc.  Best of all, when headed for a destination you can see who is already there and ask questions in advance.  Thus we met Janet and Randy, Janice and John, and Mike.  We got together for drinks and fantastic appetizers (thanks Mike, that coconut-pineapple-habanero jam was indescribable) which, under the influence of four bottles of wine, morphed into a full meal when Randy pulled out what I can only describe as the least healthy yet utterly delicious thing we have had in months: a pork loin inside a hollowed out baguette, with the whole thing wrapped in bacon.  He cooked it on his Green Egg, and in tandem with my step dad’s strong recommendation, has us pretty much convinced that we need to get one of the smaller versions of this remarkable device.

The Roswell contingent at an unofficial RVillage.com rally

There was also this nearby town with a UFO fetish.  We spend most of our second day in the heart of UFO mania.  Pretty much every small business and even many of the chains push the alien thing hard in their street front advertising.  It makes for an entertaining photo opportunity from nearly every corner. We got so wrapped up in it that we nearly missed our opportunity to visit the International UFO Museum.  Because we arrived only half an hour before closing they let us in for half price ($2.50 vice $5 each).  Yes, I’m deeply skeptical, but it was a fun and interesting to tour.  My only criticism is that they need to update the displays; some of them appear to have stagnated in 1975 or so.

The aliens are EVERYWHERE in downtown Roswell

Three days is sort of the sweet spot for us in terms of length of stay at parks, though as many longer term full time RVers mention, everyone tends to slow down their pace as time goes on and you get beyond the “OMG I must see everything right now” early phase.   Next year a week my be the prefered stop length.  But after three days in Roswell we were eager to get back on the road towards the Petrified Forest, Sedona, and Grand Canyon. 

One of these things is not like the others, one of these things, doesn’t belong.

I had grand plans: Wake up at 6 AM (an ungodly hour for any self-respecting retiree) and head out of Guadalupe Mountains National Park, turn south for two miles to hit the scenic overlooks of El Capitan, find three or four geocaches along the way, and then turn back north to meet our 8 AM appointment at the Carlsbad RV Repair Center to address a couple of water leaks.  Rosie did not object as she planned to stay in bed during the entire scheme of manuever.  What I failed to take into account was the sunrise time; at 6 AM it was still pitch black, and I don’t like to drive The Big Kahuna in the dark, much less try to geocache by flashlight or sight see without, er, sight.

So I reset the alarm for 6:40, which turned out to be perfect for a dawn start with sufficient light to both see El Capitan and find at least one geocache before we headed towards Carlsbad.  We arrived at the repair center precisely at 8, they immediately lead us into a bay, Rosie and I walked down the road to a diner for breakfast, and by the time we returned they were already buttoning things back up after repairing the two fitting cracks we knew of plus a cracked toilet valve that we did not.  We have had experience with six different repair organizations since buying the bus, and this was in the top two for fast, fair, and painless service.

Shortly after 10 we were back on the road for the short trip back to the Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  The seven mile entry road is a twisty winding pleasure for the passenger and not too difficult of an experience for the driver.  The visitor center has ample bus and RV parking, though part of the lanes are not particularly level and unless you have an excessive amount of faith in your parking brake, wheel chocks are recommended to prevent catastrophe.  I used two big rocks.

We checked into the visitor center and learned that as it is Spring Break season all of the guided tours are filled up days in advance, but we preferred a self guided tour in any case, particularly since they had a portable audio guide to rent for $5.  We used our National Park Annual Pass for free entry to the cavern itself, which if anyone is keeping track has now covered $50 of it’s $80 cost ($20 at Big Bend, $10 at Guadalupe Mountains, and $20 at Carlsbad).  We were a bit concerned about the number of people in the park, particularly the busses full of children, but the park does a great job of spreading everyone out, and since we did the longer tour starting at the natural entrance, we did not find the crowd disconcerting at all. 

We did the slightly more than a mile hike from the cave entrance down to the primary viewing areas, another 1.2 mile circuit of the “Big Room,” and then took the elevator 750 feet back to the surface.  It is difficult to explain just how overwhelmingly enormous this cavern is.  We visited Florida Caverns State Park earlier this year, and it was nice.  It was interesting and fun.  But to compare that cavern to Carlsbad is to compare a children’s flag football game to the Super Bowl.  Sure, you might enjoy them both, but let’s be serious about which one is the national wonder and which one is merely interesting.

The tour was longer and more energy consuming than we had anticipated, and thus we were ravenous enough to pay the extortionist prices at the visitor center cafeteria once we emerged topside.  The gift shop and separate library gift shop were pretty big compared to our previous national park shops, and we snagged my park patch and some post cards.

One of the key lessons from Carlsbad is that not all national parks are equal in terms of appropriate time to spend in them.  We had sort of gotten used to the idea that in very general terms, state parks are small, i.e., you can often see the high points by bicycle in one or two days, and national parks are huge, i.e., you can’t expect to see but a fraction of their wonders in less than three days and that with a vehicle. So we had roughly penned in three days for any national park we planned to visit.  This just isn’t necessary for Carlsbad.  Unless you want to do the cavern tour multiple times or can arrange a tour of some of the other caverns in the area, you can do Carlsbad’s main attraction in half a day, particularly since this is one of the national parks that does not have any overnight RV camping available within the park itself.  Once all of this became apparent we cancelled our plans to stay at the nearest private RV park and left right after our post hike meal, heading up the road to Roswell.  Since that visit we have taken a harder look at a few other planned stops, such that the soon to be visited Petrified Forest National Park, which will now be a one night stop vice three.  

After leaving Monahans Sandhills State Park, we headed towards our last Texas stop; a one night stay in Guadalupe Mountains National Park.  We would learn that one night here is simply not enough, but this visit was a compromise: we were eager to get out of Texas and on to other states since we had spent much more time than we anticipated there, but Guadalupe is one of our 59 national parks and it was directly on the way to our next planned destination.

The unrelenting brown flats and mild hills gave way rather suddenly to a jutting mountain range as we approached Guadalupe. The RV site is just a parking lot with no hook ups, but it does have a bathhouse and potable water available, and generators may be used from 8 AM to 8 PM.  The views are amazing, and we took advantage of our one day here to hike one of the trails accessible right from the RV lot.  

The ranger at the visitor center recommended we do Devil’s Hall since we only had about half a day once we finished setting up our site.  The terrain is similar to Big Bend, but with more sheer cliffs and general ruggedness.  Unlike our seven mile hike in Big Bend, this time we prepared with full meal and took a day pack.  The four mile jaunt through dirty paths and very rocky dry washes was fantastic, especially the culmination at the devils stairs and hall.

If we had more time we would have taken on some of the other, longer trails, particularly to the top of Guadalupe to look down on El Capitan.  Unfortunately we had an appointment in Carlsbad early the next morning to address a couple of water leaks in The Big Kahuna.  I suspect Guadalupe Mountains National Park is overlooked by a lot of visitors to the region that are headed straight for the Carlsbad Caverns just across the New Mexico border.  We would recommend a stop in Guadalupe to anyone passing through.

We gotta get out of this place!  If it’s the last thing we ever do …

– The Animals

Due to the unfortunate chair staining incident, we did not escape from our mechanically induced 11 day stay in Odessa, TX until nearly 5 PM this last Monday.  Such a late departure squashed our tentative plans to head to Balmorhea State Park, but there was no way in hell we were spending another night in Odessa, so we executed our back up plan and headed 40 miles down the road to Monahans Sandhills State Park, the closest state park generally on the route towards Guadalupe Mountains and Carlsbad Caverns National Parks.  We stuck with a Texas State Park since the are very affordable, $15 a night at Monahans, and the annual pass we purchased in Galveston would eliminate the $4 per person entry fee and give us the second night in the campground at half price.

Entry sign

We arrived after the ranger station and visitor center had closed, but as we had called ahead we knew to pull into any open site that was not posted on the reserved list at the entrance and make payment the next morning when they opened.  We hooked up power and water… and almost immediately learned that I had not adequately winterized The Big Kahuna for the nearly week long freeze he experienced in the Odessa repair lot.  Before we departed on our full-time journey we had nearly the entire potable water system replaced with flexible PEX piping, but a handful of the old PVC joints were still in the system, and they did not withstand the pressure of expanding frozen water.  

I encountered the first major water leak in the complex PVC joint at the water connection; it was cracked to the point that we could not get much water into the potable system. Unable to hook up a pressurized water source, I used an alternate connection to fill our water storage tank with the intention of using the electic pump to provide water to the bus. Unfortunately, as soon as I turned on the water pump I discovered a second crack in an elbow joint between the PEX tubing and the hard metal piping leading up to the faucets in the bus.  Thus we had to spend our stay in Monahans washing dishes at the outdoor faucet and filling jugs for drinking and flushing water, but we at least had the park showers available.

Monahan Sands is a 3800 acre park with extensive and massive sand dunes rising up to 80 feet tall.  They are the primary draw for the park; Texans and other people without access to snow can come here and actually sled down the dunes.  We bought a plastic toboggan from the visitor center and spent part of the afternoon laboriously climbing these over sized sand hills and sliding down at frightening speeds.  Fun for an afternoon, but until they install some sky slope style lifts, this is likely to be our only visit to Texas dune country.