New Mexico continued

Dec 2nd

The thought of driving the truck and trailer down the mountain this morning gave us anxiety, but it was not as bad as we anticipated. We put the truck in 4 wheel/low, and I walked behind the trailer, with a walkie talkie, all the way down the hill. No damage to anything. Since we were so close to Roswell, NM, we had to go. Almost the entire city of Roswell has embraced the UFO lore. Most stores in town are alien themed, the city street lights are shaped like alien heads, even the McDonalds is shaped like a UFO. We went to the International UFO Museum and Research Center and learned all about the Roswell incident in 1947. There were definitely some conflicting stories issued from the government about it. On our way out of town, we stopped at a local RV dealer, because they offered a free dump station. They had the most amazing parts department, and we bought several things for our trailer. We are staying at a USFS campground outside of Lincoln, NM tonight. We had to drive down a seven-mile dirt road to get to it. The area is beautiful. High mountains with a mix of cacti and trees. The campground is free, and there is only one other camper here. We are going to stay a couple of nights. The stars are even more amazing than our last site. There are no cities near us, so no light pollution.

Dec 3rd

After Mia’s schooling this morning, we took a hike. There are fire trails leading in every direction. We chose one and ended up climbing to the top of nearby ridge. The views were spectacular. Most of the USFS land is being used by local cattle ranchers, so there were cows here and there. We watched the stars again tonight. We did get to see a satellite train. There were ten to twenty satellites, all very close together flying in a line. They were so close together, that I first mistook them for a shooting star that was moving very slowly across the sky. The elevation here is about 7000 feet, so the temperature has dropped very low at night. Tomorrow we will head a little further south to get out of the cold.

Dec 4th

It was freezing last night. It was so cold that a bowl of water Mia left outside, froze solid. Our plan was to drive into Arizona today, but we didn’t quite get there. We happened to be passing White Sands National Park, so we stopped. At the Visitor’s Center we watched a short movie about the park and its unique dunes. The white sand is all gypsum, and the dunes move up to fifty feet a year. The ranger told us, that we had to climb out onto the dunes. With Mia’s National Parks pass it would be free to enter. We went back to the trailer and got ready to enter the park. The Parks pass was in my wallet, but I could not find my wallet. We spent over an hour searching the truck and trailer for it. Kathy got on-line to verify when the cards had been used last. We finally gave up, and Kathy took Mia back to the Visitor’s center, to get a new Parks pass. Once we were in the Park, we forgot about the lost wallet for a while. We stopped at a pull-out and climbed out onto the dunes. It is like nothing I have ever seen or felt before. The white sand is brilliant, and the texture is almost like talcum. When it gets wet it compacts like cement, but when its dry it’s a fine powder that creates the massive dunes. We hiked out into the dunes, and even tried sliding down one, but you need a snowboard or sled to go down. The sun was starting to go down as we left. So much for getting to Arizona today. We got as far as Deming, NM, and stopped at the local Walmart for groceries. It was dark by the time we were done shopping, so we decided to stay in the parking lot for the night. There were seven other RVs and several big rigs all staying overnight.

Dec 5th

Last night was not horrible, but it was noisy all night. We set out on our way to Arizona again this morning. I found a gas station in Lordsburg NM, that had a dump station. It turned out to be a $10 mistake.

1.The dump station is in the exit lane at the back, so if another RV wants to exit, they have to wait you to finish dumping. 2. The dump station is on the wrong side (passenger side) 3. We drove around and entered from the wrong side, so we lined up, but there is such a steep grade that the tanks wouldn’t empty uphill. 4. We had to turn back around and use a second hose to extend under our rig, but again the slope is so acute that we had to feed the waste up the hose, by hand, to the dump station. 5. There is no potable water, and we ran out of water trying to wash our hands.

We left tired and disgusted. I left a review about our crappy (pun intended) experience on Campendium. We stopped at a rest stop for lunch and to regroup. We needed to get water to fill our trailer. Kathy called an RV park that we would be passing by shortly, and asked them if we could pay them just to fill up. “Absolutley. You can dump and fill with water for $5.” That made us feel even worse about our $10 fiasco. Kathy found us some more free BLM camping to the West of Tucson AZ, and we headed there. We could not find the first site we were looking for, and ended up getting stuck on a narrow road that ended at a locked gate. We could not turn around. Kathy backed the truck and trailer over half a mile to get us turned around. We went in search of the next site. This one we eventually located. We turned onto a single lane dirt road and found the BLM sign. There are campsites scattered on either side of the dirt road. We found a great site for the night. The road goes on for over a mile, but there are only 5 other campers that we can see. The scenery is amazing, scrub brush with saguaro cacti and the mountains in the background. The sunset was amazing. I think we will stay here a couple of nights. To make things even better, Kathy received a message on Facebook, from a woman saying that her husband had found my wallet while he was hunting near Lincoln, NM. They are going to mail it home for me. Nice people do exist. My wallet must have fallen out of my pocket while we were hiking. What are the odds of someone coming across it in all that wilderness? This all happened as I was sitting down to make an appointment with the DMV. Now I don’t have to.