Carlsbad, NM

Our first stop in New Mexico was Brantley Lake State Park, about 12 miles North of Carlsbad, NM. This past winter has been a wet one for SE New Mexico and the lake is much higher than it has been in many years with lots of flowers blanketing the Chihuahuan desert.

About half the sites at the state park are reserveable and half are first come, first serve. Most sites have a view of the lake and are well separated from each other. A covered picnic table and a BBQ are at each site.

Our view from site #11.

Another view of our site.

Our first full day we drove about 45 minutes South to Carlsbad Caverns National Park. This cave system contains the fifth largest chamber in North America (The Big Room) and the choice of self-guided or ranger-led tours. You can purchase audio guides for the self-guided portion.

We chose to explore at our own pace without the audio tour. We logged about three miles total by entering through the Natural Entrance where you drop, sometimes steeply, about 750 feet into the cavern system. After exploring all the trails open to those without a guide, we returned to the surface via elevator. There were restroom and snack and souvenir facilities down in the cave making it easy to spend several hours underground.

Though the cave system is subtley lighted for walking and to enhance some of the more extraordinary cave features, it is nice to have an additional source of light with you to view some of the dark corners throughout the cave.

On our drive in we spotted a herd of at least 20 big horn sheep on a distant hillside.
Look for the faint brown spots scattered horizontally.

Walnut Canyon.

This cactus wren built its nest right next to the trail leading to the Natural Entrance.

Down, down, down!
This was only the beginning of a long, long drop into the earth!

Once inside my camera did not perform nearly as well as Hans' cell phone so these cave photos are courtesy of Hans.  There were many fabulous formations inside the cave and we were amazed by the enormous size of the rooms we walked through.

On our second full day we visited the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens in Carlsbad. This is a small New Mexico State Park that showcases the flora and fauna of the Chihuahuan Desert.

One of the more natural animal enclosures.

Mural in the new reptile building.

The Pecos River runs through the area though much of it is diverted to an irrigation canal. Near the center of Carlsbad river water is dammed to create Carlsbad Lake and nice walking trails line both sides of this oasis in the desert.

I wish I could have seen the little turtle make its way up to its lofty sunning spot!

Brantley Lake was a very peaceful place to spend three nights. There are not many trails in the park and the lake loop is no longer a loop due to the high water level, but walking the grounds mid-week was pretty and calm with those great long distance New Mexico views that often include lots of puffy white clouds.

This road used to go to the primitive camping area...it must have been in the trees that are now water bound.

Next up: Roswell, NM.

Last Days in Texas

Leaving South Llano State Park, it was time to start making our way out of Texas. First stop: San Angelo State Park. We stayed in the South campground which used to overlook OC Fisher Reservoir, which is currently dry due to drought. The park is still pretty in its spring green and lots of flowers popping out all over the place.

There are 50 miles of multi-use trails in the park, which look like they'd be excellent for some easy mountain biking. There is a fancy bird blind and small herds of both bison and Texas Longhorns. We only spent two nights here and enjoyed a short hike at the North end of the park as well as some good BBQ at Bodacious BBQ in nearby San Angelo.

There are numerous camping areas throughout the park, many sites have water and electric hookups. Camp sites are well separated and we had excellent 4G Verizon signal.

Site 16, we camped in a field of flowers!

Walking the aptly named Shady Trail at the North end of the park.

We'd been warned to watch out for snakes...

...and were glad we took that advice seriously!

This was the fanciest bird blind we'd seen yet in TX.
The blinds at South Llano were fenced, this one was open and this javelina was a regular visitor!

Volunteers put bird seed on the logs and "Fred" would visit every day like clockwork.
Other viewers said they'd seen an additional peccary and a tom turkey having a feed!

We're going to miss all the lovely flowers we've enjoyed this spring in Texas as we head in to New Mexico.

The drive to our last stop in Texas, Monahans Sandhills State Park, was through oil country, not the prettiest part of the state. But the state park did not disappoint. The campsites are right next to the dunes and you could walk for miles through an otherworldly mix of dunes and hardy, low lying plants.

That's our site #12 right in front.

We had a fun happy hour with Dino and Pam, owners of this very cool Earth Roamer.
You can check out their travels at UltimateCampsite.com.

Sunset our first night.

Sunrise the next morning.
That's Hans on the dune enjoying the show.

It was neat being the first people walking the dunes in the morning. Lots of tracks in the freshly blown sand and shifting shadows as the sun peeked in and out of the clouds.

We though Rosie would love the sand...but she seems a little freaked out by it.
Hans carried her to the top of the dune and she RAN back to the RV.

Ears back...Get me home right now!

What a send off! This afternoon a thunder storm passed over us and put on quite a show!

Rain's coming! And lighting! Scary exciting!

We've had two fun months in Texas. Locals tell us this has been the best wildflower season they can remember...love serendipity!

New Mexico here we come!

Wildlife Haven: South Llano River State Park

We spent the past three nights at South Llano River State Park, a place with zero Verizon 3g or 4g signal but just enough 1X signal to be able to make phone calls. Immersion in nature is the reason to visit this park and boy did it provide nature in abundance!

Though we had a reservation in advance, the sites are not assigned until arrival. We'd scoped out the camp sites via the park map and Google Maps prior to arrival so we knew we'd like to be in site 21, 23 or 25, and 23 happened to be available. These three sites are situated along the curve at the far end of the campground, each opens onto forest and are well separated from each other. There are a total of 58 water/electric sites here.

The park supports abundant wildlife in a variety of habitats. The South Llano River flows along the North edge of the park, pecan trees grow in the river flood zone, and the juniper and cedar forests of the hill country rise away from the river bottom. We saw dozens of deer each day and several armadillos. There are even beaver in the river, though we did not see any.

There are 18 miles of trails here and we must have hiked at least 12 of them, some multiple times. All of the trails along the river or in the pecan bottoms are flat, if you head into the hills you'll get a good workout.

There are several elaborate bird blinds set up in the park, each with a water feature for the birds, feeders and enticing bird habitat, with comfy seating and bird identification books in the humans viewing enclosure.

Turkeys are also a big deal here. Approximately 800 Rio Grande Turkey roost here each year between October and April...numbers like that would certainly be a sight to see! We only saw a handful of turkeys during our stay, perhaps the few males that had not managed to attract a female during the normal roosting season.

I'll let the photos tell the story of our wonderful stay at South Llano River State Park...

Site #23, deep and private.

Rosie is a bit freaked out by the deer so near our campsite!

The view from our big picture window.

We took our chairs just a few feet into the forest from our site for total privacy and nature immersion.

Most of the other sites have less privacy, though most are well separated from each other.

The South Llano River has undercut the bank and a large pecan tree is now providing fish and turtle habitat.

Walking the bottom land.

We were wildly excited to see our first armadillo!

We had two full days in the park so we headed into the hills for several miles each day. I didn't take many pictures up in the hills because we didn't see many animals and the vegetation consisted of dense juniper and oak forest with views of hills covered in more dense juniper and oak forest. We enjoyed our hikes, they just weren't particularly photo worthy!

The bottom land was prettier in our opinion, brilliant spring green everywhere you looked.

One of many viewing blinds scattered throughout the park.

One of the prettiest parts of the hill country trails!

View from the scenic viewpoint.
You can see tiny bits of RV's right behind Hans' head, that's the campground.
The pasture on the right is private property.

This is the type of environment the armadillos forage in.

Armadillos are amazingly fast creatures...most of my photos looked like this due to their speed!
We'd spot one, make our way in its direction and it would take off through the prickly pear landscape,
heading for its hole.

Our second evening turned sunny, lighting up the green all around us.

Vermilion flycatcher

They are hard to miss!

Pretty scissor tailed flycatchers are new to us in Texas.

One of the few tom turkeys strutting his stuff across a meadow.

There's an armadillo in this shot...

I stopped when I saw this one and then slowly crept towards it,
they have poor vision so I hoped to get closer without it seeing me...

He senses me and stands up to sniff the air...

See how easy it is for them to hide in this environment?!

Here's another one trying to sniff out the danger.
Notice the hairy belly!

We even had a beautiful sunset one evening.

This was a wonderful back-to-nature stopover for us. We'd definitely stay here again, it's peaceful and beautiful and the wildlife can't be beat!