16 May 2018, Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument

   Six to seven million years ago, massive volcanic eruptions occured throughout the mountains of New Mexico, one of the largest of which was from the Valles Caldera near Jemez, NM.  The tent rocks formations are the result of repeated eruptions from at least 20 volcanoes to the northwest, which blanketed this area  with pumice, ash and tuff deposits over 1,000 feet thick.  This material was then welded, fused and cemented into a type of rock known as volcanic tuff.  

   Later, geologic uplift, faulting and weathering by wind and water sculpted these deposits into unique tent-shaped formations.  

 Each layer we see in the cliff walls and tent formations represents a separate volcanic event.

15 May 2018 - City of Rocks State Park, New Mexico

   It's about time for an update.
   We, the dog and I, got to Borrego Springs, CA about the last of October and remained there until the middle of March, camping in the desert, playing Bingo two evenings a week, riding my bike plus trying to introduce Meghan (the dog) to running alongside the bike, reading many books, and taking just a few photos.  It was funny that after her first introduction to running with the bike, every time I would suit up for my own ride out on the roadways for 10 miles, Meghan would start to bark and howl each time I left her behind!  Seems she really enjoyed it.
   After a few months, it was time for her first ever session with a groomer.  She came out from it looking much better, but the groomer said that if I ever brought her back again, she (the dog) would have to be on tranquilizers!

Before Grooming

After Grooming

After I did some TouchUp on her

   Back on the 16th of January we had a new moon and I made a point to get a picture of it.

   I left Borrego Springs once it got too warm back during March, traveling to Yuma and then Benson, AZ to relax some more and visit with friends.  Finally, near the end of April I left Arizona for New Mexico, traveling to the City of Rocks State Park.  The 'City' is about 1 square mile in area, and lies at 5,200 feet altitude.  It was formed when a large volcano erupted 35 million years ago and carpeted the area with a thick layer of tufa which over the years cracked and weathered into a collection of sculptured columns and pinnacles, some rising as much as 40 feet high.
   While here, I worked some more with Meghan, getting her used to running alongside my bike, and she was always so excited to be out running that she often was pulling the bike and me if I wasn't pedaling fast enough.  It always went smoothly unless she happened to spy a rabbit...!!

 Notice my bike just under that "grinning" rock, below.

 From one viewpoint, just a couple very large rocks.

From another, it kinda looks like a rock rabbit.

 A neighbor near me was camping inside a cove in the rocks.  

Then I got real interested in shooting yucca plants from different perspectives.

    When I left City of the Rocks, I made it a point to travel a circular route through the mountains, west, north, northeast and then east to see the Very Large Array (VLA) radio telescopes located on the plains of Saint Agustin near Datil, NM.

   Each telescope is 82 feet across and there are 27 of them, weighing 230 tons each(!), and they can be relocated on 82 miles of dedicated railroad spurs to form the equivalent of a radio telescope as much as 22 miles in diameter.  The output from the 27 antennas is sent down fiber optic cables to a supercomputer, the Wideband Interferometric Digital Architecture Correlater, with merges the 27 inputs into one observation,  performing sixteen quadrillion processes per second!  Pretty stunning.

October 2017 - Colorado and New Mexico

   October 2017 already!
   I delayed my departure from Colorado Springs by 3 weeks, until the very first day of October, in order to get my traveling companion.  Her name is Meghan, and she was all of 9 weeks old at that time.  She's a West Highland Terrier puppy, or "Westie", and already an absolute delight!

   Upon leaving Colorado Springs, we drove just a couple hours south, to Lathrop State Park outside Walsenburg, CO in order to keep the Meghan's first ride brief.  But she did fine, and we camped there for a couple days, enjoying short walks and the fantastic views of the Spanish Peaks, which the Indians regarded as the "Breasts of the World."

   When we left there, we drove west across the North LaVeta Pass, and just south of Blanca Peak, which I "shot" from a Rest Area along the highway.

   From there, we continued south to revisit Heron Lake State Park in New Mexico, but stayed just one night, being chased out by the forecast of freezing temps for the next night.  We drove about 60 miles or so south over a ridge to Abiquiu Lake and the Corps of Engineers (COE) Riana RV Park.  This is a very nice park with provisions for full hookups, and also for dry camping in a very pleasant area with great views of Cerro Pedernal, which Georgia O'Keefe painted many times.

 At Sunrise

During Afternoon

   A couple days later, freezing temps were forecast for this area, too, so we moved to White Rock, NM, south of Los Alamos and 7 miles east of Bandelier National Monument, and where we could stay at the White Rock Visitor Center for $20/night with good electrical hookup.  It was peaceful and quiet both nights we were there, and there's a free Shuttle Bus service to Bandelier from May 14 to October 15 that runs every 20 minutes  from 9 AM until 3 PM daily.  But when I went inside the Visitor Center to inquire about the hours of service, the lady there said that if I were to drive out earlier, I could get in with no problem, but during the hours from 9 to 3, visitors 'must take' the shuttle service.  There are other exceptions, too, for disabled, overnight backpackers, visitors staying at Juniper Campground in the National Monument, bicyclists, or if there's a pet on-board (NOTE: pets are NOT allowed on the trails).

   I was extremely impressed by the geology of the area, and by the way the Ancestral People adapted to the area, and by how they adapted the environment to serve them.  There was a period of great volcanic activity in the area about a million years ago, and the nearby Valles Caldera is the remains of of one vast eruption, which blew ash that was carried as far away as Iowa.  It also generated a massive ash flow, some of which was welded together by its own heat into a layer of lightweight and relatively soft rock called tuff, but still hard enough to form cliffs.  When humans first came to this area, they were able to use other rocks to carve openings into these cliffs to form useful shelters, and they also used blocks of tuff to form houses in front of the caves they had carved out.  Many, if not most, of the caves were elevated and accessible only by ladders.

Tufa Columns - see all the very tiny people?

Tufa Cave

   But sometimes, nature steps in and things go awry.

   The next day, we drove to El Morro National Monument, which is a huge sandstone bluff at the base of which is a huge (200,000 gallon) waterhole.  This a natural waterhole, fed only by runoff rainwater rather than by any spring.  And there are over 2,000 handcarved messages, dates, signatures and petroglyphs around the bluff, carved by Spanish and American travelers and by the Ancestral Peoples who lived here in a permanent settlement of rock houses atop the bluff.

   There is a small campground here, only 9 sites of which only 3 sites are large enough for an RV in my opinion and the largest site is rated for just a 27' RV.  There are no hookups, but there are 2 or three bear-proof trash bins and one outhouse.  There is no charge for admission or for camping.  

At Sunrise

Afternoon From The Campground

]

 Approach To The Waterhole

 The Waterhole

A Couple Of The Signatures

P Gilmer Breckenridge 1859

A Fancy Signature

looks like "E Pen Long" from Baltimore

plus R.C. Logan, Ohio, 1866

   There are some *very* old writings, from Spanish times, the earliest dating to 1605, fully 15 years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock.

   And then there are the petroglyphs, which we can't date, but they must surely be truly ancient!

   We left the next day, heading for Hatch, N.M. where I bought 5 pounds of frozen roasted Hatch chilies plus 5 pounds of fresh (this year's harvest) pinto beans.  We then headed for Benson, AZ where we're camping with some Boondocking friends for about 10 days before heading to Borrego Springs, CA for the winter.  While here, the first night I made a fresh batch of pinto beans using some of the Hatch chilies, some chili powder from Penzey's Spice Store, and one chipotle chili in adobo sauce.  This batch is about as hot as I would ever want it to be, so may just use less of the chilies on my subsequent batches.  

   But overall, life is good, and I've really enjoyed the stops I've made this fall.

   Hoping all is well with my readers.

Early to Mid-Summer 2017 - Some NM State Parks

    After I left Borrego Springs in May, I slowly made my way toward New Mexico to visit their State Parks.  NM has a great deal for dedicated park-goers: a year-long pass that costs but $180 for state residents, $100 for residents age 62+ or physically disabled, or $225 for non-residents: with this pass, one can dry camp for free up to 14 days at a time, and for all of $4 additional, can camp in at a site with electrical hookup (sewer hookup is an additional $4). So I drove to the northeast corner of the state, popped for the non-resident pass, and entered Clayton State Park, about 12 miles northwest of the town of Clayton.
    This first picture is taken near the entrance gate, elevated way above the campground.  My trailer is the farthest away, out on the tip of the "peninsula."

   While there, I parked near another rig, and met new friends Bob and Donna.  Their motor home is fixed up rather well for solar power.  Bob constructed an elevated platform for most of his panels, such that they lie just above his air conditioners.

    Then, when he wants to raise them, all he has to do is to flip a switch inside his rig, and Voila! They rise from the dead!  Powered by DC actuators (from DCActuators.com).  No more climbing on the roof!  And I'm absolutely green with envy!!

    The weather was warm while I was there, and we had a few rainstorms.  One of these storms gave us a particularly nice sunset.

   And another yielded a nice rainbow over my rig.  But I still haven't found that pot of gold.

    During my stay there, I frequently walked along the approach road to the park, picking up trash and litter.  I ended up hauling 7 large bags filled with crushed aluminum beer and soda cans, glass bottles, plus assorted paper and plastic trash to the park's trash bins.
    But I also was observing the wildflowers, and trying to identify the ones I didn't already know.  I took a picture of one small clump of Mexican Hat flowers, in which both types were blooming - the more common yellow petalled variety, plus one that has russet, rather than yellow, petals.

     I decided to relocated to Sugarite Canyon State Park, just a few miles east of Raton, NM on the 5th of July.  And the name is pronounced "Sugar-eet" - never did find out why.  But at 6,664 feet elevation, it was pleasantly cooler there.  There used to be a coal mining town in the canyon back in the late 1800's to the mid-1940's, with a population approaching 1000!

    Besides the two campgrounds, one with hookups, the other without, there are miles of trails for hiking, and two nice lakes.  One morning, I got a nice picture of Lake Alice.  The lakes are used as water supply for the town of Raton.

    I camped at the higher Soda Pocket Campground, the one without any hookups - but plenty of bear boxes, most important for tent campers and those in canvas-sided RVs, where they can store their tasty foodstuff, secure from the roaming bears - of which I never saw one.
    One day I climbed a short trail leading to a viewpoint above the campground and got a picture of the campground (my rig is the rightmost RV), and of Little Horse Mesa, beyond.

    So of course, on another day, I hiked over and took the relatively short but strenuous hike up onto Little Horse Mesa, to get a picture back toward the campground, and out the canyon to the land forms beyond.

    Another day, I took a hiking tour of the old town site, which has several old foundations of buildings, and some few sidewalls.  I found the remains of one old outdoor oven, which must have been either wood or coal fired.  It was built by a man for his wife, and she used it to bake breads for sale in the community.

    About the middle of July, I relocated to Storrie Lake State Park, just outside Las Vegas, NM to visit long-time friends, Wayde and Resa, whom I first met about 15 years ago at the Elks Lodge CG in Colorado Springs.  After a great reunion with them, I stocked up on both food and fuel and headed northwest to check out Eagle Nest Lake State Park just outside Eagle Nest, NM, up in the Sangre de Christo Mountains.  Alas, the campground was full, so I drove a few miles east, down into the Cimarron Canyon to the Cimarron Canyon State Park.  This park lies in a narrow forested canyon stretching about 8 miles along the Cimarron River, and is a popular both with campers and with trout fishermen/women.  It has 3 campgrounds, and the first two I came to were both too full and too shady for purposes of solar charging.  I was very fortunate at the third campground, Ponderosa, to find a spot that had perfect daylong full solar exposure, yet I was just a few steps from the stream, from which people were hauling stringers full of good sized trout.

    Nearby was an area known as the Palisades Sill.

    The Palisades cliffs.

    Periodically, I'd drive the winding road 12 miles to Eagle Nest Lake State Park to see if there were any vacancies there, and I finally found one one the 15th of July.  So I hastened back to Ponderosa CG, hitched up and slowly worked my way back up the canyon to Eagle Nest Lake where I remained for about a week, enjoying the weather, the views and the daily morning walks.

Big puffy white clouds.

    Nearby was the Vietnam Veterans Memorial State Park, which was the first major Viet Nam memorial in the U.S.  It was created/financed by Victor "Doc" Westphall and his wife, Jeanne, after their son, 1Lt David Westphall and 15 comrades had been killed in Viet Nam.  It is a very beautiful and powerful memorial to all who served in that conflict.  I took just one photograph, that of an Army Huey.  Further information is available at  https://www.vietnamveteransmemorial.org/

    In that same area, I came across a large expanse of penstemmon in bloom.

    Several days later, I relocated to Heron Lake State Park, near Los Ojos, NM about 95 miles NNW of Santa Fe.  I found a nice quiet site to camp in, where I was near trees for cool shade during the day, but had full day solar for my panels.
    The whole country seems to be having unusual weather with lots of rain storms, and we were no exception.  One day I got a picture of storm clouds and reflected light from distant clear skies.

    Followed not long after by another beautiful rainbow.

   While touring around one day, I took a picture showing how rough the land form is hereabouts.

    I took daily walks while here, and one day I was fortunate enough to spy an osprey on its nest.  Actually, it's two of them.

    And on another day,  I spied a tree full of vultures waiting for dinner.

    The last day of July, I relocated to one of my very favorite campgrounds, Cimaronna CG, about 26 miles NW of Pagosa Springs, CO

   My favorite campsite in my favorite campground.

   During my daily walks, I found a bumble bee at work on a beautiful thistle blossom at about 0630.  It was still rather chilly.

And a harebell, which stood about 8 inches tall.

    I left Cimarrona about a week later to go to Durango as my new truck was due for an oil change.  But en route, I passed the always striking Chimney Rock National Monument about 20 miles west of Pagosa Springs.  Sometime I need to actually stop there to investigate it.

    After getting my truck serviced in Durango, I drove most all day to Buena Vista, CO where I RON'd (Remained Over Night) at a truck stop, the drove the next day to Colorado Springs where I'm staying at the Elks RV Area for a while, enjoying the rains...