December 18, 2022 – Van Horn – Guadalupe Mountains National Park
Van Horn
It was cold last night and we had ice on the tent this morning! We are up early as Paul wants to see the Football World Cup Final ( Argentina vs France), scheduled for 9 am our time.
We drive to Van Horn. We go up and down the main drag in search of a place to watch the football. We try the main Hotel where we see TV screens in the breakfast room but are refused entry as we are not guests! We settle for a small cafe down the road. The staff there is very accommodating and try to find the channel showing the live broadcast, initially without success. One of the staff goes as far as searching on his phone and lending it to Paul once he has found the live coverage on it.
We end up staying long after we finish breakfast. The match goes to penalty shootouts!( by then they had found the correct channel on TV). The cafe is busy with Sunday morning customers (mainly Spanish speaking) and some join in the cheering for Argentina ( loyalty to the South American fraternity!) and Argentina wins …
It is now lunch time. We have given up on the plan to ship the car from Texas so we aim for New Mexico and hope to find some warmer weather in the South-Western part of the USA.
Our first stop is at the Guadalupe Mountains National Park.
We tried to reserve a camping spot online but it is the week end and nothing is available until Wednesday. The ranger at the Visitor Center tells us of a “back-country site” on the way to Carlsbad. We do a short trail first then get back on the road.
We do not want to go too far as the plan is to come back to the park tomorrow and do some hiking. We see a big rest area with a covered large picnic area and a toilet block so we decide to stop there for the night. It is busy with both cars and trucks but we find a spot and settle for the night. It is rather cold and as we are now in Mountain Standard Time, it gets dark even earlier !!!
A Mom and her teenage son stop by when they notice the car and the steering wheel on the wrong side ! They are Mexican, living in the States, but going back to Mexico for dental treatment as much cheaper there! The Mom is originally from a town not far from the border. She is very friendly and glad that we have visited her country.
December 19, 2022 – Guadalupe Mountains National Park
We leave after breakfast and go straight to the McKittrick trail head . The trail is initially at desert level then climbs into the mountains and forested slopes. We are too late to see the splendid autumn colours but nevertheless the scenery is great if somewhat desolate, with the bare trees and dominant greys.
We go as far as “the Notch”, around 7 miles (11km) round trip.
[click on the picture to open the gallery]
We drive back to the Visitor Centre to have the use of the WIFI but a few kms down the road, I realise that the National Park Pass ” America the Beautiful” that was hanging from the rear mirror is missing. It was very windy when we came back to the car after the hike and it must have flown off when we had the car doors open! We make a U-turn and go back to the car park and luckily the pass was there, still lying on the grounds where we had parked, phew ! We had only just bought the pass yesterday ($80 annual pass, well worth it but still, we did not want to have to buy another one !)
We get to the Visitor Centre and book tickets to go and see the Carlsbad Caverns National Park the next day. We look for accommodation but not much is available in Carlsbad town. We go back to the same Rest area where we spent last night, for a second night there !!
