New Mexico

We went through Carlsbad, NM without stopping at the National Park.......already saw enough bats!  We drove through a town called Artesia and the temperature was 85 degrees but low humidity.  Most of the drive so far (175 miles) was flat and and dry with  a lot more oil well donkey pumps. 

Less than one hour from Artesia when we got close to Cloud Croft, we drove into sleet and cars coming from the West had snow on them!  As we continued through the mountains there was snow everywhere and the temperature had dropped to 34 degrees!  What a difference from 85 degrees an hour before!  As we descended out of the mountains the snow became rain and we reached our destination, Holloman Air Force Base where we are staying at the FamCamp.  No trees around us but the mountains in the distance are beautiful but the as Bill says "the wind is winding" and the temperature down here is going to be in the low 40's...brrrr.....

                                                       This is across from our campsite

White Sands National Monument is 7 miles west of Holloman AFB so we went there for the sunset tour Friday night.  It was windy and cold but beautiful sights.  It is amazing what patterns the wind can make on this gypsum sand.  We were able to take TY with us and he loved it, wanting to just run freely but we couldn't let him off the leash (Lucky would not have liked  it so he slept in the car).  The sunset was pretty over the San Andros Mountains.

                                                

We went back to White Sands the next day and did a partial hike in the dunes.  The park allows sand boarding down the dunes which quite a few children were doing.   TYwas pooped when we were done hiking.  The pictures do not do this park justice, it was such an amazing place to see.

Later in the day we went to Oliver Lee State Park about 20 miles away for a short hike and to see the sunset.  We almost camped here before deciding to stay at Holloman AFB; I wish we had as they had an awesome view of the valley and it was located right next to the mountain and very quiet.  The hike there was 6 miles and took 8 hours according to the map; obviously we did not do that hike!  I even spotted a Kit Fox checking us out the trail.     We went back to camp and the next day left for Percha Dam, north of Las Cruces, NM.