Tuesday, January 27, 2009

City of Rocks State Park, New Mexico

Travel across Texas was sunny but chilly. Night temps went down to near freezing but day time highs got close to 16C The elevations across west Texas are between 4500 and 5300' high so you can see why the temperatures in January can get quite low at night - but the stars are spectacular because of no light pollution from cities. One of the RV parks we stayed in had very iffy power - our toaster could barely dry the bread out even after several minutes. One should be very careful in these kind of parks - sophistacated power systems in modern RVs can be vulnerable to to these fluctuations. But - wonder of wonders! - they had good wifi!!
As we passed through El Paso, Texas, we stopped to refuel (diesel prices are much better than when we began our trip - now at $2.15/gal), get propane, and get a good wash for the RV and Jetta at a truck wash. Two years ago we stopped at City of Rocks State Park in New Mexico, about 25 miles north of Deming. It is such an interesting place that we returned on this trip. The area is high desert with flat land, lots of cacti and mountains in the distance. Many thousands of years ago a nearby volcano spewed rocks out that landed in a one mile area. Many are piled on each other, balanced and hanging, etc. There are areas between that make it look, on the whole, like a city with buildings and streets. Really neat to climb on and around. Campsites are nestled in and around the rocks. When we were out exploring, the ranger showed us a cross high on one rock made by the Spanish Jesuit priests who came here in the 1500s to explore. Likely they held a chapel service here and put the cross there to signify a holy place. He also showed us hidden Indian petroglyphs.

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