Cold, cold, cold was the night for camping. We had planned for 50+ degree weather overnight (perhaps a bit naively) but it definitely got into the upper 30s, and we shivered through the night…
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After what seemed like forever driving through Texas we make it to Guadalupe NP, which borders New Mexico - north and a bit East of El Paso. This park contains the highest point in Texas, Guadalupe Peak, at 8,751 feet above sea level. We are lowlanders from Alabama so we didn’t even think about climbing this one.
We found a camp site right off, which for a Friday we were told was pretty rare. First stop was the visitor’s center to get our sticker for the truck (priorities!) and see what there was to do in the park. But the first thing we both noticed is that they had really, really clean bathrooms. Either a great cleaning staff or they don’t get a lot of visitors, or both.
So what there is do in the park is hike. Lotsa hiking. We headed over to McKittrick Canyon and went, well, hiking. We hiked a mile and decided we’d seen enough and hiked back. It was mid-day sun so not very photogenic in that light. But I hear that in the fall this area is very pretty.
As the sun dropped in the sky, I hiked into the hills around our campground to take photos. I didn’t get the outstanding sunset I had hoped for but I also know it takes a few days away from the daily grind back home to get the other side of my brain working. Hoped it was going to kick in soon!
As the night settled in, I waited for darkness so i could shoot some stars and the Milky Way. But I started to get really cold so I got into the camper and tried to cuddle with Amy to warm up, but she’d have none of that (get your icy hands OFF me!) so I tried to get warm by shivering all night. If we could have built a fire that would have made all the difference, but we basically were on a paved parking lot, so no fires. And the diesel truck with the heat running idling 10 feet from my nearest neighbor wouldn’t have gone over too well. Soooo,.. it was cold.
Next day we were up with sun, had a bit of breakfast and packed up to get rolling. On to White Sands Natl. Monument in New Mexico.
And a hotel for the night!!!!!!