Guadalupe Mountains

The Guadalupe Mountains are a mountain range in south east New Mexico and west Texas, south west of the city of Carlsbad, New Mexico.  The mountain range is bookended by Carlsbad Cavern National Park at its northern end and Guadalupe Mountain National Park at its southern end.

We stayed on federal land near Carlsbad Cavern in New Mexico and visited both parks from there.

Caves like Carlsbad Caverns and Lehman Caves are dissolved out of limestone (calcium carbonate) by acidic water seeping through cracks.  The limestone is the result of millions of years of sea creatures dying and accumulating at the bottom of the sea.  This area was underwaterThis area was underwater from about 100 million years ago to about 66 million years ago.

Limestone cliffs near Carlsbad Caverns

As with the pistachios, we discovered that we were there at the wrong time of year for the bats.  They are there only in the summer.  We need to come back when its warmer.

Amphitheater seating to watch bats emerge from Carlsbad Caverns

The natural entrance of the cave leads to a 1000 ft descent to the big room.  That is about the elevation of the Empire State Building.  There is an elevator if you don't want to climb back up.

The natural cave entrance

The winding path leading down to the Big Room

The big room is impressive for its sheer size.  There are so many formations that they all blend together, but the overall experience is very impressive.

Limestone formations

Cave draperies

The Big Room

A reflecting pool

The Big Room

The little plateaus show a sustained water level at some point in the past 

Map of Carlsbad Caverns

The next day we crossed the border to Texas to see the Guadalupe Mountains National Park.

Crossing the New Mexico/Texas state line

El Capitan dominates the skyline at the southern end of the Guadalupe Mountains 

El Capitan

We took a hike through the foothills of the Guadalupe Mountains to two major water sources in the area, Smith Springs and Manzanita Springs.  It is an amazing place to spend a morning walking.

Manzanita Spring with El Capitan on the horizon

Smith Spring

We headed out to the south toward Big Bend National Park.

Miles and miles of Texas (look up the song)

Alamogordo

While in Alamogordo we visited McGinn's Pistachio Farm, White Sands National Park, tried to visit the Trinity site in White Sands Missile Range and had our broken leaf spring replaced.

McGinn's pistachio farm added the giant pistachio and a short tour to add another revenue stream.  There is also a shop that sells pistachios and ice cream.

The worlds biggest pistachio.

Our tour bus

The tour consisted of a lap around the orchard but the guide was very knowledgeable and we learned a lot about pistachios.

We need to go back in July to hear the popping of the shells.  When pistachios get ripe the shells pop open.  During a two week period there is a near constant chorus of pistachio shells popping.

Pistachio trees

White Sands is a dune of gypsum crystals that washed down from the surrounding mountains.

Gypsum sand dunes

Gypsum sand dunes and the mountains the gypsum came from.

Dune sledding

We tried to visit the Trinity site, where the first atomic bomb was tested, but we were stopped by a locked gate.  We found out later that there is just one day a year when the gate is unlocked and you can visit.  The rest of the year it is the impact zone for live fire exercises for the military.  We'll have to get back there on the third Saturday in October.

We had to extend our stay in Alamogordo to get a leaf spring replaced.  See this post for more info.

We took highway 82 to leave Alamogordo.  The highway climbs to the town of Cloudcroft at 8,800 ft in the .  There was snow on the ground and people riding inner tubes.

Snow near Cloudcroft

We left the mountains and descended back to the desert and headed south east toward Carlsbad.

Heading east into the desert

Broken Leaf Spring

When we left City of Rocks I thought the wheels were sitting low on the passenger side but we were on a an uneven dirt road and I attributed it to that.  Had I looked underneath I would have seen a broken leaf spring.  We drove to Hatch, down to Las Cruces and on to Alamogordo.  When we were leveling at our campsite in Alamogordo we could not fit the leveling blocks between the wheels and that is when we discovered the problem.

I was able to order a spring online and found a mobile RV tech who was willing to fit me into his schedule.  We had to stay an extra two nights in Alamogordo but other than that we got off pretty easy.

One of the fun parts of my job was to evaluate broken metal to try and figure out what happened.  In this case it appears that there were some surface defects on the longest leaf that allowed cracks to initiate and repeated cycling caused the cracks to slowly propagate through the spring.  The shiny parts radiating out from the defects are called beach marks and show the extent to which the cracks propagated.  When the cracks got about halfway through, the spring could no longer hold the load and the rest failed suddenly.    

The rear portion of the spring.

The forward portion of the spring, still part of the spring pack.

New leaf spring

JP arrives to install the new spring.

Ready to hit the road again.