Happy Trails with Mike & Ellen Taylor

We've spent the last week in Carlsbad and Silver City, New Mexico. In Carlsbad we visited the Desert Zoo and hiked to Sitting Bull Falls. It's at the head of a really neat little box canyon. The picture above is a view from the trail to the top of the falls that we hiked with the dogs. We're looking back down on the picnic grounds.

The next day we went to Carlsbad Caverns. We had both been there when we were younger with our parents on driving trips to California and were sort of "meh" about returning there. Were we ever wrong! It was incredible! We entered at the natural entrance and walked down and down and down and...you get the idea. The formations and the rooms were incredible and we couldn't remember seeing any of it before. Of course that was the day we didn't have a camera with us...d'oh!

The 300 mile drive from Carlsbad, back through El Paso to Silver City took us through the Guadalupe Mountains. Guadalupe Peak is the highest point in Texas but the most imposing peak is El Capitan which is almost as tall and hides Guadalupe Peak from the highway. If you check out our New Mexico web album at http://picasaweb.google.com/TxMike3/NewMexico# you'll see some pictures of it taken from the highway.

Silver City is in southwestern New Mexico near the Gila National Forest. It's a really pretty little town in the foothills of the mountains. We hiked to "the Big Tree" one day. It's the second largest Alligator Juniper in New Mexico...not a big deal but it was a nice 3 mile walk. Along the way we met up with a pack (or is it herd?) of javalina; fortunately Max and Gracie were on leashes so they didn't go chasing them into the woods. One really big boar stared at us for a long time before it finally moved on. We all did fine until near the end when we had a steep climb...I thought we might have to carry Ellen and/or Gracie the last half mile or so. We're just not used to 6,000+ feet of altitude.

Yesterday we took a drive into the Gila National Forest which took us across the Continental Divide at about 7,000 feet near the town of Pinos Altos. It was a beautiful drive and there was still quite a bit of snow on the north facing slopes. We were surprised and pleased to see such a beautiful forest (mostly Ponderosa Pines) just a few minutes from our desert KOA. We've missed "green!".

Today we drove from Silver City to Apache Junction, AZ, right outside Phoenix. The drive started out with bleak desert, then suddenly we were in mountains. Near the end of the 250 miles, we drove past huge copper and gold mines. Then we were held up on the highway for a while because there were crews blasting rock to widen the road. There were narrow canyons and many steep grades. When we finally got through that area, we pulled off in a rest area so Mike could take a break. And, boy, did our brakes smell! We got a few pictures with our little Canon, and will post those next time.

Looking forward to exploring the area around Phoenix tomorrow and Friday. See you on down the road.