Tucson, Arizona

As we rolled into town, Lois and I were looking forward to exploring this area as we had earmarked several places to visit. But no sooner did we finish dinner, disaster struck! Lois began tossing cookies, a LOT of them. She was like a desperate Girl Scout in spring pushing cookies as fast as she could — if you know what I mean 😱. As she switched back and forth between the bed and our tiny bathroom, I began my Florence Nightingale gig — clean-up the stinky dishes, buy Sprite, saltines and jello… etcetera, etcetera. it took all of 2 days for poor Lois to feel decent. With just one day left in Tucson, we finally ventured out and took a drive through Saguaro National Park.

This one excursion, whose original goal was to simply escape the confines of the RV and stare at cactus in the desert, led to amazingly beautiful scenes and vistas. For me, it takes extra effort to find beauty in the desert. At Saguaro National Park, we discovered it in abundance!

Click Images to Enlarge

Chiricahua National Monument

While binge watching Youtube videos, searching for places to visit in southern Arizona, I stumbled across this National Monument — not like anything we’ve ever seen. Tucked away at the top of a high range of snowy mountains, Chiricahua contains seas of “Hoodoo” rock formations, each one 4-5 stories tall.

One of the biggest questions on every visitor’s mind is “How the heck do you pronounce Chiricahua?” Is it:

(a) cheer-uh-caw-wuh
(b) kye-ree-ca-hoo-uh
(c) chai-rye-cow-wuh
(d) Nobody knows
(e) Who cares?

While many of you may have chosen (e), the correct answer is (a)… live and learn!

A new favorite destination for Lois and I

Las Cruces, New Mexico

This city was a huge happy surprise for both of us. Steeped in history, culture, art and excellent food, we had a thoroughly enjoyable visit. Places of interest included a walk through downtown Las Cruces where we spent time hunting down dozens of murals and decorated buildings. This area includes a hip, modern cafe with an eclectic selection of pizza, acai fruit bowls, and beverages — obviously a popular gathering hole for nearby New Mexico State students. It was so good, we kept coming back.

On a separate day, we ventured into the adjacent town of Old Mesilla, the original Spanish settlement which gave birth to Las Cruces. Of course, Mexican food was on the agenda. The evening stroll through the central plaza and by its Catholic Church was fantastic.

All in all, it was a great visit. We’ll be back!

A strong dust storm cancelled our planned visit to Carlsbad Caverns National Park… bummer! ☹️

Carlsbad Caverns National Park

Well, that was a bust! This out of the way destination contains the world famous caverns — miles of humungous caves with underground stalactites, stalagmites, occasional flying bats, and an elevator at the end of the walk to hoist you back to the visitor center. Sounds great… did not see it.

To begin with, getting here from Las Cruces, New Mexico was a bit bizarre. We dove south to El Paso, then drove half a day through West Texas — only to pop back into New Mexico at the very end where we stayed in the town of Carlsbad.

So what happened? Widespread sand storms killed the visit to the caverns (watch the video). In the region around us, there were multiple pile-ups on the highways. All we could do was hunker down until conditions improved. But by the time that happened, it was too late to go to the National Park… bummer!

The saving grace was we ate a lot of Mexican food and hispanic baked sweets in Carlsbad, including the best Mexican meal Lois has ever had! ❤️

The night sky, taken by me with my camera pointing straight up, randomly lying on top of our picnic table

Big Bend National Park

Yes, we did visit the nearby-ish National Park. But the real reason we came? The Marathon Motel and RV Park.

Huh?

One thing the tiny town of Marathon, TX has going for it is its night sky. In this remote part of West Texas, it is very, very dark. In fact so dark, it is at the top of astronomy’s Bortle scale, a 9-level system used to rate the darkness of the night sky. Believe it or not, in one corner of this quirky little motel/RV Park is an amateur astronomer’s dream — dozens of high powered telescopes, binoculars, and mini observatories. One night, we enjoyed a 2 hour session with a local expert. It was a full hands on experience as we took turns messing around with the equipment. Our guide helped us along the way. Highlights included seeing Jupiter and its moons, plus the famous Orion Nebula. A portion of the Milky Way was clearly present. We also saw shooting starts and multiple satellites, including several long trains of Starlink Wifi spacecraft streaming across the night sky.

Oh yah, we visited Big Bend National Park, a unique blend of desert, tall volcanic formed mountains, and the Rio Grand gorge. Enjoy the photos!