After leaving Austin, we headed for the Guadalupe Mountains National Park. This beautiful park is located in northwestern Texas, along the border with New Mexico. It was a very long drive to our campsite, but it was worth it. We pitched our tent in the shadow of the Guadalupe Mountains. We made dinner, had a few beers, and went to sleep.
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| Sunset behind our tent |
The next day we made the short drive to Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico. This attraction was underground, unlike any of parks we have previously visited. We hopped into an elevator that took us 780 feet underground. The temperature in the cavern was about 55 degrees, which was much more pleasant than the 90 degree weather on the surface.
The main attraction at Carlsbad is the Big Room. The room is made up of natural limestone. The limestone make up forms of various sizes and shapes. The room its self is 4,000 feet long and almost 300 feet tall! It is the third largest chamber in North America. Unfortunately, it is easier to show you with photos rather than explain it in writing. I was able to take a ton of pictures of the cavern. As soon as we fix our computer problem, I'll post them here. (UPDATE- pictures are up at the end of the post!)
After Carlsbad, we started heading to our campground. Along the way we passed through Roswell. This town is famous because a UFO "allegedly" crashed here in the 1970s. Most of the town is decorated with alien imagery (even the KFC.) We didn't stop anywhere in Roswell, but the Alien Museum looked neat.
We continued to our campground, which was outside of Pecos, New Mexico. After traveling down a long, bumpy, road we arrived at Cow Creek Campground. There weren't any cows, but there was a nice creek. We set our tent up by the creek, and prepared for the next day.
-Marc
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| Just inside "The Big Room" |
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| Lion's Tail (or as the little girl next to us declared it- Giraffe Tail) |
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| The three biggest structures in the caverns |
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| This guy reminded us of Marc's drawings |
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| This guy is actually called "The Cave Man" |
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| Crystal Springs Dome- One of the few structures in the caverns that is still being formed- it was white and very shiny, and we watched water drip onto and off of it, helping to continue to form this. |
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| A better picture of "The Rock of Ages" |
