Holiday Festivities In Carlsbad New Mexico

(Carlsbad New Mexico) 42 degrees, chilly

We traveled with another volunteer (Judy) from White Sands to Carlsbad New Mexico last weekend.  It was a fun filled trip that we planned to experience some of the area attractions.  One of the highlights of the trip was a special candlelight Rock of Ages tour at Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  Twice a year the park turns off all lights in the Big Room and participants experience a popular tour from the 1930's.  Several park rangers reenacted key figures of the time such as a very colorful Superintendent and an early explorer.  At the end of the tour we extinguished all the lanterns and stood in the complete darkness as a ranger sang Rock of Ages.  Her voice echoed through the cave.  We were not allowed to take pictures but it will always be a wonderful memory. 

Afterwards, we drove into town and floated down the Pecos river in a pontoon boat navigated by Carlsbad Navy officer.  The Chamber of Commerce sponsors the Christmas on the Pecos event and homeowners along the river decorate their homes with lights and very creative displays.  It was lots of fun. 

We stayed at a hotel for the night and the next morning went back to Carlsbad Caverns.  We had made reservations for a ranger led tour called the Kings Palace.  If you plan to visit, be sure to make reservations for the cave tours in advance.  They almost always sell out in advance.  There are lots of choices but we decided to not take one that involved crawling and climbing ladders.  :)

It was a great tour of one of the magnificent caves. Our ranger explained the caves were formed by around 4 million years ago by sulfuric acid dissolving the limestone.  Over time the cave formations began to grow.  The caves were discovered by an 16 year old cowhand in the 1893.  He explored many of the caves by lantern and eventually a photograph from the New York Times spread the word and in 1923 Calvin Coolidge proclaimed it a monument. 

As you can probably tell, I've been experimenting with Picassa's new features.  Have you tried it yet?

One our way back we stopped at Guadalupe National Park.  This Texas park is just an hour away.  It features lots of trails and has a nice campground. 

We took the dogs for a walk on the nature trail.  There is a very nice visitors center and the ranger really tried to recruit us as volunteers. Anyone interested? 

We really enjoyed our visit.  I liked caving much more than expected.  Maybe we'll have to explore some more in the future. 

A new header has been added to our blog.  We have now started our second year as full timers.  Our theme is "Our Trip Around The Sun" and we are now starting a new rotation.  Life is good. 

Ranger Patrol Along The Fence Line Border Of White Sands

(White Sands National Monument) 41 degrees, rain, cloudy

Rain is a rare event where we are volunteering in New Mexico.  They only receive about 10 inches of rain a year and have 330 days of sunshine.  It is chilly today without the pretty blue skies and there is still snow on the ground.  The rain does help refresh everything and the folks around here really get excited about it. 

Last week I got to drive around the border of the National Monument with one of the rangers doing a fence check.  John helped arrange this for me.   It was an opportunity to see areas of the dunefield not accessible to the public.  The dunefield in the picture above are the fastest moving dunes.  They travel on average about 40 feet per year.  They are lower in size, very rounded,  and look so different.  The gypsum sand is moved by the high winds and the pull of gravity along the slip face or leading edge of the dune avalanches the sand. 

There have been lots of movies filmed out here.  Most recently a George Clooney film called Men Who Stare At Goats was filmed in this area.  There is an upcoming movie with Johnny Depp that will be filmed soon.  Unfortunately, we will be gone. 

This area borders along the Missile Range.  The space shuttle landed near here in the 1980's.  I could not take any pictures of the missile range but it is certainly a very unusual place. 

Walking the fence line

The purpose of this trip was to check the fence line around the border of the monument.  In 1969 New Mexico Fish and Game introduced 97 African Oryx to the missile range.  The purpose was to provide wild game hunting to the area.  Great in theory but the animals became a big threat to the monument when their populations soared to over 5000.  There are not any predators to this animal and it has really flourished. 

The monument eventually had to erect high fences to keep the oryx out and  1998 removed approximately 228 of them from the park.  This was done by  tranquilizing the oryx and removing them by helicopter.   The fence line is now diligently checked weekly to keep them out.  Despite these efforts there are always a few that manage to get in. There are now more oryx in New Mexico than where they originally came from in Africa. 

African Oryx

It was a great day.  If I had known how fun it is to be park ranger, I would have certainly pursed this career. 

Have you checked out the new addition to Picasa?  I downloaded the recent 3.9 addition from their website and it has some pretty cool new features.  My pictures today use a feature called deep shadow that makes your pictures appear to "float".  Can you tell the difference? 

I also used a fun one called Polaroid and Focal Zone for the picture above of the snowman.  Check it out!  I have used Picasa to manage my pictures for many years.  It is free and so easy to use.