Lake Valley National Back Country Scenic Byway

Catherine is far too indulging of my desire to get up early and go shoot photos! I got up at 4 am this morning to drive 90 minutes to this spot along the highway between Hatch and Deming that I spotted on our drive back from Hatch when I took the scenic way home after a lunch out with Dad and Pam.

It was a bit tricky to find in the dark, but I found it and had time to spare to find my composition and shoot my photos. Sunrise lasted maybe 30 minutes - it was dark on this rural stretch of highway (no trains) and cool, but oh so worth the early alarm and longish drive. I didn't think I'd have an amazing sunrise, but New Mexico does seem to have more than its fair share!

Once the pretty colors of the sunrise were done, I packed up and drove the couple of miles to the start of the Lake Valley National Back Country Scenic Byway - Hwy 27. I saw fewer than 10 other vehicles, and a couple of those were ranchers who lived on the road. It was vast, empty, and starkly beautiful.

The road ends in Hillsboro, a sleepy little village with no gas station. I drove on to the Gila National Forest driving up out of the grassy desert into the mountains. These are not as high as the Lincoln National Forest, so no aspens, but still very pretty. This road snakes its way through the mountains - and is just as winding on the west side as on the east side (shown below).

This would be a fantastic drive in a Mini Cooper or on a motorcycle, assuming the deer, elk, bears, and mountain lions weren't crossing the road.

It was a great day for a road trip! I scoped out a nice camp area that I will take the family to, should be fun.

Cheers,

Marc

White Sands sunset-moonrise

Dad and Pam came for a visit, timed with the full moon rise that we watched from White Sands National Park.

We got there in time to watch the sunset, unlike our previous attempt.

I really didn't change the color/saturation. You can see from the photo below that the sand really is white. What I love about this place is that the sand reflects the sunset/sunrise colors, turning a lovely golden color this night compared to the pinks and golds from a prior trip, and of course the bright whites in the middle of the day.

We picked up the kids from school, enjoyed a nice picnic dinner at White Sands, and then waited. It was cool and a bit windy, but a very nice night to watch the sun set over the mountains to the west, and then the moon rise over the mountains to the east.

Cheers,

Marc

Hatch Chile Festival

We made our way to Hatch, NM today to experience the Hatch Chile Festival. Hatch is just over an hour away along the Rio Grande.

We were told by several people to get the chile burger at Sparkys, that they have the best burgers in New Mexico. They were certainly the best burgers I've had in a long while - Sparkys should be on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives!

Since the line was forming outside of Sparkys when we passed at 11:00, we decided to wait in line, which turned out to be a great choice. The line was easily twice as long when we left as when we arrived.

We then took a stroll through the rest of town and admired the sights and smells - roasting chiles is a distinctive smell, and kind of cool to see how they do it with the large drum roasters.

After a fairly local couple of weeks, it was nice to get out and sample some more of New Mexico.

Cheers,

Marc

Little Hike, Day-Date

We had some rain yesterday, so I decided I wanted to go see Fillmore falls at Dripping Springs, after dropping the kids off at school and Catherine said she would come with me. Unfortunately, I forgot the sunscreen so we couldn't spend the 2-3 hours out in the full sun. We changed plans and hiked up towards Dripping Springs, but since we took a ton of (iPhone) photos along the way up and down, didn't quite make it. It was still a very nice hike. 

I could watch the clouds and atmospherics here all day!

Afterwards, we drove into Las Cruces for brunch (I also forgot to eat breakfast), which turned out to be a great meal. All in all, today was a pretty good day-date.

Cheers,

Marc

Another colorful sunset

The number of colorful sunsets and sunrises since we have been here is crazy. I don't know that I've seen so many beautiful sunsets in one place! These are the clouds looking to the west/northwest.

And then pulled back a bit and looking more towards the horizon - the Organ Mountains in our back yard.

It was raining, and to the east was a rainbow...we had a rainbow over these mountains this morning, too.

Cheers,

Marc