White Sands National Park

We had some high winds this weekend, so when the died Sunday morning, I decided to grab my camera and head to White Sands National Park to see if I could find some places without foot prints/tracks.

The park does not open until 7AM, which means the sun was already well above the horizon by the time I got back to the hiking area I wanted to explore.

I had the place to myself for the first 30 minutes or so - basically by the time I hit my turnaround point people started to come into view.

Cheers!

Marc

Guadalupe Mountains National Park

Once we got back from Three Rivers Petroglyph Site, I got ready for my backpacking/photo expedition to Guadalupe Mountains National Park - another solo backpacking trip for me. I got up stupid early to shoot some photos of the Milky Way, but since I didn't have my tracker, nothing turned out good - but it was still amazing to see the Milky Way in detail with the naked eye.

I moved on from the Salt Basin area to El Capitan, and shot photos from just off the highway of the Big Dipper circling overhead while waiting for the sun to illuminate El Capitan.

Once the sun came up, I drove to the Visitor Center/Ranger Station and waited for that to open at 8. I got my backcountry permit and headed up the Tejas Trail on my way to Bush Mountain. It was a bit more than 2000 in elevation gain (to 7500 feet total) on a very rough trail. Once I made the top of the ridge, I decided to cut the hike short (it would have been a loooonng trip out) and stayed at Pine Top. That turns out to have been a fantastic decision, since I had the park to myself (7 sites to choose from, no one else there) - and I got to witness a gorgeous sunset.

I slept great, but set my alarm for 4:30 to get some photos of the Milky Way with the Guadalupe Mountains to help frame it. It didn't turn out like I thought it would (weekend of a new moon - it was DARK!), but the Milky Way turned out pretty good for a single exposure. It is amazing what lack of light pollution can do for you!

I went back to my campsite - about a 5 minute walk from here, ate breakfast and packed up the campsite, then went back to this spot to photograph sunrise.

This is about a 180* panorama from where I was photographing. From there, I took a more scenic route back to the car. The section called The Bowl was delightful, I walked on dirt with not a lot of elevation change through trees suitable to hang a hammock from while playing hide and seek with the sun and a nice breeze - just about perfect. Once I dropped over the edge of the ridge, it was back into the desert and rough trail.

Cheers,

Marc

Three Rivers Petroglyphs

On our way home from the Trinity Site open house, we drove around the other side of the range to go see the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site, which is loaded with (literally) tens of thousands of these petroglyphs.

They were carved into the rock more than a thousand years ago - it kind of struck me like the rock/bell/whatever that high school seniors paint in the days/weeks before graduating, only on quite a massive scale. Whoever the Mogollon were, they were prolific graffiti artists!

Cheers,

Marc

Trinity Site

I took a trip to Chicago last week for a healthcare conference - it was 70*F when I left New Mexico, and it really felt like the 24*F in Chicago. That Sunday and Monday were COLD, and when it "warmed up" it snowed and rained on me. 

Not that I don't already appreciate the weather here, but it really made me miss the warmth and blue skies.

When I got back, we picked up the kids from school and made our way north to Socorro for the night, on our way to the Trinity Site open house. Along the way, we stopped at our favorite burger joint in the entire world - Sparky's!

It is loaded with kitsch - and this sign made out of license plates from Kentucky really tickled my fancy, given that that is where this chapter of our Army lives began.

It was another 2-3 hours from Sparky's to Socorro, which was really just a staging ground for the trip next morning into the Trinity Site - ground zero for the world's first atomic bomb.

Thankfully - we didn't suffer from Chicago weather!

Cheers!

Marc