Correction: the peak I thought was Guadelupe Peak is really El Capitan. I've updated the information in the post!
Monday morning we left from the WalMart parking lot, fueled up at Murphy USA - almost full... the Sams card cuts off after two uses (each to $100).
Not sure what we were expecting, but certainly we have gotten more than we anticipated on this trip! What beauty and grandeur!
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| Our "old fashioned" paper map. We started from over near the "El Paso Int'l" on the east side of El Paso, and have stopped just off the map to the north in Whites City, NM |
You see that "Guadelope Mtns. N.P." on the border there? Guadelupe Peak is the highest point in Texas, and... even though EVERYTHING is bigger in Texas, it is only 8749 feet. As Patti told her dad many years ago, it isn't that the peak is not so big, but rather that everything else in Texas is so big that it may *seem* not so big. (She may have come to Texas as an adult, but she seems to have Texas in her blood...)
About halfway across Hudspeth County on US Route 61/180, you see a picnic table on the map. We stopped at this picnic area to get some pictures of the beauty around us.
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| A panorama shot with Miss Doozie and The Jee-rage on the side. It may look like a lot of nothing... but it really is lovely! |
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| The Jee-rage and Miss Doozie |
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| Patti out to take some pictures with her phone, stopped to smile at her honey taking a picture of her! |
As we got further down the road, we could see El Capitan, which is near Guadelupe Peak.
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| If you look at the map, this is from the picnic area near Salt Flat. |
There were alkali flats along the way - flat white salt-looking areas (no pictures).
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| But then, there was an irrigated area growing green with some grassy crop, probably wheat. |
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| El Capitan was coming up ahead of us - this picture is through the windshield, that's what caused the darkness at the top and the things that might look like big birds in the sky are bug splatters on the windshield ;-) |
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| The weather reports are indicating strong winds for Tuesday afternoon through Wednesday. Signs along the road warned of strong winds. The windsock was showing that there were moderately strong winds as we drove through. |
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| It is nice to have an altimeter as we're climbing to see how high we're driving. We were at about 5250 ft at this point, eventually getting up to 5600+ at the highest pass. |
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| This is El Capitan from the north side - if you're following along with the map, this was the picnic area that is shown as if it is in the green area of the park, right along a very curvy section of road. |
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| God's beauty |
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| Miss Doozie forehead-to-forehead with El Capitan and Dwayne coming back from taking the beautiful pictures that are inluded this entry above. |
We're stopped for a couple of nights near Carlsbad Caverns. We were thinking we would visit the caverns while here, but looking on the website have found that the elevators into the caverns are out of service, necessitating a more strenuous tour if we decide to do it: "While the elevators are down, you may walk in/out the Natural Entrance, a steep 750 ft. descent/ascent." Oh well, there's probably other interesting things to do!
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