Day 76 - (10/02) Santa Rosa, NM

This was another beautiful morning.  We took our time getting ready to hook up, then had a surprise.  The electric hitch stopped working.  Dick had to raise and lower the trailer with an emergency hand crank.  It worked, but it was a very slow process.

Space #63 - Elephant Butte State Park
(includes a covered picnic area and table)

We lost an hour to the Mountain Time Zone because we just realized it changed when we entered New Mexico.  Oh well, the clock seems less important when you're retired and having a good time.

It turns out that we're close to Albuquerque at the same time the International Balloon Fiesta is being held.  There was no plan, it just happened.  Our friends from CheckFree days (Carl and Vickie Eckert, Daniel and Jane Dillon) were there.  Though it would have been fun to try and connect with them, we decided to avoid the traffic.  Here's hoping they're having a great time.

The drive on NM-60 offered beautiful views of open range away from interstate traffic.  By 4:30pm we had climbed to 7,000 ft elevation.  The temperature dropped to 73 degrees instead of the 106 degrees we had experienced previously.

Unbelievable open landscape views along NM-60

NM-60 was a good, scenic, low traffic route

Trains add action to an otherwise desolate area
(you can see them coming for miles)

We stopped for the night at the Santa Rosa Campground.  It looks like an old KOA campground that had been revived.  It was OK.


We decided to leave the trailer attached to the car because of the broken hitch.  It seemed like a good idea until we decided to eat out.  We walked 1/2 mile to a McDonald's and arrived just after a bus-load of Texas Tech students.  The wait was long, but we got to talk with some of the students about their geology field trip.


A downpour hit just after we got back to the trailer.  It rained for hours.  The morning report said there was more than 3" of rain.  The bad news: you can hear every drop in an aluminum trailer.  The good news: it didn't start while we were at McDonald's.


Map Tracks
Start:  Elephant Butte State Campground - Elephant Butte, NM
North on I-25 to Bernardo, NM
East on NM-60 to Vaughn, NM
Northeast on NM-54 to Santa Rosa, NM
End: 248 miles @ Santa Rosa Campground - Santa Rosa, NM