No visit to the Carlsbad area is complete without a visit to Roswell, home of the most famous UFO crash site. So one fine day, we mounted the motorcycle and rode north to see the aliens! It was election day, so somehow that seemed appropriate …..

Roswell is also home to the international UFO museum. The museum described the events of the 1947 incident in great detail through first person accounts and affidavits. Allegedly, all of the physical evidence was taken by the military (soon after, Area 51 was formed) and eyewitnesses were threatened to stay silent about what they had witnessed. The eyewitnesses seemed pretty credible to me! The truth is out there …..

The museum isn’t very large — essentially just one big room. It only took us about an hour to peruse the exhibits and take a few alien pics. After fortifying ourselves with a hot beverage and snack at the local Stellar Coffee, we continued on our motorcycle loop.

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Our ride took us from desert floor upward into the nearby mountains. As we increased elevation, we entered pine forests and passed small lakes. We even saw snow, melting along the hillsides. We soon arrived at the town of Ruidoso, home to several casinos. We popped into one, just for fun. I tossed $20 into a couple of slot machines and won a quick $1.50. Woo-hoo, winner winner chicken dinner!! However, on the whole, casinos just aren’t that much fun in these COVID days. With many restrictions and social distancing, it just isn’t the same experience.

Back on the bike, we headed down the mountain almost reaching the town of Alamagordo, then turned left, back up the mountain to the tiny hamlet of Cloudcroft. Perched at 8700 feet, it was 20 degrees cooler here than at the desert valley floor. We stopped at a small local pub and tucked into a tasty burger and beer, while perusing the unusual wallpaper. (The pub’s TV channel was tuned to early election results — couldn’t get entirely away from it!)

After our late lunch, we climbed aboard for the nearly 2 hour ride back to our campground, arriving just as the sun set. It was quite an epic ride for us, about 270 miles. But it was an absolutely beautiful journey through desert, mountains, forest …. and aliens!

Carlsbad Caverns National Park has been on our bucket list right from the beginning of our RV adventure. We wanted to hit it on our first loop West, but it was just too far out of our way. So, we routed specifically there as we head out West for the second time.

Carlsbad Caverns did not disappoint. We visited Mammoth Cave National Park last year, and loved it. But, Carlsbad was even more impressive. Mammoth Cave is a huge interconnected network of enormous caverns, with a limited area of cave formations. Carlsbad offers the largest underground chamber in North America, and it is literally covered with formations — stalactites, stalagmites, columns, draperies, soda straws, popcorn, etc.

In this COVID time, there were no guided ranger tours offered, but we were able to do a self-guided tour. We waited a bit at the entrance — groups were spaced to allow for better social distancing. After hearing the customary ranger talk (no touching the formations, etc), we walked down and down through a dozen switchbacks into the gaping mouth of the natural cave entrance.

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The paved path led us steadily downward as the light from the entrance slowly dwindled to blackness. Our eyes soon adjusted to the dim artificial lighting. After about a mile or so of walking (mostly down), we entered the famed Big Room. Photos really cannot do justice to the scale and beauty of the formations therein. The path snaked around the perimeter of the enormous chamber as we walked, agape. Our minds constructed fairy villages, huge chandeliers, and frozen waterfalls from the crystal-rock. We saw what appeared to be bottomless pits, one with an old abandoned ladder snaking down it. No, thank you! I wouldn’t make a good spelunker, the dark crevices are way too creepy!

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We estimated that we walked over 3 miles in the cavern. Finally, the one-way path led us to the elevator that would take us back up to the Visitor’s center at the surface. We had descended 750 feet from the surface!

In non-COVID times, the elevator area also hosted a gift shop and snack bar. All closed. It would have been really cool to hang out down there, while enjoying lunch. But, back up we went, to the surface and reality. We didn’t hike here, but we did do the Walnut Canyon Desert drive. The one-way, single lane gravel drive was a bit rough in spots, but very scenic. I’m just sorry that we couldn’t take a ranger led tour. Our Mammoth Cave experience was greatly enriched by our ranger tours and I’m sure it would have been the same here. Perhaps on a future visit …..

So, Carlsbad Caverns has now made it to my (personal, biased) list of top 5 favorite National Parks. (OK, I know you’ll ask. In no particular order: Great Smokies NP, Glacier NP, Yellowstone NP, Sequoia NP, and now Carlsbad Caverns NP)

I’m so glad we finally got here.

After our cold and wet stay in Hot Springs, we were ready to high-tail it south to warmer weather! Our next planned campground was near Carlsbad, NM — about 800 miles away. Since we try never to exceed 400 miles travel distance in any one day, this required an overnight stopover on the road. As mentioned previously, our preferred option is overnight parking at a rest area, because of the convenience factor.

Our I-30 route across Texas didn’t offer many rest stop options. Most are older/smaller rest stops, with few truck parking spaces. Where there is truck parking, most are the “parallel” parking type, which can be problematic for us. We spied one new rest stop, with ample parking, about half way along our route. Perfect! We headed that way, only to find it blocked by road construction. Oops! The remaining rest stops along our way weren’t really a good option. It was too late (after 5 pm) to book a campground for the night. We had already traveled over 400 miles and were tired. We hadn’t really planned an alternative — but we needed to come up with one in fairly short order!

Allstays app to the rescue! Using the app, I spotted a Walmart about 12 miles up, just off the highway. Those of you that are RV-ers know that Walmart overnight parking is a Thing. Walmart typically allows overnight RV parking, unless specifically prohibited by local ordinance. We’ve stayed at Walmarts before, but have found them to be difficult to maneuver due to crowded parking lots, abrupt pavement transitions (scraping bottom of bus) and low-hanging tree branches (scraping top of bus). So, Walmart isn’t typically on our radar for overnight parking. Still, needs must, so we gave it a shot.

Although the parking lot wasn’t especially large, we found a good spot on the edge. We asked, and received, permission to stay — so it was a go! Our stay gave us an opportunity to pick up a few things, to boot.

The next morning, Jeff discovered he had left an attachment to his Viair portable air compressor back at the last campsite. Major bummer. Normally, he checks the air pressure in all of our tires at the beginning of every travel day. But, no problem, we were at a Walmart! He was able to find something that worked and readied our tires for travel.

So it all worked out. We found a quiet and safe place to stay. We ended needing some things — and Walmart had them. We may just have to put Walmart back on our list of potential parking spots!