Beautiful weather has come to southern NM...bright sunny days, cool breezes, and chilly nights. I am letting the dogs' coats grow out as the weather cools down.

Last week I drove to Phoenix (324 miles one way) to look at a couple of small travel trailers.  Came home with this one.  It is small and light and I can tow it with my V-8 Jeep.

I plan to take a test trip to Las Cruces (49 miles) the week after Thanksgiving to see what still needs to be added and to get some experience with set-up/break-down.  I am not anticipating any problems but you never know.

A group of park folks invited me to join them on an excursion to an eating place called Adobe Deli.  It's seriously out in the middle of nowhere and reminds me of a big Westerner or Pig Stand.  Food was good.

Last weekend Wyatt and Michelle came down.  I met them at Shakespeare, an old mining town near Lordsburg.  It was HOT but interesting.

Shakespeare

Mining Assay Office

Blacksmith's forge

Cowboys and horizontal hostesses

Next Chapters

I arrived at Hidden Valley Ranch RV Park in late July.  My RV was all set up, with electricity, water, etc. so it was easy to get settled.  I traded the big truck for a Jeep Grand Cherokee V-8 with a towing package.  Over the next few months, I am going to find a small travel trailer so I can take "vacations" from the park.

The heat for July/August/September has been merciless and we have had a (for here) lot of rain. With water standing in the roadside ditches and any little depression, we have....MOSQUITOES.  O joy...might as well be in Kansas.  On the other hand, the desert is green and beautiful.  Wild flowers and flowering cacti abound in every direction.

Datura (Jimson Weed)

Desert plants are very good at protecting themselves.  Jimson weed is everywhere and many varieties of cactus are all over the place.  

Wyatt, Michelle and Taylor came down a few weekends ago and we hiked out to where the petroglyphs are.

I went to Albuquerque last weekend to see Madison in her last race of the season.  She and a guy were neck-and-neck for the season championship in the Cruiser class.  Maddie WON!  She is a senior this year and will only race next year in the first part of the season.  She is planning to attend UTI-NASCAR so she will leave NM for NC in late summer.  Taylor is taking classes at a local juco and working part-time so she is busy, too,

Maddie in the number 76 bright red car.

Maddie being interviewed after the announcement she had won the 2014 championship, Cruiser class.

Maddie driving,Taylor at the passenger window, after having done a victory lap around the track.

While Kansas has poisonous snakes, they are not nearly as visible as they are here.  Half a dozen different rattlesnakes, including the Mohave Green (Mohave Green), are common in and around the park.  One of the long-time residents got a little too comfortable catching one to remove it and it struck him.  He had the pleasure of a couple of days in the hospital, anti-venom, and the possibility he would lose his hand or part of his hand.  Fortunately, no amputation required.  Don's index finger turned black but he didn't lose it.  Don is a pretty good amateur painter (he did the murals in the clubhouse) so he needs all his fingers.

I asked the vet about vaccinations (didn't know you could vaccinate against snakebite but you can).  He said the dogs are so small that if they take a strike with much venom, the vaccine won't be much help. He just recommended being very, very careful where I walk them.