TRAVEL DAY
From: Bottomless Lakes State Pk., Roswell, NM – Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge.
To: Chupadero Mountain View RV Pk., San Antonio, NM – Bosque del Apache NWR.
Day 77 – We are behind with our blog posts; we are fine, just slow, LOL. Today is Dec. 30 and we’re just getting to Monday’s post. Got busy – sorry!
Back to Monday, we got up early, to an alarm – a horrific way to start the day when you’re retired! We needed to get on the road as early as possible since our travels today were going to take us through mountain passes with predicted high wind gusts beginning mid-morning.
When we got up it was still dark out (another shock to the system, ho ho) and 34 degrees with no wind. We departed after dumping tanks at 8:15 a.m. There was no dump station at our campground, but since we were within the State Park, we were allowed to dump at the main campground at Lea Lake. It was sunny & clear out, still with no wind. We headed west on US 380, stopping in Roswell for gas in the RV.
We could see the first mountain range in the distance. As we got closer, the wind gusts started, so far not too bad. The rest of the drive was driving through one mountain pass, then a valley, and repeat, until we approached lower elevations around the northern part of the White Sands Missile Range. While in and out of the mountains, the wind gusts got a little scary, so since there was almost no traffic whatsoever, we slowed way down below the speed limit, and when we did have a vehicle come up behind us, we pulled over and let them pass. This process made it much safer, and the RV handled just fine. If traffic had been heavy, we couldn’t have slowed down that way.
The scenery was beautiful. We went through several small towns, each a little quirky in their own way. The higher mountain ranges far north of us had some snow on their peaks. There was an area we went through called Valley of Fires where the sand & scrub land were covered with lava from a long-ago volcanic eruption. The wind was at its highest at that time, so we just scurried along trying to get beyond the pass. Once we reached the tiny town of San Antonio, NM, we were again in mostly-flat, desert farmland. There were mountains and hills in the distance. It was dusty and dry; the wind not as intense but still blowing. We turned south on Route 1, a small two-lane highway and headed to our destination.
We arrived at Chupadero Mountain View RV Park at 12:05 p.m. It was 53 degrees, cloudy & windy. We’d called ahead to make sure they could fit us in. There is a fantastic wildlife refuge about 10 minutes from here – Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. The closest town is San Antonio, NM, a very small town, and even though there’s not much here, there are two RV Parks close to the Refuge. This is a very popular wildlife refuge, one of the best, and the Snow Geese and Sandhill Cranes winter here. Since it was still considered to be a holiday weekend, between Christmas and New Year’s Day, the Refuge was very busy and we were lucky to get a campsite for one week.
Chupadero Mountain View RV Park is a private park; the closest State Park is about an hour away. Both this Park and the neighboring Birdwatcher’s Paradise RV Park are small campgrounds that cater to RV’s, trailers, vans and campers. They are located within farm fields. We stayed at Chupadero the first time we were here in 2018. At that time, the owner was just turning a small part of his farmland into an RV Park because the people that owned Birdwatcher’s Paradise were retiring and someone needed to fill that gap. There are only 10 campsites, most with full hook-ups, and all are surrounded by corn and wheat fields. The owner throws corn out into the fields daily and Sandhill Cranes fly in – talk about up close & personal! This is not a fancy campground, there are no individual picnic tables, no playgrounds, no fancy amenities, but we really like it. (Since 2018 Birdwatcher’s Paradise has reopened; in case anyone reading this wants to come here, that campground is also small, minimal amenities, and in between fields – take your pick. It’s all about the birds here.)
Once we had settled in and had lunch, we headed to the wildlife refuge. We were shocked to see that, even on a Monday, there was a line of cars waiting to get in. That has never happened before at any refuge we’ve visited. They charge $5 per carload (not per person) to get in; we have a Federal Senior Pass card, so entry was free (which after all the visits we’ll be making, saves a bunch of money). It was a beautiful day and we saw plenty. It’s a large Refuge. We drove the northern portion. The pictures from “Bosque del Apache #1” follow.
