BOSQUE DEL APACHE NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE.
Day 161 – We packed a lunch and headed out for the wildlife refuge at 9:30 a.m. It was partly cloudy and 44 degrees, a little breezy. It was only 5 minutes from the RV to the beginning of Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. We really like being that close. This refuge is a major stopover for migrating geese, ducks, and cranes. If we’d come here when we’d originally planned to, we’d have seen it all. But our side trips to the Grand Canyon, Zion, and Monument Valley put us here after most of these birds had left. We knew this would probably happen, and it was fine since we’d spent all that time in the Sacramento Valley seeing these birds at that major stopover. And the time spent at the places we drove to was some of the best in the trip thus far.
Bosque del Apache is quite large and one of the better refuges that we’ve visited. There are many hiking trails and the auto tour was excellent, a total of 15 miles of well-maintained roads along marshes, through desert country, by lovely cottonwood trees, and with plenty of viewing platforms to bring you closer to the wildlife. There were still some Snow Geese, lots of ducks and other geese, and many hawks, plus a couple of bald eagles.
Click any picture below to see a slideshow.
We spent several hours on the auto tour, then stopped for our lunch. Then finishing the driving tour, we drove south to the edge of the wildlife refuge to an overlook to get a general picture of the entire area.
Overlook, Bosque Del Apache NWR, San Antonio, NM
By this time it was so windy, it was shaking the car. 25 MPH winds with higher gusts, according to the weather forecast. We’d planned to leave tomorrow around noon; we looked to see what the wind conditions would be. Even higher. We won’t drive the RV when the gusts are that high, so we’ll either stay another day or two depending on the forecast, or leave early in the morning tomorrow to beat the wind.
The high today was 52 degrees. It’s almost 4 p.m. now & it’s extremely windy, dark clouds are rolling in. Changeable weather here. End of Week 23, Trip #3.