Week 3: Exploring the Guadalupe Mountain Range, Inside and Out

Things seem to be running a bit smoother around here these days. We aren’t yet a well-oiled machine by any means, but this week felt the most “put together” we have been.

In This Week’s Installment of Our Crisis’ …Not Much (Yay!)

The most significant crisis we dealt with is when our Starlink quit working. For those that are unaware, Starlink is a service that offers internet from satellites in space. We have a dish that we set outside of our van and get internet from anywhere in the country, even in the most rural areas. This has been great for us, relieving any concerns about having internet at the places we stay. However, this week, seemingly out of the blue, it would not connect to the internet. We contacted support and they suspected it was something wrong with the cable that connects the satellite to our router. They sent us a new one for free and refunded a month of our subscription, which is great! But they sent the new cable to our address… in Rosedale, Ohio. Not great. We will have Kendra’s parents ship it to a post office near our next location. Thankfully our cell service has been good enough that we can work using it and Kendra’s work-provided hotspot. Crisis averted.

Our Humble Campsite in New Mexico

This week we arrived in New Mexico, just across the border from Texas. We stayed at a small, free campsite (really just a parking lot for travelers like ourselves) minutes from Carlsbad Caverns National Park and Guadalupe Mountains National Park. Both parks are a part of the same mountain range that spans both Texas and New Mexico. This is where we explored this week.

When You Go to a Small Town “Natural Grocery Store”

On our 5 hour drive from Big Bend National Park, we stopped at a hole-in-the-wall local grocery store. We were pretty apprehensive as we pulled into the parking lot and saw that the building wasn’t in great shape and didn’t look like the kind of building you would expect to get groceries from, rather it looked like a large rundown home or an old restaurant. The grocery store exceeded our expectations though! They had all kinds of tasty, healthy options. And since delicious and nutritious is our M.O., we spent too much money here…

Kendra Eats the Scraps off of a Stranger’s Plate

We also stopped at a local cafe in town where we picked up lunch. After debating between a sandwich and a quesadilla, I decided on a sandwich, only to be disappointed in my selection once I saw Kendra’s quesadilla. But, as luck would have it, there was a group of guys eating quesadillas next to us, and one exclaimed that he had more than his fill despite a whole piece being left on his plate. Once the guys had left, I snuck over to their table and grabbed his leftover piece just as the waitress walked in the room. I asked if it would be alright for me to take the scraps. She didn’t mind. Moments later, I took a bite and was disappointed that it was steak. As I made my disappointment known to Kendra, she offered to trade a piece of her chicken quesadilla for my steak quesadilla. After making the trade, I asked if she remembered that it was some random person’s meal. She hadn’t. That is the story of how I tricked Kendra into eating someone’s scraps 😁.

Getting the Blog Launched!

Tuesday, we worked pretty well all day. I worked hard into the evening as I was dead set on getting the blog website launched that day. I was successful, but was quite tired from all of the hours of work.

A Very Windy Night

That night the winds really picked up. We were both laying in bed as the van was shaking back and forth. Because it was late at night and we were tired, things probably seemed worse than they were and our brains were not especially rational. We were both worried that things were going to be flying off of the van, namely, the solar panels. They did not. But the wind did give us trouble as we tried getting a good night’s rest.

Hiking Carlsbad Caverns National Park

The following day, the wind proceeded to worsen, escalating to 55 mph gusts. As we spent the day in the van working, we felt as though we were on a boat in the sea with all of the rocking back and forth. We braved the wind later in the evening and drove to Carlsbad Caverns National Park, where we hiked down into the cave. We were both amazed at the beauty we experienced there. It is incredible the formations that were created in such an inconspicuous mountain. Each stalactite and stalagmite built one drop of water at a time. There were many “rooms” full of all kinds of unique formations. We took the Natural Entrance Trail into the cave, which took us 750 feet underground. The trail lead us to the most popular attraction in the park, the Big Room Trail. This hike was the highlight of our trip thus far.

Our First (Real) Shower

On Wednesday, we realized we were running low on water and electricity. We had experienced several cloudy days in a row, so we were not getting the energy that we needed. We decided to book a night at a state park nearby that had full hookups. We were pleasantly surprised when we realized that they also had showers! It felt like quite the luxury as we took our good ol’ time in the abundance of hot water.

Back to Texas We Go… and then Back to New Mexico

Thursday we decided to do a hike in Guadalupe Mountains National Park. The entrance was about 30 minutes south of our campground, landing us back in Texas. We hiked a 2.5 mile scenic trail called the Smith Spring Trail. After the hike, we returned to our campground in New Mexico.

Don’t Shop While You are Hungry, They Say

The next evening we decided to make a trip into town to pick up some groceries and dinner. We waited to make this trip until we were very hungry, so of course, everything was looking good in the grocery store. We ended up buying way more than we should have. Normally that is not such a bad thing, but when you are living in a tiny space with a miniature fridge, it makes a big difference how much groceries you bring home. We managed to squeeze everything in the fridge using all that we learned from Tetris. From here we chose a local Mexican food truck and each ordered a “mega burrito” (they were not especially “mega”). As we looked for restaurants it seemed that about 90% of the options in the town were Mexican, so I guess that tells you something about this area of the country. We enjoyed the burritos that night while watching a movie in the van.

Full Day of Adventure

Saturday was our day to really explore the Guadalupe Mountains National Park. We started off by hiking a trail called the Devil’s Hall where we hiked over rocks and through a dry river to get to the end of the 4-mile out-and-back trail. At the end of the trail was a beautiful “break” in the mountain that felt like a large hallway (hence the name). The layered rock that made up the mountain was clearly visible. We then took a break to eat lunch and watch the Columbus Crew game (Go Crew!). We finished off the day with the short McKittrick Canton Nature Trail and a small ranch museum called the Frijole Ranch.

A Few Things About Guadalupe Mountain National Park

Guadalupe Mountain National Park is not an exceptionally popular park in relation to other national parks. It ranked at 52 out of 63 parks in terms of annual visitors in 2023, according to More Than Just Parks. I can understand why that is. It does not have the wow factor that some other parks have. Don’t get me wrong, it is beautiful! But what makes the park unique is that it is the world’s largest exposed Permian fossil reef, meaning scientists believe that the park was once underwater. They believe this because there are all kinds of fossils from marine life on the mountains. The mountain range includes the highest point in Texas, so it is kind of wild to think about it being underwater and having marine life thriving in the area. While the views of the park don’t necessarily blow you away, it is an area that I found to be fascinating to learn about. Maybe that is just the huge nerd in me 🤓. If you want to nerd out with me, you can learn more from the National Park Service.

On to White Sands National Park

Next stop is White Sands National Park, about 3 hours northwest of the Guadalupe Mountains.