Monday - An oasis in the desert.....
Bottomless Lakes State Park. This is our second visit to this unusual and very attractive park. Last time we explored the many lakes and the interesting geology of the park, this time, we just wanted to relax.
Arriving in the early afternoon we had our choice of camp sites as there were few occupants. The spaces here are fairly large, and we picked an end one with a nice view of the lake. We were definitely ready for a bit of cooling off by the time we got camp set up, so suited up and took Shiner and her favorite orange ball over to the lake.
We've made several attempts at tempting her to swim with no success, but this turned out to be the magic day. It didn't take too much effort to get her swimming way out in the lake to retrieve her ball.
While Steve tossed the ball for her I picked up some of the trash that had collected in the water around the lake. This park seriously needs some volunteers to give it a little TLC - the result of budget cuts I would guess.
We paddled around in the slightly salty mineral water to our hearts' content, then went back to the rig to relax. Over cold drinks we admired the huge, billowy thunderheads that the southwest is famous for building in the distance, and they were rapidly moving in our direction. They're very picturesque, but sometimes deliver more than scenery.
We had been hoping for a cooling sprinkle, but here's where Mother Nature's sense of humor comes in. Within minutes lightning flashed a little too close for comfort, and we headed indoors. Thunder pounded, the floor of the trailer acting like a giant drum and vibrating under our feet, waves of rain slammed against the sides of our little house on wheels.
Peering out the windows it looked like we were in the middle of a desert sandstorm, as gusts of wind drove the rain sideways in great smokey puffs. The billowing rain completely obscured the building that houses the concession stand at the lake, and made for a very dull sunset!
We
are in the desert here, but it's not sand blowing, just water. . .water water everywhere, running in deep rivulets around our camp site sand down the road, turning the entire campground into a lake of mud. Along with all that water the temperature dropped 20 degrees, so I guess we did get our wish.
Welcome to the monsoon season in the southwest. This is totally
not
what people think of when you mention weather in the southwest.... and
that's where we are, in the
Sonoran Desert, near
Roswell, New Mexico. (See the
post from our last visit for more about
the campground.) For those who think it never rains in the desert a
visit to the Sonoran Desert in monsoon season will definitely change
your way of thinking.
We felt for the family with a couple of little boys that just moved in,
with a tent. Steve checked on them when the worst of the storm had passed and the tent stayed up. They had been tucked safely in their car so weren't too wet.
After our swim we were all tired and slept quite well in spite of the thunder and lightening that continued throughout the night. When morning came we packed up all the wet chairs, washed the 5 pounds of mud out of the door mat, and headed down the road, toward Roswell.
The lightening storm would have been a great setting for an alien visitation,
but none appeared. It seems we are here in time to celebrate the 65th
anniversary of the famous Roswell event (
see the Fox news article). As it is, when we drove through Roswell we noticed several businesses that had been open during our last trip are now shuttered and there are "for rent" signs everywhere. It's hard to keep the public's enthusiasm alive for an event that happened 65 years ago. I'll bet the residents are wishing those little alien guys would visit again!
We have two goals for this leg of the trip. Drive no more than 250 miles a day, and keep as cool as possible. The latter is the hardest to accomplish as the entire country seems to be having good dose of summer weather. We did find a comfortable little place to hide Tuesday night, in an historic area of New Mexico.
Just west of Socorro, NM,
Datil Well is a nice little campground up in the mountains a little over 4,000 feet, along the Magdalena Stock Driveway originally established by the Spanish as a cattle route, with wells every ten miles along the road.
The well here is still producing, now supplying the campground water. We had the campground pretty much to ourselves, so Shiner enjoyed romping in the junipers and sagebrush.
The scenery was so relaxing and the weather so mild that we were tempted to stay another night, but decided we'd better not.
Wednesday, we had an "interesting" drive over highway 60, the snakiest
highway I have seen in a long time, through Salt River Canyon.
The drive offered some dramatic views of the deeply cut gorge, Salt River, and the cliffs beyond.
Another noticeable feature of the drive was the multiple switchbacks that offered a good view of much of the road we'd just traveled.
It's also a steep grade, both up and down. Probably not a route we'd choose to take westbound again if we had another choice.
Just east of Superior, a copper mining town, we stopped at Oak Flats campground for lunch. Deciding the primitive campground in a hot little basin wasn't a great place to camp for the night, and since it was still early, we set out for the Elks Lodge in Tempe.
We were making good progress down Hwy. 60 until traffic stopped at Florence Junction for an auto fire. A concrete pumping truck had caught fire, the whole front end and bottom were engulfed and made a huge black-smoke fire.
The firemen working the blaze didn't seem the least bit concerned about the traffic stacking up, as they stood around and discussed the situation at length before they got around to opening up the road. Two hours later, after waiting in 110 degrees on an overpass, we were on our way again.
4:06 PM Tempe, Arizona Elks Lodge. 111 degrees. ugh. 'Guess those reflective window shields I made will come in handy tonight.
