Posting from Fort Davis, Texas

It has been a few days since I posted — we have been staying at parks without internet access.

Tuesday, March 25

Yesterday we finally left Tucson. We spent a couple of hours at La Mesa RV while they worked on our coach leveling system. Eddie was feeling better, although far from 100%. The antibiotic was doing its work, but his allergies were still giving him a hard time. Interestingly, for the last few days there seemed to be a haze over Tucson and we saw on a local weather forecast that the pollen count was through the roof.

We left Tucson at about 2:30 and drove to an RV park halfway between Huachucha City and Tombstone. By the time we got there Eddie was breathing better. Today we drove the back roads from Sierra Vista to Columbus, New Mexico and Pancho Villa State Park.

Just after we crossed the border from Arizona to New Mexico we stopped in the very tiny town of Rodeo. Last year we had lunch at a café there, and we decided to stop again. A burrito at the café and a visit to the local art gallery were nice break from the open road and endless desert.

The campground, with electric and water, is set in a desert botanical garden and is a beautiful spot — except for all the dust. Everywhere dust! The sunset over the desert was beautiful!

New Mexico route 9, which we drove from the New Mexico/Arizona border to Columbus, runs very close to the Mexican border. We must have passed half a dozen border patrol cars along the route, and a three different places we passed outposts of some type that we presumed were manned by the infamous Minutemen "protecting" our border. The photo I took through the window of the RV is blurry, but you can see a tower, tent, and porta-pottys. The towers looked pretty high-tech — wonder who is bankrolling them?

Wednesday, March 26

A nice day of driving — but then it is easy for me to say as I "drive" the right seat. We continued along New Mexico 9, which run along the US/Mexican border, until just before El Paso, Texas. In El Paso we got back on Interstate-10 to get through the city limits. Once through El Paso we cut down to Texas route 20 for about thirty miles — the same route we took on the way out. When we turned onto 20 Eddie suggested we stop to share a burrito. He had an uncanny knack for picking places to stop for indigenous food — he can always spot a place that is local, busy, and serves excellent, and usually inexpensive food. Our medium sized burrito was delicious, and cost $.99 plus tax. Can't beat that!

This afternoon we arrived at Davis Mountain State Park in Fort Davis, Texas. The park is located in the southern reaches of the Rockies Mountains, and is at an elevation of 5,000 feet. It is sixteen miles south of the McDonald Observatory, an astronomical research facility of the University of Texas. We have stayed here twice before, once in our RV and last year we stayed at Indian Lodge, a beautiful, adobe WPA era hotel in the park.

The park is in a valley surrounded by mountain peaks. Tomorrow night I have to go "up" and take photos at sunset. Our plan is to stay here three nights, which means we will be here for Eddie's birthday on Friday. We are also planning to go to a Star Party at the observatory on Friday night, when telescopes are available for viewing.

As we were setting up camp site, we had company. These deer are very scruffy looking, and definitely look different than the deer at home on the east coast, but they are not the least bit skittish. After they walked away from our site, one of the deer practically walked up to an irish setter who was being walked.

Thursday, March 27

I am online at the Fort Davis Public Library. A small, but well stocked library in the town of Fort Davis, Texas. Eddie is also online, and has work to do, so as soon as I finsih posting I am going to take a walk in town, and visit the original Fort Davis fort! We've been here twice before, but I've never visited the fort. The next time I post I will add some photos of both the town and the fort.