Big Mona On The Move

 I started the day with a one mile hike around the RV park.  We are basically literally just off the main road where 10 spots are used by short term campers and RVs  Further in there is a large section for tent camping  they even get grass. As I walked around I found a path that lead to a gate which went 3.7 miles up to the Carlsbad Caverns visitors center. I turned around because Dennis had no way of contacting me and I had no water. Circling around the tenting area I came upon a snake, maybe 8feet away. I’m pretty sure it was a Ridge nose rattler, but he didn’t rattle or react to me so I just kept going. The back section of this park looked like long term residents so I headed back home. Today we took off down the highway about 33 miles back into Texas. The Guadalupe Mountain National park is located there. The visitor’s center had a great display of animals and plants. (Sorry didn’t take pictures) I learned the Jack rabbit is 3x the size of normal rabbits. We walk...

 It was a short drive of 154 miles. Long straight roads. A lot of oil and water wells as well as power stations. Our camping spot is essentially a parking lot, but we are right at the entrance of Carlsbad Caverns National park. We drove the park road the first day. Then went in and visited the museum the next day and took a 9 mile scenic dirt road to see what the Walnut canyon was like. It’s like a desert. A lot of cactus and desert plants. There was a severe thunderstorm warning that evening but we mainly had wind and some rain.  Monday we hiked the caverns from the natural opening all the way in to the ‘Big Hall’ 2.5 miles almost 3.5 hours. I had to remind Dennis to duck in several places because it was dark and he couldn’t see the changes in heights.  It was a good hike! Dennis says I sprinted and he crawled.  Tonight we watched the Brazilian flat tail bats emerge from the caverns. Quite a spectacular sight. There was a full moon so we were able to see the bats as...