Getting to New Mexico.

07/15/2011
Left home around 6:30 a.m. and headed towards Santa Anna for a short visit with Keith's parents. Got there around 9:30 a.m.



Paul was busy building breakfast for us. We had eggs, bacon, sausage, french toast, and actually some decent Dunkin Donuts coffee. We ate and checked out their new home. By the time we left at 10:30 a.m. it was 100 degrees on the front porch.


We headed up towards Lubbock and filled up with fuel in Sweetwater. We also started thinking about our destination today and decided we'd try to make it to Santa Fe instead of Tucumcari. When we got to Fort Sumner I called Ronda to she if she could find us a campground in Santa Fe. Our new found travel advisor (Ronda) suggested we stay in Vaughn instead of going to Santa Fe because it would take us out of our way. So that's what we did.


We had our first official setup in this rinky dink RV park (9 spots) and Pancho didn't complain at all. We decided to cook hot dogs on the RVQ. We found some chili at the convenience store but they didn't have any can openers (we didn't buy one before we left). So we ate naked hot dogs, but they were good. Keith likes them with ketchup and mustard. Yukkkk. :(


The door latch on the camper had been a real pain since I got it. Previous owner put in a new one, but it didn't appear to be working right. After taking it apart we found a spring was not set in the right place, so it works great now.


Met a nice couple from San Antonio that left out of there this morning. They're two slots over.


BAD NEWS: Before we left, Ronda took pictures of us and I also took pictures of Paul and Tammy at their house. For some reason Ronda's camera would take the pictures but would not store them onto the memory card. Good thing she made me take a spare memory card because that one works and is plenty big enough. So no pictures to post today.


We drove 583 miles today! A good head start. On to Durango in the morning.

Getting to Colorado

Last night around midnite the carbon monoxide detector went off and woke us both up. That was rude. Don't know why it did that but at least it only did it once. A little later I woke up and noticed the A/C was barely blowing any air. We figured the unit had frozen up, so we ran it on "fan only" and before too long we started getting some air flow. When I woke up around 4 a.m. I set it to low cool. Worked fine after that. It got down to 60 something in Vaughn so it was a comfortable night.
We made up some oatmeal, took our showers, organized stuff between the truck and camper then left around 9:45 a.m. mountain time. Yep, we changed out watches. Fueled up and headed out toward Albuqurque(sp?)
We finally got to Colorado after 921 miles.

Got to the Junction Creek Campground outside of Durango withou too much trouble.  Here's Keith as we're getting ready to grill some fish we got from Dwight.  It was great.  Also had some of the venison sausage Margarito and I made earlier this year.

Headed back into Durango to find a WIFI connection then I couldn't connect my laptop.  Don't know what was wrong.  I handed it to Keith, he hit the Internet Explorer icon and it just came right up.  Go figure.  Anyway, it's getting late and we're heading back to the campground.  A bear was spotted getting into a dumpster a couple of months ago, otherwise the raccoons are the biggest problem.  Good night.

Hwy. 371, south of Farmington is very rough. Won't come this way again. Little traffic, but it's obvious why. Lots of alfalfa fields.

Left Vaughn, NM at 9:45 a.m. No WiFi. Headed to Durango, CO.

On hwy 84 north of Lubbock. Lots of dust devils 100's of feet tall.

Just leaving Lubbock. 100 Degrees here to. Changed plans. Trying to get to Santa Fe tonite.

The night before the Big Adventure.

Tomorrow morning around 6 a.m., begins with pulling out of the driveway on a 6,000 mile road trip. 

The truck is gassed up, propane is full, tires checked, oil changed, groceries bought, gear packed, anticipation is high.

My nephew Keith, agreed to tag along and keep his uncle out of trouble.  I wish him the best.  I thank God for having a great job that granted me a four week sabbattical making this trip possible.  God also did a good job in giving Ronda this idea of a road trip.  I don't think she considered she'd be without me for 29 days!  We will both miss each other.  Love you Honey!

Keith and I will be hitting most of the National Parks across the Western United States and Banff in Canada. Part of the trip will also be used scouting out a new hunting area for this fall's elk hunt in Colorado.  Also plane to hike into some really cool areas and fish in some remote areas.

Blogs are new to me.  Never done this before, but I figured it would do me good to document what we do and where we go.

I've never taken a trip with an RV so this might be a terrible way to get my feet wet, but it's a challenge I look forward to.  My popup camper, affectionately named "Pancho", will hopefully prove to be trust worthy.

The first part of the trip is heading towards Durango, CO with a stop over in Tucumcari, NM.  I'll do my best to post pictures as I have access to the internet to update the blog.

Updating this blog is the last thing I'm doing before going to bed.  So I'll see ya'll down the road a bit.