RV Trips: W18: Rocks, Birds and Pancho Villa!

Sunset View

This one is at the Rock Hound State Park in Deming, New Mexico!

Day 25: March 6

Yikes, it got to the low 30s last night and was still chilly this morning, so we did the frosty dump and water fill and headed to New Mexico.

We passed through the Davis Mountain and caught sight of this old chapel:

David loved the fast driving on Highway 10, but that inevitably means you get to a big city: El Paso. Yuck. But we were very close to Juarez, Mexico and saw a bit of a wall!

In Las Cruces, we stocked up and drove on past acres and acres of Dairy farms and acres and acres of Pecan Groves. They tried to trick us at the Border Control station asking if we were Americans. Nothing much to the drive.

We got to Rock Hound around 1:30 and got the last Unserviced Site (#5, $10) then hiked the Turtle Egg Trail, picked up some pretty rocks:

…and enjoyed the birds (including the “Love Bird”) in our own “private” Cactus garden and around the campground:

Here’s the view from my chair:

Day 26: March 7

Chilly morning and a down jacket for our morning bird walk. Too cold for the birds!

I hiked the Jasper Trail and found more pretty rocks (I prefer beach glass, though!):

In the afternoon, I walked the Turtle Egg Trail again (that’s David watching from below):

…then, we took one last look for the Scaled Quail and were lucky to get a few great shots of these furtive birds:

Day 27: March 8

In Deming, we went to Walmart and Dollar Tree for our “necessities”, including a little Hummingbird feeder. We were starting to see the Chiricahua Mountains, some dust, and some snow:

At the Sunny Flats campground near Portal, AZ, we got one of the last available sites (#6, $10, Unserviced), levelled with most of our blocks, hung our birdfeeders out, and let the watching begin:

The best sighting of the day was a Magnificent Hummingbird (and he was), a Life Bird:

We had a Happy Hour with neighbour, Jan, who started to volunteer in parks after Trump got elected to overcome her depression (her words). Interesting perspective. Few talk politics, we find, and she was discreet. But she did say that, thanks to his cutbacks, the camping fee will double this summer to $20. People will vote with their feet and maybe at the ballot box.

Here’s the view from my chair:

Day 28: March 9

It was a birding morning in our campsite and around the campground:

…then a bike ride (barely pedalled for 1.5 miles, and you know what that meant for the return ride).

Back for lunch, more birds, including this Blue-throated Hummingbird, but NOT the Yellow-eyed Junco we saw here the last time:

After a short bike ride (uphill to start!):

…I chatted with Ontario neighbours who had camped at the Tonto National Forest where the price had already doubled. They said there were very few campers there and most were Canadian. Hmmm…

Day 29: March 10

We decided not to head farther west into Arizona, so decided to take Highway 9 to Pancho Villa State Park in Columbus, NM, and hope for a chance to partake of the festivities scheduled for the day there.

It was an uneventful drive with Pronghorns and Border Patrol vehicles (including ATVs) as the only distractions:

This route goes along the border and also follows the old rail bed (one trestle bridge was stamped “1909”). Again, we wondered why a wall of any kind is needed with desert and mountains everywhere.

We did manage a primitive site at the park ($8, unserviced) and were excited to be part of the 19th Cabalgata Binacional and Fiesta de Amisted/Binational Road Day Commemoration.

Pancho Villa attacked the town of Columbus, and riders on horseback from Mexico (joined by American riders at the border) have ridden en masse into town for these 19 years to commemorate that victory. Love the enthusiasm and love for Villa:

In the town square, after some speeches (the Pancho Villa “look-a-like” spoke, perhaps a poem, but in enough Spanish words that I understood him saying that Pancho was not “dead”, that his spirit was strong, and the crowd cheered, perhaps in defiance of you-know-who!). Then we had lunch: