Day 2 at Alamogordo, NM White Sands

Thursday, 5/07/2015
Alamogordo, NM

Janie decided that instead of cooking dinner tonight she was going to make breakfast so we had a nice meal of scrambled eggs, bacon, hash browns and toast.  A good way to start the day.

Today our first tour of a National Monument occurred.  We drove about 20 miles to White Sands National Monument.  This is one of the world's great natural wonders.  They rise out of the Chihuahuan Desert and engulfs 275 square miles of desert.  The sand is actually gypsum that is carried out the of surrounding mountains, through the water system and finally to Lake Lucero.  As the water evaporates the gypsum is blown by the wind to the dunes and wears down to a fine talcum consistancy.  The dunes are only about 7000 years old.  The animals that live here have all adapted by becoming lighter in color.   The lizards here are earless and bleached almost white.

After viewing a film on the dunes we drove out to them.  There are a couple of places you can stop and walk on the dunes.  You can actually sled on them too!

After spending some time enjoying the view of the dunes we drove back into Alamogordo to visit the New Mexico Museum of Space History.  It was a pretty interesting tour.

Moon Rock

At the base of the flag pole is the grave site of Ham, the world's first space chimp.

After visiting the museum we decided to have something to eat and finally found Si Senor, a mexican restaurant.  The food was fine.  I thought the red sauce on the enchilada's was a bit spicy.  Also, they were stacked instead of rolled.  I keep forgetting to take pictures of the food.  I need to remember that.  After lunch we went back to the rigs so the others could walk their dogs before heading up the mountain to visit the Apple Barn.  The drive was nice but the place was a tourist trap.  We did split a piece of apple pie with ice cream for dessert.

On the way back down we stopped at a view point for the Lincoln National Forest.  These are the mountains that the gypsum is being carried out of and down to White Sands.

I forgot to add these pictures of a famous astronaut (or is it astronut?) before.

Bill and I spent an hour or so doing laundry in town to get caught up.  Tomorrow we head toward Carlsbad Caverns and Roswell.  Enjoy all the pictures.