Retirement Travels

Our next stop was Carlsbad Caverns. We arrived late Friday afternoon after stopping to check out Gaudalupe Mountains National Park.  We had reservations for a tour Saturday morning. On our drive out to the Cave we saw some barbary sheep. These are non-native originally from North Africa and first appeared in 1959. It is thought that the herd probably escaped from a private ranch in the Hondo Valley of New Mexico. We toured Carlsbad Caverns in the spring of 2021 and enjoyed it just as much the second time. There are so many different formations. The Natural Entrance The walkway down into the cavern. There are so many different formations. One thing we didn't get a chance to do in 2021 is watch the bats fly out of the cavern at dusk so we made sure to see it this time. The park has 17 different bat species however, the large colony of Brazilian free-tailed bats are what wow the visitors every evening from spring through fall with their outflights. The best way I found to get a still

  From the Grand Tetons, we stayed a night at Hill AFB Famcamp, Ogden, UT, a night at a Love's RV Stop in Filmore, UT and a night at Desert Eagle Famcamp, Las Vegas. From there we headed to Arizona and stayed 5 nights at Saguaro Skies, Luke AFB in Glendale. I was really happy to see my best friend and spend time with her. We had lunch at a newer restaurant called Stillery. The food was really good and so was the atmosphere.  From there we headed south and stayed at Boneyard Vista, Davis Monthan AFB in Tucson for a few nights. We had brunch with our friends Jeff and Louise and spent a few hours catching up with them. Our next stop was White Sands Missile Range Famcamp in White Sands NM.  A view of our RV and the San Andres Mountains We visited the museum which was really deep in history. Outside were old missiles that had been tested there.  Short Range Attack Missile Hound Dog Redstone A beautiful Ocotillo outside the museum in bloom. We also spent a day at White Sands National Par

We stayed at a lovely RV Park in Alpine, WY which is southwest of the Grand Tetons. It was a lovely drive to and from the park with Jackson (Hole) in the middle. We spent a few days there mostly looking for that elusive moose which we found on the first day. There was a family hanging around a creek right off highway 26. We stopped early in the day and decided to drive back through later in the day where they were closer. We also got to see them stand up and move around a little. That bull didn't move too much, he stood up and stood still for awhile, walked by a tree and stood for awhile then moved a little more and laid back down. We found a boat launch and walked down by the Snake River. The colors in this area were stunning. It was hard to get some good pictures of the colors because we weren't out during the early morning hours. We stopped in Jackson (Hole) to check out the tourist shops and get a picture of us under the arch of antlers. Note: Jackson is one town, Jackson H