Texas and New Mexico

Texas is big.

We pretty much just drove across Texas in two days, from Beaumont to Junction in a day, then Junction to Carlsbad in New Mexico the next day.

Texas was pretty hot, we did not really stop much after Beaumont, but the speed limits were crazy high, I managed to hit 100 miles per hour and didn’t really feel like I was speeding because everyone else was going 90.

We stopped for the rest of the day in Carlsbad Caverns which were super cool and saw the bat flight at 7:30, which is when the 200,000 bats all fly out of the cave, it was really amazing but no photos or videos because it messes with the bats echo-location.

After the bat flight we drove down the road a bit and pulled down this dirt road that one of the park rangers said was owned by the Bureau of Land Management so we could camp on it for free, this sounded like a good idea but we ended up driving down a pitch black dirt road that was blocked by cows.

At this point we decided it was late and we were tired, so we slept on the crash pad in the back of the car.

The next morning we drove up further into New Mexico, through the Sacramento Mountains, which were super beautiful, to Alamogordo and the white sands desert.

The mountains were amazing and we stopped for breakfast at this little place called big daddy's dinner which was really good, but the most amazing thing we did today was visit white sands.

White Sands National Monument is the largest gypsum desert in the world, and being inside the park surrounded by these large pure white sand dunes is very otherworldly.

While inside the dunes all you can see is bright white sand in all directions, with the Sacramento Mountains on one side and apache mountains towering above from the other side.

After white sands we drove through a rather large thunderstorm and are now in Albuquerque

The gaping maw of Carlsbad Caverns

Different cool rock formations in the cave

Enjoying the fresh air after being in the caves for 2 hours

The dark dirt road we were trying to drive down and camp off of

The white dots are the eyes of the cows we almost hit that were hiding in the dark

A tunnel in the Sacramento Mountains

A narrow and winding mountain pass

Coming down the other side of the mountains, that white strip on the horizon is the white sand desert

Enjoying the weather and scenery in White Sands National Monument