Cimarron Canyon and Eagle Nest, NM

We left Arklahoma on Monday, July 7, and met friends Janice & Dean, Melba & Bobby, and Pat & Roy at the City Park campground in Dumas, TX, on Wednesday. Pat & Roy were going on to Colorado where we’ll meet them later and the rest of us proceeded toward Eagle Nest, NM.

We arrived at Cimarron Canyon State Park, New Mexico, and happily discovered that there was space available for us, so we called this “home” for 5 nights.

The campground is about 10 miles east of Eagle Nest, a tiny little community and lake surrounded by mountains. These were taken from "Signal Mountain" looking down on the valley, with Wheeler Peak, the tallest in NM at over 13,000 feet , in the background clouds and a peek of the winding highway into Eagle Nest.

The area has a lot to see and do, so we spent most days exploring. One day was a trip to Wild River Recreation Area which overlooks the Rio Grande River and a stop in the town of Red River where we saw these neat little "rental cars":

While in the area, we picked up a couple of “hitchhikers”, Joe and Marty, who will be traveling with us for awhile….to see them at various places along the way, click here: http://picasaweb.google.com/bdcyrus/TravelsOfJoePenguinMartyMoose?authkey=GFL2FM_QQ_A

Another day we went to Taos for an Indian PowWow and Arts & Craft Fair. Here's a street in Old Taos and a pic of me in the Town Square:

The 10-mile canyon drive to the Taos Ski Valley was beautiful, but I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed with the ski resort itself. Of course, since we don’t ski, we wouldn’t be going for that reason, anyway! Here's a pic of Joe the Penguin and Marty the Moose as we were leaving the resort:

During our stay we also visited Angel Fire resort and the Angel Fire Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial. Both were very interesting in their own special way. This is a picture of the entrance to the Memorial:

We met a lot of nice people in the campground and had frequent visitors such as deer and even a black bear:

The weather was absolutely PERFECT while we were here with highs in the 70’s and lows in the 50’s! Mostly sunny days with an occasional light shower in the evening or at night. We’re in agreement that this may have been the best overall weather we’ve had in the four-and-a-half years of fulltiming. We WILL be back, but we still have places to go and people to see, so it’s on the road again for now.