We did pass by several smaller pecan farms, but pecan trees are typically harvested in November, so they were still bare and not so pretty to look at.
About halfway through our travel day we passed through the city of Deming, NM where we grocery shopped at Walmart, ate lunch at Wendy's, filled with gasoline and dumped our waste tanks at the 5R Travel Center (just north of town) and then filled one of our propane bottles right across the street at Griffin's Propane.
Gee, if we had also done our laundry this morning we could have cleared our entire "To Do List" for the week, but then we would have no excuse to drive back into town and eat a nice lunch (ie NOT Wendy's) sometime later in the middle of the week.
After driving another 30-miles across the barren New Mexico desert we came over a rise in the roadway and got our first glimpse of our next destination.
While driving through the campground we got a glimpse of all the interesting rock formations we'll get to explore here this week.
All the sites are named after constellations, there's even a small observatory here.
After getting all set up on our site it was time we go and "officially" check-in I guess, and it's still a little before the 4PM check-in time. Hope we don't get into too much trouble!
We watched a short video about the history of this location and just as importantly learned there are hot showers and flush toilets available to campers located just outside of the Visitor Center, we didn't know that.
On our way back to the campsite we took two more photos of THE POD in his new home.
We set that 30°F alarm on our weather station to remind us it's time to start the furnance to keep our water tanks under THE POD from freezing. When the tempuratures bounce back and forth between 31°F and 30°F the alarm goes off multiple times a night.
The afternoon highs have been reaching the mid-50°F's each day, but with winds in excess of 20MPH it feels much colder. But today we'll have to brave the weather because we've got to get laundry done soon.
Rather than head south, back to Deming, to do our laundry we headed north to the town of Silver City, NM. While Tricia was doing the laundry I checked out a few of the local tire shops to get some suggestions on what tires to purchase for ROVER this month.
Our original set of Goodyear Wrangler 6-ply Passenger Car tires lasted us for 50K miles. Our second set of 6-ply Light Truck Tires are closing in on 40K miles, but this next time I want to upgrade to a 10-ply Light Truck Tire that is tougher and better suited for a little more Off-Road travels, like what we put on THE POD in September of 2021.
We now have nearly 20K miles on those tires, thanks in part to our Alaska travels last year, and they are still looking like new. So now I'm looking for something very similar to put on ROVER.
I timed it perfectly returning to the laudromat, so we loaded up our nice clean laundry and went in search of lunch.
Just up the road I saw a "new to us" burger restaurant. It's called Blake's LOTABURGER and after Googling it I found out that it's a small chain of 70+ locations found mostly in New Mexico, with just a few locations in neighboring Arizona and Texas. The first location was opened in 1952 in Albuquerque, NM.
What makes Blake's LOTABURGER unique is their "New Mexico Style" Burger that is basically a Double Beef Quarter Pounder with Cheese, but with a generous helping of Hatch Green Chile on top. They also offer a "Frito Pie" which is a Blake’s Chili con Carne Bowl with a handful of Fritos Corn Chips underneath.
All of their Green Chiles have come from the nearby town of Hatch, NM. It's located just 40-miles north of Las Cruces, NM where we are headed next.
Since both the Green Chile Cheeseburger and Frito Pie were on my New Mexico Bucket List of Must Taste items I was happy to give them both of a Thumbs Up rating. Now if a can just find somewhere that offers a Green Chile Lemonade and/or Piñon Coffee I can complete my New Mexico Must taste items.
I'll give you three guesses what we are all excited about and I'll bet not one of you get the right answer.
Most of you would guess, "It's Super Bowl Sunday!", and you would be right, but that's not why we're excited.
A lot of you would guess, "We've been here a week and it's time to move to another exciting location". That would also be correct, but not why we're so excited.
A few of you might even think we received our Direct Deposit of our tax return. Nope, we haven't even applied for that yet.
I gave you all a hint of why we're so excited at the beginning of this blogpost. Today we're going to take advantage of them having FREE HOT SHOWERS at the Visitor Center. No more washing up in the bathroom sink with a washcloth or wiping down "all the stinky bits" with an Adult Sized Wetwipe, today we're taking an honest to goodness unlimited hot water shower.
Anyone who travels like we do knows what I'm talking about!
But before our showers we're going to a little bit of a final day sightseeing trip here at the City of Rocks State Park. All week I've been watching cars and trucks driving up and down the "Big Hill" we see when looking out our back window. It's inside of the State Park, but not located inside of the campground.
Here are a few photos of our little impromptu sightseeing trip.
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