Our route started out traversing the 3-mile wide lava field on US-380.
At about 50-miles down this road we traveled passed a fascinating Point of Interest. The entrance to the Trinity Site, the location where the first ever atomic bomb was exploded on July 16, 1945, was locked up tight.
On the 3rd Saturday in October every year the site is open to the public for just one day. Well that is every year except this year, thanks to the property being managed by the National Park Service and the government shutdown, this years Open House was cancelled.
Soon we were backing in to our campsite here at the Riverside Campground of Caballo Lake State Park. It's not one of my finest campsite selections, but it'll do for our week long stay.
New Mexico State Parks offers an Annual Camping Pass which you can purchase every year if you're planning on spending a lot of nights camping in their state parks. We purchased the annual pass back in 2023 when we first visited New Mexico.
Back then the pass was $225 for non-residents and the nightly camping fee was just $10, which means on night number 23 you were finally saving money. I should also mention that the pass only covers camping fees, it does not cover electric, water or sewer fees. In 2023 you paid $4 extra for electric and water, plus another $4 for sewer hookups on your site each night.
In 2023 we spent 30-nights in New Mexico State Parks, so we did made it to the point of saving money. Also when you bought your annual pass back then it was good for 12-months from the date of purchase. This created a problem for the State because you could use your pass number to reserve a site for the entire year you purchased your pass in, plus the following year because the website had no way of knowing which month your pass expires. If the Ranger didn't physically check your pass when arriving at the park, you could conceivably use the pass for 24-months if purchased in January.
The problem arises when beginning in 2026 all annual passes are only good from January to December for the year you purchase them in, no matter which month you purchase them.
In 2025 they are offering pro-rated pricing on passes so that everyone's will expire in January of 2026.
When we arrived at Manzano Mountains State Park a few weeks ago in the middle of October we purchased one of these pro-rated passes. I mentioned the prices had changed since 2023 when we bought our last one, now the price for an Annaul Pass for a non-resident is $600 and the price for camping is $20 a night. That means you need 30-nights to break even.
The better deal for us is when we purchased a pass good for October, November and December for the prorated price of $150, or just $50 a month. That means we only need to spend 8-nights in State Parks before the end of the year to come out ahead. Since we already plan to spend 11-nights here in state parks it seemed like a no-brainer to purchase the pass.
We immediately saved $80 on the balance of our visit to Manzano Mountains State Park because they stop taking reservations for nights after October 15th and we were basically FCFS for the last 4-nights we were there.
The flaw in my thinking comes into play when I realized you can't apply the pass to a reservation you made before you possessed the pass. I know what you're thinking, cancel the reservation and pay the $10 cancelation fee, then immediately rebook it using the pass. That would have worked except it takes the State of New Mexico between 2-3 weeks to activate the pass in your online account with ReserveAmerica, the agency who books the reservations.
I foolishly thought that once I arrived at Caballo State Park I could physically show them my pass and they would apply it to my week long stay with them. Nope, New Mexico has a rule that once your reservation date arrives there are no further refunds for that reservation.
One good thing did come about though, the Park Manager here was able to immediately activate my pass online. So I don't have to wait for some clerical employee in the Santa Fe Headquarters to get around to activating my pass and I can now start receiving the discounts I paid for.
We had plans to visit the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument up in the Gila National Forest, but since the government shutdown is still ongoing the National Monument is closed (Winston and VerJean verified this by making the trip up there).
Since we can't do that, guess what we're going to do? That's right, we're going to revisit two of our favorite New Mexico State Parks and spend 11-nights doing so, using our newly activated Annual Camping Pass. The best thing is that both of these state parks offer primitive camping (without utilities) so we camp for FREE.
They came wandering out of the brush that lines the entire west side of our campsite. One at a time they popped their heads out to check out the situation and then cautiously came out to feed on the grass.
We saw a total of three, but there could have been more.
How about our State by State Bucket Lists or Visited Campgrounds List?
If so, click on the sign below to be taken to our other website.
Would you like to be notified of new blog posts?
