Day 3779

 I woke up at 7:30, played games, and then got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After that we decided to do the wash.

There wasn't any point in hurrying to leave.  The Carlsbad park's check-in time was 2.  Because of the timezone change that was 3 our time.  We had plenty of time to do the wash and put all the clean clothes away when it was done.

After that we hooked up and left.  There was a little delay because Ellen didn't shut the bedroom slide and only partially shut the kitchen slide.  Also I forgot to tighten the wheel nuts.

The trip itself was about 150 miles.  The first half was in Texas.  It was good road and little traffic.  I did the same 65 mph average speed that I would on an interstate.  Things got crappy when we crossed into New Mexico.   The road was OK at first, but they declared it a "safety corridor" and lowered the speed to 55.  I was afraid of a speed trap so I went 55 until a rabbit doing 65 passed me.  Then I followed him.

After 20 miles or so the road started getting crowded with oil trucks and vehicles.  There's a lot of drilling going on in the area.  The road also started going through small towns.  That slowed progress considerably.  We had to drive through beautiful downtown Carlsbad.  The speed limit was 30 and every intersection was an untimed light.  When we got through town it was 15 more miles to the park.

I didn't mention the hellacious head wind that we had throughout the New Mexico part of the drive.  We ended up making 8.5 mpg overall even though the Texas leg was 10 mpg.  There were parts where I had to slow don to keep the ECG's below 1300.  They were above 1250 for much of the time.  We'll have to drive 15 miles back to town to get fuel tomorrow.

The park is really nice, at least for New Mexico.  It's large and even has some trees.  There's also a field (dirt and scrub brush) for Abby to run in.  There isn't much to do around here and the cavern is 40 miles away, back through town.  I plan on running an RC car tomorrow.  There's a good place to do it not far from the trailer.  I need a day of total rest anyway.

The park has a restaurant that delivers to the trailer.  We ordered from it and the food is really good.  We'll probably do it again tomorrow. 

The wind blew all afternoon and until about 8 at night.  Hopefully it won't blow tomorrow.