The Southwest

Friends,

During the early fall, we have moved through the southwestern States of Arizona, New Mexico, and finally to Austin, Texas where Paula has two friends, Jose and Anne-Marie.    

Camp Verde UMC

Water and outdoor campfire restrictions were in place throughout the region. 

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Native American Cliff Dwellings

We stayed in a central AZ RV Park outside of a small town named Camp Verde, not far from Sedona. We visited their small UMC that was doing a great job picking up children and bringing them to church on Sunday morning.  The congregation was demonstrating some new audio-visual technical equipment in their Sunday morning worship service that had been donated by a young professional in their midst.  Most of our time in AZ was spent with Cheryl and Rob, friends of Paula's from Phoenix, and being inspired by the red rock formations and beautiful sunsets.

   We only spent 3 days in New Mexico, but all three of them ended with wildlife suprises!  On the first evening, we ended up driving the motorhome into a remote high-elevation Apache National Forest area, where we were the only campers 

Apache National Forest

present.  As we munched on smores and snuggled under our blankets (first night below 40 degrees!), we listened to bull elk bugle the night away in the surrounding forest.  That experience was matched by one the following evening near Cloudcroft, NM where a small herd of elk occupied a grassy pasture across the highway from our rv park.

On our third afternoon in New Mexico, we visited Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  
Besides the truly amazing underground sights, we also returned at nightfall to view an amazing daily bat emigration from one of the major caves in the park.

Driving through hot and dry west Texas was not an exciting adventure.  A great deal of oil and gas drilling and extraction were taking place, and very large tractor-trailers hauling all kinds of liquids and heavy equipment filled the otherwise remote highways.  When we entered the Austin-San Antonio area, however, car (and pickup) traffic began to increase, and we looked forward to visiting with Jose and Anne-Marie, Paula's friends, who used to live in Vermont.
  
For the first few days, we stayed in McKinney Falls State Park, southeast of Austin, and became familiar with the prickly pear cactus and chiggers. 

McKinney Falls State Park

Prickly Pear Cactus Fruit

Both would cause you to itch if you weren't careful!  During the following days, we did learn how to use the prickly pear fruit ('tunas') in smoothies and in a pie.  During our last weekend in Texas, we attended the Gruene (pronounced "Green") Music and Wine Festival and the Gruene UMC Sunday morning worship service on Oct 12.  I will tell you about those more in my next post.

Later this week, I am headed east to Biloxi, Mississippi and St Andrews State Park near Panama City, Florida.  Talk to you soon!

Love,
Tim