Now to head home after three weeks of great traveling through beautiful landscapes, seeing new things and revisiting places from previous trips that always seem new. After reading Tony and Anne Hillerman books along the way, it’s seems appropriate to show images of Shiprock and it’s neighboring peaks in New Mexico!

Continuing along our route, our next stop is Chaco Culture National Monument in north-western New Mexico. We checked into our RV park in Bloomfield, New Mexico, packed our tents, food, campstoves, water (lots), and drove to the Chaco campground. The roads were gravel and the last 4 miles very rough dirt. We had rain while setting up camp and through dinner, but the weather cleared and we had a beautiful next day. We’re glad the trailers were safe in Bloomfield.

Chaco is a magical place, not what we expected. We thought it would be more like Bandelier. Check out the photos.

After leaving Taos, we drove a couple of hours up into Bandelier National Monument. The Monument is close to Los Alamos where Walt lived for a four years as a child. After setting up our camp in Bandelier, we drove to Los Alamos and visited the museums and the newly created Manhatton Project National Histirical Park, the first third located in Los Alamos. We had a nice thunder and lightening storm in Los Alamos but it didn’t make it to the campground. The clouds were beautiful over the trailers though! The next day we hiked down into the valley to visit the ruins of Bandelier National Monument. When we left Bandelier, we drove Highway 4 and went along the Jemez crater, check out the photo.

Continuing north we head for Taos, New Mexico, a magical place. I think there’s a reason why so many artists have been and still live there. We spent time in the old downtown, and hiked in the mountains and along the Rio Grande River. The weather was beautiful, sunny and warm.

After all the white sand, we went north to Santa Fe, New Mexico. We explored to downtown Santa Fe, road our bikes to the downtown, hiked to Santa Cruz lake near Espanola, and had a wonderful dinner at Rancho de Chimayo, near there. Great sopapillas!

Onward to camp in Las Cruces, New Mexico and a day at White Sands National Monument. The first evening in Las Cruces, we visited the neighboring historic town of Messilla, very cool and enjoyd a great meal at the Double Eagle restaurant and had “award winning” margaritas! We enjoyed the area, another place to spend more time.

White Sands National Monument was beautiful and unique. Naturally we bought sand (snow) sleds and enjoyed the dunes. It was so bright, white sand and desert make it hard for the eyes!

Our next stop, via beautiful Gila Bend, was Tucson, Arizona for three nights at Catalina State Park. While in Tucson, we bicycled, hiked, and visited the Pima Air and Space Museum. And, we enjoyed desert prairie dogs and road runners at the camp site. Here are some images to check out.

We’re heading for the south-west again this year, this time to New Mexico for some new places and old. Our itinerary includes Joshua Tree NP on the trip out, Las Cruces and White Sands National Monument, Santa Fe, Taos, Bandelier National Monument, and Chaco Culture National Monument. We’re traveling with Ann and Bruce Smith and their new 27′ Airstream, Flying Cloud – the first big trip!

The first stop, Joshua Tree National Park was beautiful, especially after a long day from San Luis Obispo. The campground was in the park, well situated and close to hiking. A very interesting landscape, we’ll return!