Deming New Mexico

5/11

We left Whites City and Carlsbad Caverns NP. Heading west toward Deming, NM.  The road skirted the Guadalupe mountains and dipped briefly back into Texas.  At the western edge of the Guadalupe’s stands Guadalupe Peak, the highest point in Texas at 8,749 ft.

 The road then descends back into desert until reaching El Paso.   

As usual the drive through any urban area with our rig was… well… exciting.

Back on I-10, we headed north, crossing the New Mexico state line again, to Las Cruces then west toward Deming, NM.  Our destination was El Rancho Lobo RV Park about 7 miles east of Deming.  Looking at it on google earth it looked like a green patch on a tapestry of desert sand and scrub.

As it turned out, it was a square ring of trees with RV sites surrounding the central building housing the facilities (rec. room, laundry, bathroom etc) along with the park owners residence.  

The owners were out of town so the camp host helped us pick out a site and get setup.  Our site had a row of trees to shield us form the afternoon sun with a little nature path among the trees.

 

On the eastern side of the compound was a garden area with many flowering plants and small trees.

And then there’s the birds, hundreds of birds.  Their calls and chirps were everywhere.  This truly was an oasis in the desert.  The interstate was not far away, but all we heard were the birds.

? any one know ?

Scaled Quail

House Finch (Male) and Barn Swallow

White-Crowned sparrow

Swainson's Hawk

Barn Swallow

Eurasian Collared Dove

Bunny rabbits were everywhere too.

After setting up, we sat in the afternoon shade, enjoyed the cooling temperatures and the symphony of bird songs. Right away we decided this was a good place to spend a few days and unwind.

We found this campground through Passport America so the price was very good, $11 a night.  The only difference was there’s a meter on the power post and you have to pay for the electricity used.  This is common for monthly or seasonal rentals but it’s the first time we’ve encountered it on a daily rental.  We arrived around 4:00 in the afternoon when it had started cooling down for the evening.  We noticed the campers around us had their windows open so we decided to try leaving the A/C off and see how the “dry” heat felt.

The first few days weren’t too bad. There was a gentle breeze and as long as we were in the shade it was fine The roof vent fans kept the air moving in the camper.  By the last day, even the locals had their A/C on. We succeeded in keeping the A/C off until we left but the dry heat of the desert was starting to wear us down. For the 3 days we used $7.62 worth of electricity.

We spent the hottest part of  our last day in the city of Deming, sightseeing.  Deming is a nice little desert town.  The main drag had lots of RV Parks (presumably for the snow birds).  We heard the city museum was very good so that's where we headed.

The museum was indeed excellent. We spent most of the day there. This link describes some of the more prominent exhibits.
The museum is housed the the old USO building.  The second story has a full basketball court that served the GI's during WWII.  The town had an inordinate number of locals in the Philippines during the Japanese occupation and the
Bataan death march.  There's a number of exhibits and memorials dedicated to them.

Here's some pictures we took in and around the museum.

 

Mimbres basketry (local Native American tribe)

Notice size of baskets compared to dime in lower center.

Military room

There was a large collection of geodes

In every Garden of Eden there has to be at least one serpent.  Ours had many, we’re in a desert, ha-ha.  While we didn’t see any real snakes, the serpent on our garden was the dust.  We were lucky we didn’t encounter any famous New Mexico sand storms but those gentle cooling breezes also generated dust.  We didn't notice it at first but it got in and on everything.  Having the windows open meant we had to wipe down EVERYTHING when we left. After driving the 2 ½ mile gravel road leading to the campground the truck was a mess.

With the dust being the only negative, we thoroughly enjoyed our time at El Rancho Lobo and Deming,  NM.  Next time we’ll have to try it in a cooler month.

Here's some more pics.

Coming next, Tuscon, NM and Saguaro NP