Guadalupe Mountains

From Wikipedia – This park contains Guadalupe Peak, the highest point in Texas, as well as the scenic McKittrick Canyon filled with bigtooth maples, a corner of the arid Chihuahuan Desert, and a fossilized coral reef from the Permian era.

• Established: 10/15/1966
• Annual Visitors: 172,347
• Size: 86,367 acres

Guadalupe Mountains National Park November 3, 2020

We left Alpine, TX where we stayed at a Quality Inn. We’re Gold members with Choice since our adventures started. We really like La Quinta for non-kitchen suites as we are Platinum with Wyndham now, so they waive the dog fees. We are also Platinum with IHG as well so, for rooms with kitchens, we like Candlewood Suites, our go to hotel whenever they are available.  The points have added up! We’ve been on the road 8 weeks…57 hotel nights…so far! Except for a very few places, we’ve been paying $89-$110 a night on average.

We made a stop in Van Horn, TX, roughly 100 west of Alpine to stretch our legs. We crossed vast open plains with mountains in the distance. We saw very few homes, cross roads or other cars. Heading north, these next two parks, Guadalupe Mts in TX and Carlsbad Caverns, NM, as well as our stay in Whites City, NM will not have access to a large grocery store and only one restaurant available to us so we stocked up in Van Horn at an independent grocery store called Porters. We also filled our 7 gallon water jug at our hotel this AM. We then continued on an additional 50 or so miles from Van Horn to Pine Springs Visitor Center in Guadalupe Mt NP through uninhabited lands, except for a ranch house or two, a tethered blimp, a radar outpost and an aviation monitoring station. It was fun to see Old Capitan and Guadalupe Mountain getting bigger and bigger in front of us, topping off at 8,700 ft and in the Mountain Time Zone.

Guadalupe is known as one of the least known national parks. It was fun to have this one and Carlsbad Caverns so close so we could do them together. This will be the first time we have done three parks in three days consecutively. And, in two different states. Big Bend and Guadalupe are in TX and Carlsbad is just over the border in NM.

Pine Springs Visitor Center was open to go inside so I could get our postcard, pin and stamp. Guadalupe Mts NP has a “Paws on Pavement” policy so we could only walk a couple of trails with Rangeley. The Pinery Trail starting at the visitor center was one of them. The just under ¾ mile round trip stroll brings you to the old Butterfield Station ruins. This was a well-known stop for the stagecoach that delivered the US Postal Service’s mail 2,800 miles from St Louis, MO to San Francisco, CA. The Butterfield Overland Mail Co. began the route in 1858. We talked about that route in our Gateway Arch NP (in St Louis) blog. If you want some interesting reading, research John Butterfield, Henry Wells and William Fargo. Do the companies American Express and Wells Fargo ring a bell? This is the start of it all!

We did not get to the Salt Basin Dunes and tours of that western part of the park have been suspended due to COVID. Not to mention we can not bring the dog…maybe another visit?

Guadalupe has some great backcountry camping locations and long hikes but no good roads to drive a van through. We entered and exited through the south west entrance. You can also enter through the north at Dog Canyon and at McKittrick Canyon in the north eastern part of the park. A four wheeled vehicle, no dog, great camping gear, lots of water and good hiking shoes would equal some good times in this park.

We drove to Frijole Ranch History Museum to have lunch. There are picnic table close to the seven-building 1800’s farm. The once residence, now an indoor and outdoor walk through museum, is open to stroll the grounds anytime but the museum, docent and indoor furnishings, photos and schools house were not available for viewing today. Dogs are not allowed on this property so Gary and Rangeley took a short walk around the picnic grounds to wait for me. I added several shots and plaque explanations for your interest in the slide show below. I especially liked how they had lights in the house, got their water from a 6 gallon a minute spring and how many hardworking and caring people have maintained this property over the years for us to enjoy.

Today is America’s day to vote and yes we mailed our ballots in a few weeks ago : )

We are staying in Whites City, NM for a couple of nights at the Whites City Cavern Inn, at the base of Carlsbad Caverns National Park’s entrance road, only 7 miles up the hill to the visitor center. This town was started by Charlie White in the 1920’s. This privately-owned unincorporated small resort town is less than a half square mile with a population of 7.

Next journal will be Carlsbad!