Monday, June 11, 2007
SKP The Ranch Co-Op, Lakewood, NM - May 25-June 8
The main reason for our trip here was to give up our co-op lot. The finances of having a lot here just didn't work for us. It costs $400 annually whether we park there or not, and since there was also a subtle shift in the social scene in the park, we just weren't enjoying being here all that much.What we do enjoy about the area is playing bridge at the club in Carlsbad. For the $400 per year we will save, we can stay a month or two in Carlsbad and save the $12/day gas for the 45-mile round trip from Lakewood.
While here, we finally decided to take a leap and join the ACBL (American Contract Bridge League) and actually start saving up the Master Points we earn towards someday (in the very distant future) getting our Life Masters. We have been doing fairly well at our bridge games around the country, and we want to start saving up the bits of points we earn.We took one day to take a "tourist trip" up to the north side of Guadalupe Mountains Natl Park to an area called Dog Canyon. This area had been recommended to us by one of the rangers at Chaco who had been here for several years. It is a LOVELY area but a bit difficult to get a large rig up to due to several tight switchbacks. It almost made one long to be tenting again -- the campground was quite lovely and very secluded. We took a short nature hike through an attractive meadow.
Also in the area was the Guadalupe Rim Drive, which is a dirt road that parallels the rim of the Capitan Reef for several miles at the New Mexico end. There are many little side roads that go right out to the edge, and the views were spectacular -- especially with a fairly severe thunderstorm heading in!One of our last evenings here, we decided to try to find a lesser nighthawk, a bird fairly common to the area, but that we had not yet seen.
We drove through a nearby wildlife refuge (Seven Rivers NWR), and within the first 5 minutes, we had seen several of the birds and were able to positively id them. What a treat!# posted by Doug and Willie @ 6:30 PM 
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