Nov. 11...Wednesday in Riudoso, NM

Arrived here in Riudoso after a few hour drive from Albuquerque....it's a lovely mountain resort town, and we'll be back another time to do more hiking....it was threatened by a huge forest fire in 2012, and you can see burnt forests all around the area, but thankfully, the town was saved. But it does make me worry about our valley back home, and what could happen....

Nice and toasty in the RV last night, but VERY windy outside - at one point I bordered on waking up as I felt the RV rocking side to side, wondering what it would take to tip us over??!!?? Nice sunny morning, and we are going to drop dirty laundry off at the laundromat in town, where they'll do the work for us, while we take a good hike that Amy found talking to a Forest Service Ranger. We'll have lunch in town afterward, pick up the clean laundry and head south to Cloudcroft and Alamogordo. Some pics from the really nice 3.5 mile hike:

Molly beat us back down the trail by a minute or so:

And she was tuckered out!!! As you can see, she was watching me put away my hiking gear in the back of toutou:

After the hike and lunch, we headed south through Cloudcroft and Alamogordo, to Oliver Lee State Park....a small campground set against the very dramatic Sacramento Mountains....arrived just before sunset and had a nice walk around - we'll hike here in the morning....lots of cactus, and it is starting to look a lot like Arizona....look closely and you can see some RVs here in the park...we were lucky to get the last electrified spot!

The sunset was gorgeous, as was our home-away-from-home:

Relaxing, sipping some wine now....I'm in the passenger's captain's seat, turned around facing the interior...the girls are in their usual spot as well:

About to start heating up dinner - chicken tangine, made by Molly Harrison back in Vail. It's yummy.....she serves it aside tomato farro...tomorrow we'll hike here in the park,  and then visit White Sands National Monument, which looks very cool.....On our way to Silver City, NM....all for now!