Change of Venue

After trying to work today with the poor Verizon coverage and really spotty wifi at our campground in Carlsbad, we made the decision to pull out early even though we forfeit one night's space rent. We were able to get a refund for one of the two remaining nights that we'd reserved so that was good.

We looked carefully at Verizon's coverage map and found that in order to get good cell service we'd have to get on the other side of the mountains. Brock really needed that good service because he had an all company meeting that he needed to facilitate on Tuesday afternoon. We had planned on detouring south and then coming up north to get our trailer tires looked at (Brock has noticed one tire is wearing funny so he wants to get the alignment checked) at a Jayco authorized service center, but decided to just head straight from Carlsbad to Alamogordo which is where we would've been in three or four days anyway.

We got as much school done as we could and I worked on tax information gathering so that I could send stuff off to our CPA so he can prepare our return. I think we are getting later and later every year. I also called ahead to be sure that the spot that I'd hoped we could stay at in Alamogordo would have a vacancy and that we could pull in late. Yes on both.

Mondays Brock always has a lot of meetings and the last one ended at 3:30 so we decided to get the trailer as ready as we could without him and then at 3:30 we'd finish hooking up and hit the road for the 3 hour and 47 minute drive. :O) While he was on that last call, I took Bryn, Spence and Sky down to the indoor pool and let them swim for the last 40 minutes or so. They had a blast! Skylar is growing up so fast. He decided he didn't need his water wings anymore and was swimming all over the pool by himself, even in the 8 feet deep. He still looks a little thrashy and requires close supervision, but he was very excited to be a swimmer!

We ended up leaving Carlsbad by 4 pm with one stop to get a propane tank filled.

It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon with a high of about 88 degrees as we drove. There really wasn't a lot to see along the highway we were taking... A few oil pumps and big storage cylinders... Some really stinky cows in very high concentrations.

But then, guess where we stopped for dinner?

That's right "The Dairy Capital of the Southwest". Huh?

More hints...

Aliens welcome at Arby's

You wouldn't believe how excited I felt to see that they had a Wienerschnitzel. It's not as cute as the one in Corvallis when I was a kid, but still...

We read about a Chinese restaurant that got great reviews on google so we parked in a large parking lot and walked over and had dinner. The food was slow to come out, but it was hot. We didn't really agree with the reviewers about just how GREAT the food was, but the server was happy and kind and the prices were ok. I'm not sure a sit down dinner was the best idea though because it was after 7:30 when we got back on the road and we still had more than two hours to go!

We ended up driving through a mountain pass in the dark. The road (I-70) was really nice, recently redone I think, for which we were thankful. From what we could tell, it might've been a really pretty drive. Our gps has a feature that can tell you what elevation you are at and Brock turned that on, so we watched ourselves climb and climb. Would you believe that in the middle of the desert, we topped 7500 feet? The Yukon performed beautifully and we made it up and down the mountains no problem. We pulled into our rv park, which is right in the middle of town and yet feels pretty quiet, between 9:30 and 10 pm. We got out our headlamps and got set up and everyone was really ready for bed.