Guadalupe Room

Hi Gang,

Last night I finally got to go into the 'Guadalupe Room'. It's an off trail cave tour, which is NOT available to the general public. It does follow the route of the 'Hall of the White Giant' cave tour which is available to the public on Saturday afternoons. Here's a link for those of you who are curious: www.nps.gov/cave.planyourvisit/hall_white_giant.htm

However, this trip continues past the 'White Giant' to the 2nd largest room in the cave (second to the big room). This area is still an active part of the cave, and it's very physically challenging. You climb over breakdown, crawl on your belly, corkscrew through rocks, you have to carefully navigate large cracks, crevices with drops you don't want to fall in to! You slide down an area of muddy clay (and later have to negotiate your slippery way back up it). I'll be honest, my back, shoulders, and legs are all sore this morning, but it was worth every minute.

There are no electric lights, only the lights from our helmuts and flashlights help us find our way. The trail is marked with orange plastic tape and at times is only a foot or so wide, other times it's non-existant. The beauty in the area is breath taking, with stalagmites, stalactites (which are often only inches from your head), columns, flowstone, various colors in the rocks, and an entire room of soda straws.

We continued to the Canary room, having to change our hiking boots for aqua socks to protect the resource (the cave floor). The canary room has odd shaped formations. One of them being a canary, another a woodpecker, and a thin column the width of a soda straw, but about ten feet long. My fellow rangers took pictures, I'll share them with you once they post them.

It was truly an awesome trip. Although not available to the public, if your interested, book the Hall of the White Giant tour. You'll have to book several weeks (sometimes months) in advance. Only a limited number of visitors are allowed because of the sensitivity of the area. If that's too much for you, there is the 'King's Palace' tour which is available daily and only requires a one mile walk and a variety of other cave tours which vary in intensity!

Come on out and visit while we're still out here.

Miss you all,

Love,
VAL & JOHN

Fall in New Mexico

Devil's Hall

Last week we hiked down in the Guadalupe Mountains in TX. A short hike, just over 4 miles and only 200 foot gain. Leaves were beginning to turn. Nice hike, fun day.


Devil Hall - October 2010

Caving Pics

A couple weeks ago, we went caving. John didn't bring his camera, but the other couple we went with sent us these photos. Thought I'd post them for you all to enjoy!

Me on the rope coming back up!



John on the rope coming back up!

Tonight we hope to see the bats exit the cave from INSIDE the cave. The bats will begin their migration south to Mexico soon. Might be our last opportunity to do it before they leave.

VAL & JOHN

Autumn weather

After having survived the long, hot summer in New Mexico, the cooler autumn weather is a welcome change. The past few mornings it's been in the low 50's and the afternoon only reaches the mid 80's! The air conditioner is only on for a few hours, we can enjoy the cool evening temperatures, and we've even let the cats wander outside of the rig for a few minutes while we watch them closely.

The past week at work was busy, despite it being October. The annual Balloonfest in Albuquerque brought additional tourists to the cave. Also, we had the last 'Star Party' at the park last night. We had four telescopes set up for viewing, a couple of presentations about the night sky (including one by me) and the Draconid meteor showers. Only noticed one meteor myself, but up on the hill it's quite dark with the new moon, you can easily see the Milky Way! :-)

Hope to do some hiking next weekend. The leaves might be changing up in the mountains. John is waiting for his new camera to arrive, and I'm sure he'll want to get out and take some pics.

More soon...

Love to all,

VAL & JOHN

Lower Cave

Yesterday, John finally got to go into 'Lower Cave' thanks to Tammy who led an off hours tour. Although I trail this tour almost weekly, John had never gone down into the area below the "Big Room". It's wet, slippery, requires going down a rope and a series of ladders, but it's scenic and fun.

An extra treat that I wasn't expecting was going the long route. I hadn't taken the long route before so that was new to me as well. Definitely more physically challenging as you have to climb up and over some 'break down' rocks. You also get to see lots of dead bats (OK, some of you think it's gross, but many have been there for hundreds of years). Lower Cave for the most part has no lighting, you're wearing a helmut with a light source.

It had been a difficult weekend at the cave this weekend. With two elevators off line for major improvements, we're down to the two freight elevators. On Friday, only one was working. For most of Saturday NONE of them were working. Yesterday they did get them working for the afternoon. Not sure what today will bring...

John and I walked down the Natural Entrance, but did get to take the elevator back up after our Lower Cave tour. I walk UP the Natural Entrance a few times a week. Personally, I think it's easier than going down and it gives you a good workout to boot!

Tonight I'm back to being Bat Flight Rove. I enjoyed giving the Bat Flight program last week, instead of watching from the back. Although from the back of the ampitheatre you do get a great view of the bats as they exit the cave.

That's it for now. Need to get ready for work. Have a great week.

VAL & JOHN

Wildlife Refuge Tour

Today we went back to Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge, east of Roswell. We had a tour of part of the refuge and it's interesting eco system. They have a variety of animals including several endangered species found only in the Refuge. Learned a lot.

After our tour, we did some birding. The refuge bird population swells this time of year as the migrating birds spend the winter.

White Pelicans...

Long billed curlew...


The refuge has thousands of dragonflies and damselflies. Here's a picture of a dragonfly...

A few Avocets near the edge of a pond...


Beautiful day, and a awesome place. We'll be back again as Snow Geese and Sandhill Cranes will arrive in the thousands over the next few weeks!

Miss ya all,

VAL & JOHN