Headed to Arizona

After leaving North Carolina, we spent a few nights in Hamburg State Park in Georgia before moving into the KOA in Americus for Thanksgiving with Amy’s folks. The state park was small and very nice and we had a site that backed up to the small lake that is the attraction for the park. If our path takes us across Georgia in this area in the future, we will stay here again.

Our time with Amy’s folks was very nice and they seem to be doing well. Amy cooked a full Thanksgiving dinner and Dan took care of a few chores that they can no longer do on their own. Soon it was time to head west toward Austin, TX, where we would spend Christmas with several of our RVing friends like we did last year. But before we get to that, we need to take a few weeks of travel to get there.

We have a habit of staying in places that we’ve stayed before, especially if we like them and they are along our route. This time we decided to try out some new locations and we now have more state parks and COE campgrounds to add to our list of places we’d stay again if in the area. Our first stop moving west was at Frank Jackson State Park in Opp, AL. Once again, we had a nice site that backed up to the water. We also had our friends, Jim and Corinne, join us for a couple nights as they worked their way back to western NY for Christmas.

As we left Alabama, we spent time in two state parks in Louisiana. Our first stop was at Fairview Riverside State Park located on the north side of Lake Pontchartrain and a short drive across the causeway from New Orleans. Given that we were this close to the famous city and had never driven on the causeway, we decided to venture out and spend a day in walking the French Quarter. We had done this during our first year RVing and knew where to park the truck. We enjoyed walking around the city and having some beignets with a cup or coffee for a mid-morning snack.

Our second Louisiana state park was Sam Houston Jones State Park located in Lake Charles, La. This park has recently been renovated after damage from hurricane Laura. It turns out that a couple of RVing friends, Mike and Terri, spent time in the park volunteering during its renovations. It was cool to take a walk on a boardwalk that someone we know helped rebuild. The actual campground in the park is very much like a private campground with concrete pads and no tree coverage but very well built. We would definitely return here again in the future.

Our next stop was a return visit to the KOA near Conroe, TX. We pass through Conroe in order to avoid passing through or near Houston. We also found one of our favorite breweries on the road here in Conroe. We made arrangements to meet Martin, a young man we met during our hike on the Appalachian Trail, and his new bride, Gabby, at the B-52 Brewery. Martin was one of the first hikers we met early in Georgia and crossed paths with several times during the hike. Dan even met up with him as he was entering Harpers Ferry. We had a great time catching up, sharing memories of the trail and getting to know his bride.

As we worked our way to Georgetown, TX and our Christmas gathering, we stopped for a week at Rocky Creek COE on Somerville Lake. This campground was nice with a waterside site but we had problems with our electric hookup and could only utilize the 30 amp service. We aren’t sure if the power was questionable at other sites in the park. Other than this minor inconvenience, we enjoyed our time in the park.

We arrived at Jim Hogg Park in Georgetown, TX to spend Christmas with RVing friends at about the same time as the cold weather hit. We had one decent day that we spent celebrating Laura’s 60th birthday. Laura provided everyone with t-shirts to commemorate the occasion and we all gathered around for a group photo. The following day would bring frigid cold weather and water issues for most of the group, including us. Over 4 years of RVing and this was the first time we had frozen water lines. We were able to get things flowing again and were lucky we had no damage to our pipes.

The weather continued to be cold, but we made the most of it and gathered for a couple of shared meals. One evening, we had a total of 10 people in our RV for dinner. It was cozy and the extra bodies helped keep our living space a little bit warmer. All and all, we made the most of it but it certainly did not compare to last year’s gathering where Christmas day was in the 80’s.

We left Jim Hogg and headed to San Angelo State Park for New Years. We have stayed at this park several times and each time we take a walk along the river in downtown San Angelo. They setup Christmas lights depicting the 12 days of Christmas and Amy has always wanted to see them lit up but the opportunity had never presented itself, until now. We spent a warm afternoon and evening downtown and was able to walk along the river after sunset to enjoy the lights.

Our next destination was Las Cruces, NM where we would meet up with our friends, Jim and Corinne, and check out the progress on their house they are building. They weren’t due back in Las Cruces for another week so we decided to swing south for warmer weather and spent a few nights in Seminole Canyon State Park, just north of the Rio Grande and the Mexican border. We had a great short stay here with a long hike one day and a day of relaxing in the 70 degree sunshine. We left the park and moved closer to civilization, if Fort Stockton, TX can be considered civilization, for the weekend in order to catch the final week of the NFL season.

After an overnight stay in El Paso, TX, we moved into the Elks Lodge in Alamogordo, NM. We wanted to spend a few days in Alamogordo in order to take in White Sands National Park. We spent the better part of the day checking out the park and hiking all the trails they had to offer. In total it was around 10 miles of hiking, but most of that was up and down sand dunes, which can be quite challenging. After a while, we got smart and started plotting routes that took us up and down the gentler and firmer sections of the dunes.

The scenery in the park was very stark but beautiful. I couldn’t help but think of winter scenes from my youth in Maine but even though it looked a lot like fields of snow, it wasn’t. The consistency of the sand was extremely fine, like powder or the sand used in hour glasses. In order to keep the roads and parking areas clear in the park, they use bucket loaders and plows to move the sand that blows around and covers these surfaces. This also adds to the illusion that we were in a winter landscape in the northeast and not the deserts of the southwest.

A short drive from the Alamogordo Elks lodge took us to the Elks lodge in Las Cruces where we would park next to our friends for the next 10 days. During our second day there, we were surprised by a knock on our door. Expecting it to be Jim and Corinne back from errands for their house, we were surprised to find our mutual friend, Paul, standing outside. Paul and his wife Kay, are from Maine and we met them through Jim and Corinne during our first year on the road. Paul had just flown to Phoenix to pick up a new RV that he had purchased and was driving back to Maine. It was nice to see him and catch up.

We have now left Jim and Corinne but will be meeting up with them again next week as we spend the next couple months in the Tucson and Phoenix area. Hopefully it won’t be another 2 months before I post another blog. The should be plenty to write about as we have our next month or so planned out with stays at a few Arizona State Parks and a week or so RVing with Amy’s sister, Karen, and her husband, Fergy. Until then, stay warm.