Happy Birthday To Sheryl

Happy Birthday to my lovely young bride. This birthday is very special to both of us as it marks a new chapter in our lives for various reasons we will keep to ourselves. But I will say they are very good reasons.

 

 The day started with giving Sheryl her gift. She had seen this purse at the gift shop here at the RV park when we first pulled and fell in love with it. So a week later I just knew it would be the perfect gift for her birthday.

 Next, it was what to do for the day??? We decided to head up into the mountains for the day and escape the desert heat. Our first thought was lunch in the mountain town of Ruidoso at one of our favorite little lunch spots.

 Well on our way up the mountains, Sheryl said she wanted to check out the Inn of the Mountain Gods Resort and Casino that everyone here brags about. We both had our reservations about what it would be like, however we decided to check it out. One thing I must say is, we were very pleasantly surprised. The resort is beautiful and is situated on a clear mountain lake. They had a Sunday Brunch going at the Buffet, but we both said that would be such a waste for the cost as we both don't eat that much. We found the other restaurant in the resort and had a great breakfast there.

 We were lucky and scored a window seat with views of the lake and mountains.

 After lunch it was still pretty early so a Sunday drive through the mountains was in order. We drove through Ruidoso, but decided not to stop as it is just one big tourist trap (we hate places like that) and just spent time driving and enjoying the scenery.

 As we were coming down out of the mountains I remembered hearing about a small ghost town a few miles away. Ok, well more than just a few miles, but still in the same area as things go, so off we went. Upon arriving we were a bit disappointed, the town was there, however several of the buildings and homes had been bought and were being renovated. Most had no trespassing signs out so we could only look from afar.

 One that still had some public access was the old School House built in the late 1800s.

 There was this old safe on display outside, the sign says it was blown open during a robbery.

 As this was a mining boom town in its day, the wealthy town folk, built some beautiful homes out here in the middle of the desert mountains. After that it was just the ride home. All toll, our Sunday drive consisted of 150 miles of beautiful scenery and great company.

I leave you with this parting shot of just what this duck thought about having his picture taken. We had a great day together and looking forward to many more during our travels as Sheryl's back gets better and stronger.
Ok, that's it for now and keep Lovin Your Life as we do ours.

Eagle Ranch Pistachio's

 I know, I'm a bit behind in this post, but as I said before, dang if that life thing just didn't throw a monkey wrench in the works. Good news is, we beat life back and are on our way to living and loving it again. Ok, on to the post. We visited the Eagle Ranch Pistachio farm a couple of days after visiting the other one. I must say this one was a much better experience. The farm offers a tour as well as wine tastings and much nicer facility.

 During the tour, we learned, there is a male tree and a female tree. The male tree is larger and the branches point upward (typical male...lol) The female tree is smaller and the branches naturally point downward from the weight of the pistachios. The male tree are planted along the prevailing wind edge of the grove, so the wind can pollinate the female trees. We also learned the pistachio nuts are covered by a soft spongy membrane, this membrane allow the nuts shell to split open when its ripe and time to pick. So the nut splits on its own, and we all thought it split during the roasting process.....ahhhhh how Mother Nature has her way of fooling us.

 As with all modern plants the pistachios are first processed by machine.

 However, the final process is done by human eye, by these hard working ladies who have a keen eye for the bad ones that slip by. Below are some of my favorite pics from the day.

It was a good day, we did have to leave early as part of the tour included the final processing. In this processing room, the chili dust used to flavor the nuts was just unbearable for both of us to breath and affected us for a while after we left.
If all goes well, we should be headed out on the road again in just under 3 weeks......woooo hooooo!!! We ave a few places we want to see before we leave, so we'll be hitting those soon. Take Care and Keep Lovin Your Life as we do Ours......see ya next time.

Organ, NM.

 Organ, NM. is located east of Las Cruces at he foot of the mountain range separating it from the White Sands Missile Range. The small town started as a mining community in 1883 before drying up. It hosted military personnel during the Atom Bomb testing days, as the testing wore down, so did the little it. The town now stands empty along Hwy 70, you may just see it as a few abandoned buildings and annoying drop in the speed limit as you pass by. Here are a few pictures I stopped to take the other day. Enjoy.

Stop and check out some of the old abandoned towns during your travels, and relive a small piece of American History.
Take Care and remember to Love Your Life everyday!!!

Ole Glory and a Trip to the Mountains

 Ever since we bought the 5th wheel, I have been racking my brain trying to figure out how to mount a flag on her. As I have said before, sometimes the simplest solutions avaid me, then one day I'll have that Ah Ha moment!!  Well this week that Ah Ha moment came around, simply drilled and mounted the flag pole holder to the Kingpin box.

 A couple of metal screws and it's solid as a rock. Ole Glory's mount has even been tested pretty good, as we've had some pretty windy days lately as some cool fronts have been pushing through. I must say, I love the way the flag looks flying in the breeze mounted on the front of the rig!!!

 This week I also had some business to take care of over in Las Cruces, NM., so while I was there I thought I'd do a little exploring in the Dona Ana Mountains. The mountain lie just northeast of Las Cruces, between the White Sand Missle Range and I-25. The mountains are public land belonging to the BLM.

 I have been to the mountains before with the Jeep, but that was much farther north. I have never been to the southern area so that was this days adventure. I was ony out for a couple of hours and manly stuck to the easier trails as I was alone.

 All the trails out here are actually pretty easy, no real tech rock crawling reqired. What makes them give you alittle pucker factor is they can be very very steep both up and down as well as alittle sidways. I'll leave those for a later trip when I have some other folks around.

I love the vastness of the west, you can lose yourself for days out here and never see another sole, it's great when you just need to get away from it all. I must say ole Red performed very well out there, she's not the Jeep by any means, just have to get used to the stiff suspention and light rear end.

Just a quick update, it's been a crazy week or so as life hit us square in the face again, but we're fighting the good fight and thats all we can do.

Take Care and see ya next time.

McGinn's Pistachio Farm

 This week we have been doing the tourist thing again and hitting up a couple of the pistachio farms in the area. First stop was the McGinn's farm conveniently located across the street from the RV Park, so we just walked over. The big draw for this place is the giant pistachio nut out front, ah la, old school roadside attractions. Of course we had to have our picture taken with it!!

 

The farm has that old country store feel and decor, how ever it is not set up very well. There is one door in and they have the sample pistachios set up right as you walk in, so you have to push your way through all the kids and adults in the way.

 The farm also has a winery and you can sample their wine, and of course buy some if you so desire. Now Sheryl and I are not wine snobs by any means, but it seems as if all their wines had a very acidly taste, just not very pleasant to us. Below are some shots I took from around the farm.

 All in all we were disappointed in the place, too small and too crowded, the wines were not all that good. We wouldn't tell anybody not to stop here for a look, but it just wasn't for us. We did stop by another Pistachio farm down the street and had a much better experience, so stay tuned for that in our next post.

See Ya Then!!!

Found It!!!

You may remember a couple of posts back, we took a trip to Silver City, NM. On the way home we stopped in Demming for dinner at a local Brew Pub. While perusing the beer selection I noticed they had a Green Chili Beer, so I just had to try it. The beer was very good with a truly New Mexico twist. I wanted to talk to the brewmaster and complement him on his beer. Well low and behold, this just happened to be the only beer on the menu he does not brew, he actually buys it from another brewery. We chatted for a bit and he told me the name of the brewery and we left for home. Well as you can imagine, my memory stinks, and I couldn't for the life of me remember the name he told me.....ahhhh whats new. A few days later I was still intrigued with the brew, so I set about on an internet search to find the brewery that crafted this fine cerveza. After a bit of searching I had found my elusive prey.....you gotta love the internet.
The beer was brewed by the Rio Grande Brewing Co. in Moriarty, NM. Now my next task was to find it locally, I didn't set out on a mission to find it, rather I just looked in all the normal places we shop. Well, today while at Walgreens, there it was sitting proudly on the shelf, with all the other specialty beers. Of course I picked up a six and am enjoying a cold Pancho Verde Chile Cerveza.....ahhhhhhhh good stuff. I believe 'll be picking up a case to take on our travels to share with friends and family and let them taste a true New Mexican beverage.
As I enjoy my cold one, don't forget to Love Your Life as we do ours.....Take Care and Cheers!!!

Cloudcroft and a Day in the Mountains

 Thursday was a day to get out of the house for a bit. Since we are going to be here for another 6 weeks, we thought we'd take a look at some of the RV parks up in the mountains. We have givin thought to moving to one of the mountain RV parks for a change of scenery and cooler temps when our time is up here.

On our way up we stopped in at the Old Apple Barn, it's a typical tourist stop which sells all kinds of goodies and trinkets in a old country atmostshere. It was fun looking at all the old stuff and things for sale. We only stayed for a 1/2 hour or so and then it was farther up into the mountains.

 I'll spare you the blow by blow on all the little RV parks up here. Most are pretty tight, small spaces, no TV reception and no WiFi. Great places for a weekend getaway or week long stay, but for any longer it could get old quick. However if you have satellite TV and don't depend on wifi, these mountain RV parks would be a nice getaway from the desert summer heat. So we decided to just stay where were at until it's time to head out, as the temps should start cooling off a bit soon.

One great thing about spending the day in the mountains, was the wild flowers were in full bloom, everywhere you looked it was just beautiful.

The day was getting on and we had planned on being home for dinner, however, our tummies had different plans, as we got pretty hungry staying out later than we planned. We stopped in the small mountain town of Cloudcroft for dinner at one of our favorite places, the Western Bar and Grill. We got into town just after 5:00pm and as you can see the sidewalks roll up pretty early here, but that's the charm, it's not so touristy that is loses its small town roots. Well after filling ourselves with Chicken Fried Steak and Honey Battered Fried Chicken (yes, we chose the healthy heart options.....lol). It was time to head home and back down to the desert heat. One can get used to 70 degree temps pretty quickly after a few months of upper 90s and 100s.

Ok, that was our quick day out, take care and we'll see you back here again in a few days.