RV podcast: surprising wonders in New Mexico
What’s there to do in New Mexico? We gather a group of RVers to find out some of the best, and often surprising, things there are to do in the Land of Enchantment. From beautiful hikes to incredible campgrounds, dark skies, historic places and more New Mexico offers a lot more than many may realize.
This is our 200th episode so we’re also celebrating that as well.
Other places to hear the podcast
Our friends from New Mexico who appeared on this podcast (from L-R); Tony Barthel, Bryan Camus, Patrick Reed, Peggy Barthel, Dr. Mike Trobec, Lisa Trobec, Micki Ziegler, Michael Ziegler.
Mentioned on this episode
There are a tremendous number of links to the places our guests mentioned.
We also recently did an article about Bottomless Lakes State Park.
Ruidoso https://www.ruidoso.net/
Fort Stanton https://www.fortstanton.org/
Taos https://taos.org/
Santa Fe https://www.santafe.org/
Jemez Pueblo https://www.jemezpueblo.org/
Los Alamos https://visitlosalamos.org/
Vallas Caldera National Preserve https://www.nps.gov/vall/index.htm
Deming City of Rocks https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/city-of-rocks-state-park/
Rockhound State Park https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/rockhound-state-park/
Aguirre Springs Recreation Area https://www.blm.gov/visit/aguirre-spring-campground
White Sands National Park https://www.nps.gov/whsa/index.htm
Organ Mountains National Monument https://www.blm.gov/programs/national-conservation-lands/new-mexico/organ-mountains-desert-peaks-national-monument
Vista Linda near Jemez https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/santafe/recarea/?recid=75836
Boondocking at Fenton Lake State Park https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/fenton-lake-state-park/
Acoma Pueblo Sky City https://www.newmexico.org/native-culture/native-communities/acoma-sky-city
Aqua Piedra campground https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/234700
Brantley Lake State Park near Carlsbad https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/brantley-lake-state-park/
Cosmic Campground International Dark Sky Sanctuary https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/gila/recarea/?recid=82479
Ancient way walk sculptures at El Morro National Monument https://www.nps.gov/elmo/planyourvisit/hiking.htm
Elephant Butte State Park https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/elephant-butte-lake-state-park/
Chama: City Guide https://www.newmexico.org/places-to-visit/regions/northcentral/chama or Rio Grande Recreation Area https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/riogrande/recarea/?recid=29628 OR El Vado Lake State Park https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/el-vado-lake-state-park/
Cumbres and Toltec railroad: https://cumbrestoltec.com
Navajo Lake State Park https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/navajo-lake-state-park/
Carson National Forest near Taos https://www.fs.usda.gov/carson
Coronado campground and historic site https://www.tobnm.gov/departments/coronado_campground/index.php and https://nmhistoricsites.org/coronado
Bosque Brewing Company https://www.bosquebrewing.com/
Wines of the San Juan Harvest Host https://www.winesofthesanjuan.com/
Hatch https://www.newmexico.org/places-to-visit/regions/southwest/hatch/
Gila River and Cliff Dwellings near Silver City has nice KOA https://www.newmexico.org/places-to-visit/regions/southwest/silver-city https://koa.com/campgrounds/silver-city/
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Automated transcription of this week’s podcast episode
Welcome to the weekly podcast, all about turning the great American RV adventure into Stressless camping. Each week we explore tips, tricks, ideas, and destinations, and talk to the happiest campers in the RV world. Pull up a seat at the campfire as we enjoy some Stressless camping.
Welcome to the Campfire.
I'm Tony.
I'm Peggy.
And we're two RV industry veterans who travel part-time.
in a small trailer
Looking to share big adventures and help you with great tips,
Tricks
And discounts.
We are home <laugh>. Yeah. For a while. Little while. We are spending Tony's birthday week here at home.
And our anniversary too.
And our anniversary. And we have been hanging out with friends and it's been super fun. And you know, on Tony's birthday we invited some people over and Tony fired up the smoker and made a delicious brisket.
I was really both apprehensive and impressed with what happened. So <laugh>, we have one of those little pellet smokers and uh, I went to a local butcher shop and got a pretty big Bri, what was it like 12 pounds? It was huge. <laugh>. It was huge. And literally smoked the thing overnight. Yeah. The next day. Oh my gosh. It was so good. It was exactly all the things. Eat my dust. Bs this brisket was awesome.
<laugh>. Yeah, it was great. It had great bark, good amount of burnt ins and just delicious and tender and fantastic. And we are eating it every day. <laugh>. It's so good. Yeah.
So we are at episode number 200,
200 <laugh>.
And I mean, I'm gonna brag on us just a little bit. We have never missed a deadline with the podcast. We have had 200 episodes every Thursday morning. Yep. At 2:00 AM Well
On occasion you accidentally put PM and then it comes out at 8:00 AM when we wake up in relax.
Yeah. Wake up and I'm like, dog on it. But yeah. Okay. So other than operator error, it's been every Thursday. Every
Thursday morning something. Yeah.
At about 2:00 AM <laugh>.
So yeah. So 200 times. So we're nearing our fourth anniversary in a couple of months, which will be another celebration for us. But two hundred's. A good number. I like it.
Yeah. And so, you know, we couldn't do this without you otherwise we'd just be too dark sitting in a room or in a trailer, <laugh> talking to ourselves, which is what we do quite
Frequently. I would do anyway. But you get to hear the benefit of that for about an hour a week. Oh
Yeah. If you call it a benefit, you call it a <laugh>.
And so this week we asked for the help of our local friends and while the brisket was on the smoker and everybody was smelling brisket, we asked them to sit around the fire and tell us about their favorite places to camps.
As some of you know who have followed us for a while. We moved our home base. Basically we moved our junk from Northern California to New Mexico and then we basically left. Right. For example, our most recent trip has been 50 days on the road. Yeah. We have not really had the opportunity to do much camping in New Mexico. Correct. And so we asked some friends to share their favorite camping adventures and boy did they come through.
Yeah. So I guess I'm gonna zip my app now, <laugh>. And uh, we will play that back. And, and the best thing is you can hear the smoker grinding away. <laugh> <laugh>. Without any further ado and with a bit of smoker in the background, <laugh>, I wish this was a, uh, smell. Smell of
Vision.
Right. Here we go to visiting New Mexico.
Welcome to Tony's birthday. Candles. Oh dear
<laugh>. And episode number 200.
So number 200. We're sitting around a campfire with some of our New Mexico friends, and since we're sitting around talking about camping anyway, why don't we ask the experts to tell us where we should camp in New Mexico. So, welcome Michael
And Mickey.
Michael and Lisa. Patrick
And Brian. Some of us are more accustomed to talking on a microphone than I guess would be Tony and me cuz everyone else is like shy and doesn't wanna say anything. But just pretend you don't have a microphone with you and just pretend like we're sitting around the campfire. Just chatting.
Last week we camped with four of the six of the people here. Yes. Or would that be six of the eighth? Anyway, <laugh>, because Brian and Patrick were not able to join us. They were in New Orleans area. <laugh> enjoying themselves. They were
Eating boudin
Boudin. Oh my gosh. So we all went camping. And what I found was the guide references that we had to bottomless Lakes said there's kind of not a whole lot to do. And boy, you guys came through with some epic adventures, which we did share on our website, but we thought there's gotta be a lot to do here in New Mexico. And since now we encumbered the state with our <laugh>
Presences,
Maybe we could share some great tips and ideas of things to do and see in New Mexico.
So just to start off, I'll say that we camped together at bottomless Lake State Park last weekend. Yeah. It was really fun. And that was, that's close to Roswell. So we did take a day trip to Roswell, but then also we took a day trip to a couple other places. I'm gonna ask Michael and Mickey to explain, because I know the names of the towns, but that's kind of all I can explain. <laugh>.
Yeah, we had some good times. I did a lot of traveling a long time ago throughout New Mexico, so I got some weird knowledge about just some weird different places in New Mexico. Not that RDO is weird, but we had a nice drive to Rio Doso. Beautiful scenery. Showed you, uh, in of the mountain, gods beautiful view over the lake. We saw some elk, we saw some deer. You know, I really enjoy it down there because it's the mountains and that's where my heart is. And then of course we swung around to Fort Stanton and that, that's actually my first time there.
That was an excellent surprise.
Yeah, that was,
That really was.
So Fort Staton was unusual because it's an old fort and it was also a tuberculosis, I guess getaway
The fifties.
Yeah. Yeah. And there was history of both of those there. Yeah. In fact, something that has surprised me, Michael and Mickey have taken us a number of times on journeys through New Mexico. And I think before I got here, you assume, hey, I'm going to the, I'm gonna go live in the desert. Yeah. <laugh> and my gosh, there are forests and mountains and skiing and things. You may or may not associate with this state. Right.
We have all four seasons and you can be in the desert and then up in Taos or Santa Fe or Red River within a couple hours.
They're these gorgeous forests. It surprised the heck outta me. There was also a really good brewery up there. Right. <laugh>. But wait, there were a few,
Right? A handful. <laugh> <laugh>. In fact, the first time that Michael and Mickey took us on a day trip and we went up toward,
Through the hammus around through Los Alamos.
CAA Valdez.
Yes. Uh, vias. Calera. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, dropped down around through Santa Fe. It's a great loop.
As soon as we started it, climb up into the trees and stuff, Tony's like, oh, there are trees here. There's mountains. Yeah. I thought I was just in a big old flat desert. So, yeah.
So Peggy and I are very different in, I guess our appreciation for landscape. Peggy is a desert person and I'm a forest person for sure. So I, I do Miss Redwoods, but there's beautiful forest here too, which was a huge surprise.
Northern New Mexico is stunning. I mean it's the really far southern tip of the Rockies. So that's where we get that beauty from. Hmm. And we have that elevation too. Having that elevation though is always helpful and nice. Yeah.
It's always interesting cuz New Mexico is so diverse. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, like down where we were in Roswell and I think one of our favorite places that we've camped was down near Deming in City of Rocks. An
Amazing campground that we really love. Volcanoes and volcanic, uh, formations. And we learned a lot camping down there because we,
We were camping at City of Rocks, which is another dark sky site, which we love. Yeah. Beautiful stars at night. And we had run and we had spent a day at Rock Hunt mm-hmm. <affirmative> State Park. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, which is kind of nestled back in the crook of two mountains and you can just see for miles and miles and miles. Beautiful. It was gorgeous. And we really learned a different appreciation for that part of New Mexico. Although it can get really, really, really hot <laugh>
That's a winter destination. <laugh>.
I think we were down there in March, April last year and it was 98. Oh my. And we were in our little tuna fish can our little safari condo alto, which is made of aluminum. And we just could not cool that camper off fast. Awesome.
It
Was so hot. But we had a great time in Deming. Yeah. We've loved New Mexico. Mm-hmm.
<affirmative>. That was another thing I really appreciated about bottomless lakes was it was these gorgeous dark skies and they didn't feel the need to light that campground up like a Christmas tree. Right. I mean, they just really celebrate that dark sky experience. And so walking around at night was just, I saw 12, 13 stars. It was amazing.
I saw dozens of them.
<laugh> I
Saw
14.
Oh, you stayed up later. There's
Another little campground down that Wayra Springs, which is right in the Oregon Mountains off of, what's the big sand? White
Sand. Oh, white
Sands. Sands. White Sands. In fact, getting to it, you can't be longer than 25 feet because of the switchbacks, but when you get there, it's all boom docking and it's right in the foot of the Oregon Mountains. And we were there at the end of winter, I think it was. So there were still snow cap on top of the Oregon mountains. And they're named there because they look like Pipe Park Oregon. And it was, it was such a wonderful spot. It was so quiet and peaceful. No lights really a great spot to be in. But don't go there if you're long <laugh>.
They
Say 25 feet and they mean 25 feet. Feet.
Yeah. No, Brian and Patrick just got a new grand design fifth wheel. So would you take that there?
No. Okay. It's 30 foot. But for my birthday, which was last month, Brian bought a truck tent with a truck mattress, air mattress department. We put it up yesterday to try and it's great. Can't wait to get out and Good. So gonna, that's what we would take there. We'd pull a little trailer, a little utility trailer with all the camp gear and gone. Others a great idea.
That's so funny because we've been tent shopping. Yeah. Yeah. So,
So we can
Do same thing.
You put it on the ground, run the pipes like
The fishing poles. Yeah.
That's what they
Remind
Me of. And then, then just pick the whole thing and put it on the truck. Strap it under, under the bed of the truck great's.
Awesome. So you're off the ground, but you're still covered. We're
Off the ground. The still covered
To me the mattress would be the important part.
The mattress is the important, the, the other thing is we're, we're looking into getting a, a power source. A solar charged, uh, power source so that we can, if we need to run a little fan, we can run a little or some lights.
I think you may have a friend who's got at least two jacks in the garage. <laugh>, you welcome to borrow.
He's got two.
I've been waiting for one to be dropped off at my front door.
<laugh>.
Well, the other one you, the truck is right outside. We just <laugh>. But the other place that, uh, Mike and I were talking earlier in Hammus we found is Linda Vista. Mm-hmm. It's five miles from Hammus Springs and about five miles from the visitors center, the wallet tower, uh, visitor center. And there's one site. It's only 14 spots. You go around the corner and when you go around there's this little spots.
You let it out. Don't, but we can't
Tell. You don't.
And, and the thing is that if you, you back in and then you have your campsite and it's wooded all around. And then there's a walkway right down to the river. And right there there's a bunch of boulders in the river. So all evening you're here in the running water of the river of the hammus. Awesome. I
Was telling Patrick, Lisa and I were up there cuz we had been in Hammus and we were driving through and we went through that campground. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I think that's the campsite that we identified as, oh, we need to come back up and take, that's the one
Because
I could just walk out the back and throw a fly fish and, you know, fly right in the river and catch some fish. Nice. Don't
Show up out the afternoon
Thinking you're gonna get it. <laugh> just saying,
I usually go on Wednesday to make sure I have it. And during the summertime it's a big, uh, family place. So you'll get several campers there. And it's a big party on the weekends. And
The great thing about the hammus, if you get up to where Fenton Lake is. Yes. And you take, I don't know, the road that connects to Cuba, there's a ton of boondocking a that area because it's a huge area for elk and deer hunters during elk and deer season. So there's a ton of area to boondock. There's a lake San Gregorio lake. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. It's a hike in only lake. So you got, you know, people just boondocking everywhere. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and then pulling their little pull behind boat, up this trail to San Gregorio or just bringing their, their rods and rails to go fishing up there.
We rode up there. Well we've been up there twice, just looking. The last time we went we almost didn't get out. The roads were so ice. Oh. Oh. But it was so absolutely gorgeous. The forest was just covered with snow and,
And a lot of wildlife.
Lot of wildlife. Lions, tigers and bears. Oh
My <laugh>. That's what we saw at that wilderness exhibit. Right. We did see lions, tigers, and bears. Were there tigers? No tigers. No
Tigers. There are lions.
A mountain lion. Yeah, mountain mountain
Lion. We saw the mountain lion. We saw the bobcat. Yep. Bobcat. We saw the Catalinas.
Turtles.
Turtles, turtles. Snakes. Oh, Tony.
Well no, I missed, Tony missed, I, I must have been distracted during the snakes going through thing because the
Only snake I have seen was one Rattler and he was dead right outside our campground. Fresh keel. Somebody ran over him or something. He was full, he'd just eaten. And so I told the rangers about him and they came and it was interesting. They cut the head off and threw the head one side of the street and the body on the other. But before they did, they cut the rattler off and gave it to me. So I have the Rattler for that one. Oh, these snake that I've seen. But he looked like he was coming towards I camp keeping
A decapitated head. It could still latch down
On you. That's what they were telling us. That's why we didn't mess with it. So
Mount that rattle on a ear hoop and then we'll be twins. Cuz I've got one. You do
<laugh>. I wanna put one, I've got a feather that I bought from the Laguna guy. Haven't found anybody to put my snake on. But I realized what I can do is just get a fine drill and drill through the end of it. Yep. And then put a hoop. Yep. And I can put something. And I'm going down to the Native American holiday, which is this week. Starts tomorrow. Yeah.
The big powwow.
Big powwow is next week, weekend. And so I'm hoping to go down there. There's
A tremendous Native American culture here in New Mexico. No,
It's huge. There's Pu Pueblos here. We have my team Pueblos here in, in New Mexico, but we also have Navajo and Apache who are not pueblos.
Are there opportunities to visit those?
I think they're all open now. Some of them still require you to wear your mask, but most of the Pueblos are open now. Aima is beautiful.
Sky city.
Sky City. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. That's beautiful.
And even Hames on the Pueblo and
Ham, they
Have a nice cultural center where you drive and you can go through and tour. And when is it that they have the lights? Is that around Christmas? Oh, where they have the whole hames in Hames Springs is all the canarias, the, the
Me bags with Oh
Yeah. Yeah. And then they have the dancing and food and everything else. They have a big cultural thing in the winter where you can go and be part of it. Is
That by the welcome center? Yes. I
Think it's light of the ruins. I think it's what it's
Ruins. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> love that place. Yeah, I know those, those pueblos are really cool. The ACMA Sky City's incredible for Tony and Peggy. It's up on a, up on a bluff. Yeah. And they built Sky City up there was because defensively it was the best position from whomever hundreds of years ago.
No bluffing, <laugh>.
I have a picture of an old Aima woman and a friend of mine painted it years and years ago. He, he worked for studios in Los Angeles, but he would come to New Mexico every year to paint. And so he painted her. And I had, uh, a friend who lives across the street now. She came in, she's Aima. And she walked in and said, oh yeah, that's, uh, and she named her. She said, yeah, she loves to sit down on the street and talk to tourists. But she had posed for him. Uh, and you should see this picture.
The, the detail is so beautiful. But when I was in 1972, I started in college here in Albuquerque at, uh, what is St. Pius 10th now? Used to be the University of Albuquerque Paloma
Mater. There you
Go. I started college there. It was with Franciscan Group. So we went up to the mission up there. That was so fascinating. Alma is so beautiful.
At least last time I was up there 20 years ago, there were still people that lived up in some of those homes too.
Oh they do? Yeah. The, the girl across the street, her family still lives there. Jean Oh is her name. And her family still lives in Aloma.
And we're not talking sticks and bricks. We're talking
Adobe. Straight
Up. Adobe. Adobe.
Really? That's so cool.
Like Taos, the Pueblo in Taos is over a thousand years and is continuously occupied by Taos Indians. Now the the interesting thing, I met a girl who's a Taos at my doctor's office. She no longer lives there because her great-grandfather moved out of the pueblo. And once you do, you lose the right to that home. Huh. And he goes to somebody else who's still living there
Because it's owned by the pueblo.
It's owned by the Pueblo.
Taos. Pueblo is gorgeous because it's that stereotypical picture you have of pueblo's of the stacked homes with multiple stories. All Adobe.
It's awesome. Yeah, there's a great, uh, there's a campground. When you go up to Taos, you go up to the gorge, which is absolutely fantastic. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, there's a campground up there that's, it's high. It's in the open plains you can see for just miles to miles. Miles. And it's a beautiful place to camp. And you can go right down to the gorge or you can get it back on and go the other way to the forest.
We boon docked Right as you crossed the gorge going towards those, uh, earth ship homes. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. And you can take a couple dirt roads and literally boondock right on the edge of the gorge. Oh. That we were sitting there and you could literally just look straight down. We're watching people paddle boring kayaking. Yeah. Everything.
You have to lock the doors in case anybody's a sleepwalker.
<laugh>. Yes. Yeah. I don't wanna walk out. And next thing you hear us,
Oh gosh. I'm actually gonna have a chance to go to that area to Taos and stay at Agua Pire campground with the Girl camper group in July. Oh, that's neat. That's neat. So that's, I'll get to see a part of the state that Tony doesn't get to see because No, because no boys allow. Yeah.
My plumbing, my plumbing is inappropriate for the group. What
Was your rules and girls drool
<laugh>.
The Rio Grande is looking pretty high this year. Year It is. When you're up there, the Taos box, which is right there is a great river place to whitewater wrapping. You go, you go right through the gorge under the bridge and you see big horn sheep up there. And it might be a really
Good year.
You guys might want to plan, you're looking for something. Adventure wrapping trip. Okay.
I read an article a couple days ago that Navajo Lake, which is up in Northern New Mexico. It's in New Mexico and Colorado. It's 16 feet higher than what it was this time last year. Wow. And one day it rose like 18 inches. That's
Good for us.
We've had a great year. That water and the Rio Grande's really gonna be flowing.
There's a lot of water stuff here. I was surprised when we went to Carlsbad where there's water related things there, frankly.
Lanes,
Pistachios,
Bentley. Yeah,
Pistachios
Too. We wanted, I tried to get, um, a spot there cuz we were gonna come from New Orleans and just go straight over to Carlsbad but we couldn't get a spot at the park. Just totally booked. That's what I was Great.
We tried the same thing you did because it's always busy. And that's the one I pointed out when we were
Driving up. I guess you have to, you have to book real early,
I guess. I'm glad we didn't try it. We rearranged our route a little bit in order to meet you guys at bottomless Lake. Yeah. And so we skipped the Carlsbad stop for this trip. Maybe I should start planning now for whenever we're gonna be there the next time. Yeah,
We'll have to go. I mean that was, that was really fun having the group and of course Brian and Patrick. Hopefully we'll be not traveling all over next time so they can join us as well.
We were gallivant
Gallivanting.
We have mama obligation. Yeah,
I understand that.
Who's priority number one? We
Have. Absolutely.
And boudin,
We have to stop going.
Yeah. I won't promise anything cuz this is just how I am. But maybe I could give you more than 10 days notice next time. <laugh>.
That would work. You'll spoil us. That would work.
That would be insane. I
Can't make any promises. Um, just not that good. Planner.
Another campground that we really enjoyed here is Cosmic Campground. I don't know if you've ever been there, but it's Southwest and it is a, the
B
Rla right? It's it's down by the, the large array. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Oh, okay. Um, it is out in the middle of nowhere and it is one of the darkest places in the United States. Ooh. And these guys who were astronomers, they set up this campground and when you go there, it's first come first serve and every campsite has concrete pads for telescopes. Oh wow. And it's a huge astronomy site. And you can also boondock around, which is what we do. It's uh, there's no hookups. Uh, first come, first serve, but when you're there all night long, there's no white lights are are allowed.
And people are out there where their telescopes looking at the sky at night. And it's a very, very cool place. If you like dark skies.
I always have to go with, there's other people cuz I always want to go out and see the stars. Oh yeah. I want to go look at the stars. Then I think open the doors. Just lion and tigers in there. Oh my. I can't, I can't bring myself to step out the camera. Especially at night. Oh there's a snake down there somewhere as I know. Okay. We'll
Protect you.
You know, coyotes ate my shoes right outside the camper. Yeah. Here,
Here on the property. Yeah, here
Actually at our,
Here's your house.
Coyote ate my shoe Monday
Night after we finished dinner or whatever and we went our separate ways. I was cleaning up and about a two inch long scorpion came running out from underneath my propane. So yeah.
Where was saw that? That was at
The, that was the bottomless lake. Oh yeah.
Lakes. I've got friends who find scorpions in their bathtubs. They've got towels along the doors to keep them. Oh dear. But they come in anyway.
Found a mouse in the bed of our truck too. He, yeah. That's odd. He looked at me, we said hello and then I went about my thing and I was like, I'll deal with him later. And then I never found him again. So
How, I wonder how he got up in there. Oh
They do. My friends have a 25 foot airstream and they went in one day cuz they don't can't year round. They, they can't. Two, three weeks a year. <laugh> guess
They're seasonal. Damn.
It's only one season. <laugh>.
So they went in and they pulled the drawers where all silverware and all that stuff was ness. Oh boy. Mices field mice Nest had eaten wires. Uh, they had to scrub down the entire thing. Oh dear.
Yeah, we're gonna change the subject cuz this is one of my most giant fears in the world is mice and rats
Get, get cats
With
The smell of Tony's brisket cooking out back. I'm sorry. I know you, you have some coyotes out there. I thought we were gonna have
The wind a porch full of coyotes when we woke up this morning.
Morning. Well yeah, we were actually concerned leaving it overnight. We're like, I wonder if it's so hot if they go to the barbecue, if they'll like not open it. And fortunately it survived the night. Now the porch, the back porch is gonna smell like brisket cuz when I pulled it out of the smoker I spilled a bunch of the juice on the woods.
So they'll be the wood. They'll be here. Yeah, they'll
Be here. They'll be here. Yeah. So we mentioned, I think we mentioned El Morro. Right. So there's the El Morro monument that has the campsite, but then the ancient way campground there when you walk behind, they have the ancient way walk. That's a walk all the way up to the top of the mountain. You can go to the top of the mountain behind there. And all along there they have sculptures that people do with all kinds of cans, spoons, whatever. Oh fine.
Whatever they
Find. Whatever they find. And it's just sculptured all the way up. And there's even a swing. You get way up there. There's a swing that you can sit in and overlook. The whole area in the back is gorgeous. It's a beautiful place. We're going. I'm going. I'm going again. I have a good friend who lives up there.
Now I know that there has been a time that Brian and Patrick, you told us and we were not around to go with you, but you went to Elephant Butte. Oh.
But we've
Been there a couple times. Elephant
Butte is good. Don't go during the summer because it's packed with boaters and kids. Oh. But if you go during the winter, we've been up there twice and it's quiet and you just look over the lake. And that's one of the reasons we bought the trailer. We did. Cuz now it has the dinette in the back with back around windows. Oh mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So you get up there and you back in and all you see is the lake and the mountains on the other side. It's a beautiful place to go. But don't go in busy season cuz it's loaded with kids.
Okay. Yeah. The bes and No-no. During the summertime. Oh
Yeah. So maybe we should go round as a kind of drawing to conclusion and just everyone say your favorite place to go in New Mexico.
And I'm taking a list so that I can plan our next few trips. Yeah,
Well hopefully everybody can join next few
Group trips. Group
Trips. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And a new campfire. Yeah.
New campfires.
We love just Northern New Mexico. No one place in specific Red River, that area. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, Questa. That area is just, it's stunning. So that would be my go-to area.
And that is sort of a summertime destination cuz it's up and higher and colder. Right. So yeah,
Trees late
Spring, summer up through, probably mid-October. First part of November. Okay. Yeah.
We didn't even talk about this one, but one that I'm hoping to do this fall and we're hoping somebody can join us as we really want to do Chama. Oh. Because Chama New Mexico, it's northwest. It's up towards Colorado. They get a ton of snow in the winter, but there's good trout fishing and we really want to go because the old train from Chama goes up to Santo up through the mountains with a foliage. And then we've heard it's just absolutely beautiful. So we had talked to you about that.
Yeah. We're we're planning on doing that this fall. So,
Okay. You had me,
What's the lake up there? There's outside of Chama, there's a dam and I can't remember the name of it. Yeah, I don't know because we camped there and we drove into Chama. Yep.
It's not Abaki is it?
It's not aba. We've been there and that's nice too. But this one here is just, it's really gorgeous. You gotta go up and cross the dam.
Is it Navajo Lake?
Yeah, it could be Navajo. Navajo Lake. Because we ended up, we took the road going to it and all a sudden the road said, oh, highway ends. You're on a patch. Land
On Ave Road. Next 18
Miles. 18 miles all the way up. And then we got up there and there's the dam and there's this right turn. And I don't mean a curb, a right turn, 90 degree angle that you have to go and you can barely fit across the dam to get to the lake. Wow. And, and, but it's right outside of Chama. We want to do that.
Well we knew if we wanted to get Peggy and Tony, especially Tony, if we can combine camping and trains.
Oh, you're golden. Yeah.
You're, that's a absolutely. There you go right there. I do have a one track mind. Oh yeah. <laugh>. But camping is my favorite way to get sidetracked.
Favorites.
One of the other places we went that we really like was Silverton, Colorado. We went and we stayed in the National Forest. Before you get to Silverton, there's a national forest and you just turned down and it's boondocking and it's woods and a river. Very, very nice place. Silverton is great. We did the million dollar road up to Yep. Ure. Ure. Yeah. That was awesome. And then we tried to do the <inaudible> trail in a Ford F two 50
<laugh>.
Michael tried that too. No,
We've, we've done that whole
You did in a
Jeep? No, in a Pathfinder. And we dropped down into the little town of Fer. Yeah. It's actually not even a town. It's just a community. There is kids and it's a dirt road and there's kids selling lemonade Right at the entrance.
Now do they call it that? Because you go there and you go, oh, for Pete's sake, why did I get, what was
Our favorite? What would you say would be our favorite
In New Mexico?
In New Mexico. In
New Mexico, for me it's gonna be a toss up between City Rocks and if we don't have that much time. Vista Vista
Linda. Yeah, Vista Lindas.
Because that's so, I mean hour and a half tops and you're there.
Okay.
Oh
That's nice out here. Cause everything is hard. Mountains. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> Yeah.
Are just beautiful. But Taos is, you know, we stayed at a campground up in Taos in the, uh, national Forest there. And that was the only place I've seen a bear. <laugh>. He ran across, walking
Down the road going from one house to the next. <laugh>
Begging.
This was a pushy there. <laugh>
Begging
For It was more like a biscuit.
<laugh>.
You got any snacks?
Uh, I'm really looking for some porridge. Yeah. Yeah. Then I want to sleep it off. But I don't want to bed to be too hard or too soft. <laugh>,
It has to be just right. Yeah,
That's right. I don't know if there's too many bad places to camp in New Mexico. They're
Very different. There's a lot of different, depends on the time of year. You go to each one, depending on elephant view. Do not go during this summer.
Go stop.
Too crowded. Um, so we actually stayed in the campground up in Bernillo, right by the Oh
Yeah. Corona. Corona. Corona. That's where we met you. Shore
Site by
Post Escape Brewery. Yes. By
Both gates, by bus Cape Brewery.
And we, over last summer, we lived there a total of about a month and never went to the store site. That's embarrassing to admit. Yeah, right. But we were busy house hunting in our defense
And going to the bus gate brewery. <laugh>. Yeah.
Yeah. And even that, what you guys showed us was that, I mean, we camped because we knew we needed to, uh, not use our facilities all the time because they had water and electric, but they don't have sewer. And we didn't wanna have to hook up too many times while we were there, there. But the sites that have less hookups, I think, but they're right. Overlooking the river. Oh
Yeah. That's where you guys were.
There's uh, sites and it overlooks the river. <laugh>.
Get him again. I'm just saying
<laugh>.
It overlooks the river and it's just beautiful. But then there's site A, which a little bit further there's A, A and B that are right together than there's a cooking place. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and then there's C and D or whatever. But a I got in there, I took, I took a long time to park the trailer and guys came up and said, you need some help? No, no. I know exactly how I wanted because I wanted to put my trailer so that it was angled. So that when you looked out, when you sat outside, all you saw were the fields or the prairie or whatever.
The desert on the other side of the river and said it was gorgeous. Yeah. They were quailed, they're road runners all over the place. Great. So
You don't really think of that as a destination necessarily, cuz it's right there in town. Right. Yeah. But it was a great little
Yeah. And you overlooked the Rio Grande. And
I took a walk every day and I'd walk over to the like non hookup part where a lot more tents are, but there's also space for trailers and stuff. So it's a great, that is kind of little secret place right. In the town.
And if you go, like during the fall, there's all the ducks, geese, they're floating down the river. Oh it really is nice.
I don't like those guys. They always make wise quacks.
Geez. Smart.
I will say one final thing. Our, our favorite place is a starting point to get up north. And we've talked about, this is the, uh, harvest host, the wines of the San Juan. We really, really, really like it there outside of Aztec because they have power, they have water and they have wine. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. Yes. Beautiful cottonwood trees. Beautiful.
And where
Is it? East of Aztec, New Mexico.
We stayed at a winery in New Mexico also.
We stayed at a winery in Las Cruces. Yeah. Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
<affirmative> have a harvest.
Harvest. And that was, they had music and good wine. Yeah. And food. They had tacos. Of course. We didn't even talk about Green Chi. Well about Chilis. <laugh>. That's another topic for another
Day's. Yeah. I want to go to Hatch.
I do too.
Yeah. Yeah. Just
Go. I'd love to go to Hatch.
Our daughter goes to Las New Mexico State in Las Cruces. So the last two years we swing through Hatch and get our chili.
So we Oh man. Yeah. At Bottomless Lakes, we still would drive like 60 miles or something to go to Ruidoso. So it's not like you have to camp on Hatch. You just have to camp somewhere in a driving vicinity to go spend a day there. If
You're going to City of Rocks, you go right through, right through Hatch. You go right through. We've been through so many times and I keep telling Brian, I'd like to stop here sometime. And he just keeps driving. <laugh>.
The final final thing is we do want to explore the Gila, which is down in the Silver City area.
We've done that. Yeah.
We really want to get down there. We love Silver City. That's a fun little city. We
Love the Koa. There's very nice, it's not, it's Koa, but when you're there, we've done it. We were here many, many years ago in the, uh, we had a motor coach and we had, we pulled the Saturn and we took a Saturn all the way up into the mountains. You went to visit one of the mines. I went to the mines. Okay. Driving down this road and there's no end. I'm praying. Nobody's coming in any other direction. Tell grinding, look to the right, look to the right, keep looking to the right <laugh>. And then you get up there, it's how do you turn around to get outta <laugh>.
But it's beautiful up in that area. There's
Lots of good exploring to do in, in New Mexico. There's so many varied kind of environments and locations and it's a drive. There's a lot of distance in between a lot of places cuz it's such a big state. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But it's so diverse and there's so many fun places to see.
Yeah. We have been so fortunate to have met all of you and spent time with all of you and your outstanding tour guides and phenomenal friends. And we're, that's just, we're very grateful for all of you in our lives. Your BD
Shirt, <laugh>, take off right now. I'm good. <laugh>. Throw another log on the fire and check that brisket's. Right. Thanks
Everybody for hanging out with us around our campfire and just having a campfire chat. We love it. Maybe we'll get to do this again. Maybe not from our own home, but from a campground would be kind of fun too. Yeah, let's go check out the brisket.
It's pretty close. I've been watching it on my phone. All right.
All right. I'm so inspired. I'm so excited for many, many adventures, you know, with our friends or by ourselves or whatever. So thank you to Michael and Mickey and Mike and Lisa and Patrick and Brian. Thank you guys all so much for all of the great destinations that you were willing to share. And don't worry, Brian, I did zip out the site number that Patrick accidentally gave away. Oh, you might have noticed
<laugh> and another group that we really are appreciative of. Of course it's all of the people who listen to the podcast and that's, it's would be a pretty decent sized city if you put 'em all together, which would be kind of a fun camping trip. The others are the people who have stepped up to be sponsors. And of course one of those we talk about now every week, which is ABC Upfitters. And when we go about choosing people that we talk about it's companies or services that we truly appreciate and enjoy and believe in.
Absolutely. There's recently been information in the media about some companies that have turned out to be less than reputable. And so we're really careful not to work with companies that we don't typically use ourselves. Right. And as you may know, 50 days on the road in our Rockwood Mini Light and we have the ABC Outfitters Power package installed in that and it just performed remarkably well. So we
Were able to spend a lot of those 50 nights without being hooked up boondocking in different places and not having to be concerned about if it gets too warm, can we turn the air conditioner on for a minute? Can I microwave some soup? <laugh>, any of those things with a b, c Upfitters power package, we were good to go.
It really changes the game in how you plan your RV adventures and really opens up boondocking and off grid camping. But as we said, I think last week there were instances where we were at campgrounds and the power went out. Yeah. And we were like, eh, so what, you know, right. We'll just, we'll just sit here and, and use our battery system. It really changes the game and some of the outfits that they're doing.
I've been really impressed how they engineer these systems in some of these smaller trailers. Last week was a escape trailer, which is similar to like a casita that they put a system in. I mean, it's just been pretty impressive how these engineered solutions are installed.
It's also impressive to see some of those pictures of Mike getting into some of those places. <laugh>.
Yeah.
Where they've designed for the system to go.
Yeah. Yeah. That's true. So anyway, if you're looking to upgrade your off-grid capabilities, give ABC Outfitters a call, they'll, they'll be happy to answer questions and all of that. Also, you know, other partners that we have, if you look at our discounts and deals, those are deals on things that we use ourselves or really believe in. So that's another place to look if you're here in the RV space or camping space. Something to look at on our website.
And also on our website, we have links to the stories and videos and podcasts that we know will help you get the most out of your RV experience. Yeah. So visit the website. Also, by the way, you could sign up for our free weekly newsletter, <laugh>. It'll be a popup on your first visit, but if you have visited before and forgot to sign up at the bottom of every page, you get another opportunity, sign up for the newsletter. And as we say, we're not going to sell it or give it away or anything like that. We just use it to keep in touch with you.
You'll
Also find the show notes for this episode, which is number 200 on the podcast page. It stresses camping.com. And boy, there are a bunch of links to Camp Grounds and such that everybody shared. So it's gonna be a lot of links this week. Yeah,
Lots of links. And you know, we're all in the social places and you might have noticed we kind of skipped some features today cuz well, we're still celebrating. So <laugh> <laugh>. But you still can answer those questions of the week on our fun and friendly Stressless camping podcast Facebook group. Whoa. Or you could go to all those other social places, Facebook and Instagram and all that. And you can find the links to those at the top right of stressless camping.com so that when you're done with the website, you can still get more Stressless camping.
Wow, that would be great. <laugh>, on the subject of the podcast, remember always that a review will help others find this podcast. And of course, the more listeners, the more awesome guests we can get and better deals and discounts, that kind of thing. Right. So, uh, thank you to those of you who have left a review and here's your invitation. If you have not,
And if you have left a review and you still wanna help anything that you see on the website or on Facebook or something, if you will share that with your friends, maybe more people will come join the party and as we said, more listeners means more great episodes.
Well, thank you for being with us. Some of you have been with us since the first episode. Yes. Oh my gosh. So thank you. But even the first timers welcome. And to everybody
Happy camping.
We hope you learned a lot and had some fun and got some tips for your next Stressless camping Adventure. We're honored by your reviews on Apple Podcasts, which helps others find us too. Don't forget to subscribe so you won't miss out on the adventure. And we look forward to your joining us next week. Until then, happy camping.
Throw another log on the fire and check that brisket.
