Day 14, Thursday, 9/19/13 - Belen to Alamogordo

Well, here we are in Avocado - Avogadro - Alamogordo, after a good day looking at old pueblos, painted burros, and petroglyphs.  First stop was Abo, a unit of Salinas Missions Nat'l Monument.  We arrived well before the official opening time, so we took photos from a distance.  We had previously visited it in any case.




The second unit of this Nat'l Monument is Grand Quivira, where we arrived shortly after it opened at 9 AM.  After a nice chat w/ the ranger, we took a walk around this large pueblo.  It was built of a different colored rock than the other units and was considerably further south.  We learned that these Piro/Tompiro speaking pueblos were abandoned before the pueblo revolt, and the language apparently didn't survive. 


Off to Carrizozo, watching rains developing in the mountains.  Had lunch at about the only place in town after touring it looking at the painted burros (waitress at the restaurant called them "jackasses").  They're everywhere, even on the roofs!  We stopped at an old-fashioned soda fountain and got a couple of ice cream cones, then hit the road again.

Next stop, the Three Rivers Petroglyphs.  This is a BLM site with a $5 fee, and we took a nice walk around

it, taking pictures of the glyphs (and the storm over the nearby mountains).

Ended up in Alamogordo, which means large cottonwood, and started getting ready for tomorrow's early pictures at White Sands and a trip to Las Cruces to see Sandra's Uncle Murray, and lunch in Hatch.