We are at the Rose Valley RV Ranch on the outskirts of Silver City. SC is a city of 55,000 nestled in the mountains - well - high hills. We were here 2 years ago and liked it so much came back. The historical downtown is filled with quaint shops, antique shops and art galleries. It also has a 'Big ditch' - a series of floods took out the main street and all it's buildings between 1895 and 1906 - today it is 55 feet to the bottom and is now a park. The only building to survive is the Warren House (see photos). Today, Bullard Street is the main street. We arrived here yesterday and will stay until Sunday. We are enjoying our time here at the Rose Valley RV Ranch - a private park with a western theme. A little more expensive but free wifi and laundry.
Backing up - we left Brantley Lake SP at Carlsbad on Feb. 5 driving through the Guadalupe Mountain pass and onto El Paso arriving in Columbus. It was quite the drive - very very windy and cold. There were flurries through the Pass and the elevation climb was steep so a slow drive in some parts. The photos show the extreme change - once over the pass the sky went from black to blue but still windy. On to making our way through El Paso which went ok until we needed to find highway 9 to Columbus on the west side of the city. A bit difficult - we took a right when we should have gone left. Once we hit Vinton we realized our error and turned around. We went for a couple of miles not finding #9 but took 178 instead because hey - it was going west. Turns out it was the right road!!! Number 9 to Columbus is a nice drive - a small road running along the US/Mexico border. We happily arrived in Columbus just before dinner.
In Columbus we stayed two nights at the Pancho Villa State Park - this was the location of the Pancho Villa raid on Columbus in 1916 - they have a great Museum with footage and items from the raid. We went to Palomas Mexico the next day. We were told that this one of the best places to border shop - it isn't large but it is safe. There is a parking lot at the border so that you can just walk into Mexico. We went to the Pink Store - the main store with Mexican items and a restaurant. It was great fun. I got an eye exam and new glasses for $120. Seniors go for the pharmacy, dentists and optical.
We left PVSP Thursday morning headed for Rockhound State Park southeast of Deming. An easy drive an hour north. A really nice park but not many sites. Good thing we were only planning on staying one night because we could park in a reservation site - a really nice site. RHSP is situated nicely at the base of mountain. People are allowed and encouraged to take 15lbs of rock away. We decided to go on a hike on the trail which then turned out being a climb to the top of the mountain. Boy were we sore 3 hours later when we got back to our site. A great hike though and a wonderful view of the area from the top. We even managed to find some great rocks.
Early Friday morning we left Rockhound for City of Rocks - also a short drive of about an hour. City of Rocks SP is also nice but without hook ups and 30 miles from Silver City we decided not to stay. So - on to Silver City. We went straight to the downtown since there is good RV parking at the Visitor's Center right beside the historic downtown. We spent a few hours hanging around the downtown going back to our favourite places from the last time.
Today, Saturday we headed back downtown for a couple of hours. Now we are relaxing back at the site doing laundry as we will be back on the road tomorrow! A beautiful day with blue skies and a temp of 20c. Not bad - what is the temp in Canada! ha ha sorry couldn't resist - again.
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