Roswell New Mexico

After camping in the Big Bend back-country I took a different route out than in to check out the path through Marathon TX. This meant skipping a visit back through Lajitas or Terlingua. In that prior post, there is detail on this drive toward Carlsbad, New Mexico.

Carlsbad in a great little town which serves as nice base station for those visiting the nearby caverns. This time, I chose to only pass through while en route to Roswell.

Sometimes when traveling, I find it best to try and stay at some locations for more than one night just to provide a little break from driving, packing, etc. This also allows me to explore more of that stop with less of the hectic shuffling of gear.

New Mexico is one of my favorite states in general. Especially Taos, Santa Fe, Albiqui, Chama and the areas up around the Carson National Forest east of Farmington. This time though, I wanted seize the opportunity to check out more of the southeast corner of the state. The closest to this vicinity I'd been through previously while on return from a motorcycle ride was Tucumcari, which is an awesome little historical Route 66 town.

This time, it was about keeping an eye on the sky for little green men. And whenever you think of mystery, intrigue and New Mexico altogether, it's hard to not think of Roswell.

For starters, if you visit this area, I encourage you to take the time to check out Bottomless Lakes State Park. It's just about 15 miles east out of Roswell.

While up on plateau to get get photos of the sunset, I ran into another photographer who shared some interesting stories about the area, including an old legend that someone who was once drowned in one of these lakes later had a shoe found down in Carlsbad caverns. Now, I did a little research on this and couldn't find any validation of this story. It also seems most probable that these lakes don't actually connect underground, but then again, you never really know.

More to come on this post soon.