Santa Rosa SP, NM - Apr 2008

Continuing north, we next landed at Santa Rosa Lake State Park. Located east of Albuquerque by about 90 miles and up at about 5,000', we'd finally gotten far enough north to enjoy cooler weather again. It was nice to see water and greenery again -- even if it was only cedar shrubs and pinon pines.

When we arrived, all the first-come-first-served sites in the campground were occupied and most of the remaining vacant sites were too short and/or too unlevel. We finally found a reservable site that would work which meant that any day we could get booted out by someone making a reservation. We opted to risk it and paid day-by-day and stayed for a week without having to move.

The lake level was low and the exposed rock along the shoreline made for interesting hikes.

There were a couple of very nice, paved walking paths in the park. This one circled around a bluff that overlooked the dam and the Pecos River. The dogs especially enjoyed this trail since they didn't have to worry about getting stickers in their paws (an ever present nuisance in this part of the state.)


Yay -- a few flowers were emerging around the lake. Not many, but enough to provide some colorful relief to the browns and grays of the desert.


One crisp and cold morning we had a wonderful sunrise -- this was taken looking out our living room window as it was too cold to go out and snap a picture.


Speaking of cold weather, while at Santa Rosa we had SNOW -- yes, you heard me SNOW!!! Now, these two Texans can hardly believe that snow exists anywhere in April -- usually our air conditioners are running all day by this time of year. This particular day started off sunny, but by noon the clouds rolled in, the temperature dropped 20 degrees and at 4:00 a few flakes started floating down. It didn't take long until the flakes got bigger and were falling in great abundance.

I had to go play outside for a bit, but then the wind picked up and the snow came down so hard and fast that it was nearly a whiteout. I scurried inside and took this photo from the RV's window. The snowstorm lasted about two hours and then was over. There was only about 1/2" of snow accumulation and only on a few surfaces. Most of the rest of it melted quickly, but what a fun day!