Month: October 2014

National Solar Observatory – Thursday October 16, 2014

Today we went to the National Solar Observatory

This is the part which is above ground.  We were able to go inside this building and watch as they were taking observations of the sun.
This drawing shows the relationship of the above ground structure and what is below ground.
The observatory is only 6.29 miles east and a little north of here. This is from Google earth. The drive to get there is 50 miles.
This picture show’s the distance.  The elevation change is from 4420 to 9256.
Here is the whole area showing where we are, the Observatory, White Sands and Alamogrodo.

Very Large Array – Sunday October 4, 2014

We spent an additional 4 hours at the Very Large Array today.  It was the first Saturday of the month behind the scenes tours and this month was the semi-annual expanded tours.  One of the people participating in the tours was Barry Clark one of the scientist’s who wrote and got the original approval for the VLA back in the early 70’s.
They just finished a ten year updating of the electronics including the computer system.

Read the last paragraph, it’s faster then my Dell.

The tour was really interest and we learned a lot about the VLA.  The tour was organized by a group of scientists.  The tour started at the admin building which is about 150 yards from the visitor’s center.  This picture shows the distance.

They had made this sign so everyone would know where the tour’s start.
Here’s the challenge, the sign is with the yellow flags 150 yards away from the visitor’s center from where you could see the flags but not the sign.
Here is some information about the place we are camped.

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We have taken a lot of pictures during this trip, however we are using my cellphone for internet access so I’m not posting may pictures.

Here is one from my paddle board outing with Vickie.

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White Sands National Monument – Tuesday October 14, 2014

The sand at White Sands is really white.
I took this picture so there would be something in the picture that wasn’t just white.
One with a couple of plants.
This is the edge of one of dunes.
and I have a bunch of pictures showing the waves in the sand.   Hank had a great time walking around on the sand.
This evening I took a bunch of night pictures. It is really hard to believe how many stars there are in the sky.  The Milky Way is much easier to see in a picture, these are all about 20 seconds long.
I just missed a shooting star in this picture, it was just to the left of my picture.

Oliver Lee State Park, NM – Monday October 13, 2014

Today we drove across White Sands Missile Range to get to this state park.  We’ll be here for several days as we explore this area.

This is the first park I’ve ever stayed at where all the sites were wide spots in the road.  No actual a pull through site or site to back in, interesting.

I want to go back and add a couple of pictures for Fr. Selden, it was an interesting place.
The fort was built out of adobe and they are washing away with time.
One end of the parade ground to the other.

This is an amazing bronze sculpture of a buffalo soldier our served at this fort.
We found one Lange Pvt I from the 8th Cavalry who served at this fort, on dates for first name with listed on the roster.

Elephant Butte State Park, NM – Friday October 10, 2014

Yesterday we headed to Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument, however half way there the road was closed because of all the recent rains.  We turned around and went to Ft Sheldon one of New Mexico’s Historical Sites, Here’s a link. 

I’ve spent part of the last couple of days working on the pictures I’ve taken during this trip.  I have a sampling of them three folders.

Set One

Set Two

Set Three

I’ll work on captions.

Southern New Mexico, Wednesday October 8, 2014

I may have to start a new feature: “The World from Harry’s Lazyboy”.

Here’s my view at Elephant Butte State Park, New Mexico.

 

This morning I got up at 3:30 a.m. to take pictures of the Blood Red Eclipse.  I had everything ready to take outside and start taking pictures.  I got seven pictures taken and at 3:52 clouds moved in and the moon was gone.  It decided to come back 4:30 and I got another 252 pictures.  Many of the pictures have clouds covering some part of the moon, it was not clear in New Mexico.  At 6:30 a big bank of clouds must have moved in because I didn’t see the moon again, I gave up at 6:45.

Here are some of the pictures:
Notice the star on the left side of the picture.

We drove north to visit a state historical museum about an historical road from Mexico City, Mexico to Santa Fe, New Mexico.  This road was first used 400 years ago and it’s called El Camino Real.

 

Elephant Butte State Park – Tuesday October 7, 2014

We left the RV Park about 9:30 a.m. and headed to the state park just 8 miles south.  This is the largest park in New Mexico and has the most usage of all the state parks.

It is a winner, Great park, we have a great site with a great view of the lake, water and electricity with WIFI.   Yes, for $14.00 a night we have a strong WIFI signal with a repeater just outside the back of the motorhome.  It had good speed this afternoon to watch a video but it slowed down right after dinner when everyone started watching videos.  We are pleased with the place and will be here at least until Sunday.

We have a bunch if day trips planned over the next several days and I’m sure we’ll find more.

Phone GPS puts us HERE:  elevation of 4509
Great site, number 56 asphalt and level, you can see the WIFI repeater pole coming out of the top of the RV.  The pole and base alone has to be $300.00 installed.
Here is map of our travels to date:
We have come quite a ways and it’s been a great trip.

Elephant Butte – Monday October 6, 2014

Today we moved toward Truth or Consequences, New Mexico actually spending the night just north of Elephant Butte, NM which is just north of Truth or Consequences, if I have all of that correct. We had two goals when we left Datil; find a place to do laundry and a place with WIFI.  I found a RV park which listed a laundry and WIFI which is also part of a discount RV park system called Passport America.  By joining this group you can stay at a member park for 50% of their going rate.  This park listed as having 69 sites and the laundry/WIFI.  However, when we got there the WIFI no longer worked and the laundry was one washer and one dryer (at least they were clean).  The 69 sites had 10 people who lived there permanently and one RV from Washington State.  Later in the evening three other traveling RV’s pulled in, we all left Tuesday morning.

This campsite picture makes it look a lot better than it really was.  Oh well they all can not be Monument Valley.

Here is the InReach hike Hank and I took on Sunday.

Topo
Aerial

Here is Monday’s drive