DAY 31 Carlsbad Caverns to somewhere in Texas
After breakfast we all went to the pool, although Michael stayed in his carseat carrier and didn’t get in. I snuck out for a few minutes to take a shower at the campground bathhouse, then came back to help herd the family back to the camper. We drove to the caverns again, this time to go underground. There were a lot of signs warning of strenuous trails the way we wanted to go, through the “natural entrance.” Once we got there and saw it was a paved trail with handrails along both sides, we thought, “Well, how hard could this really be?” Not to mention it’s one way going down, and you take an elevator back to the surface. But after about a half mile of walking downhill, with one child strapped on each of us (no strollers allowed) we could see how this could get taxing on the knees.
I learned that the twilight zone is not just an old TV show. It refers to the part of the cave where there is still some daylight getting in from the surface and you can still see a little bit. We passed through the twilight zone and into the section lit only by strategically placed artificial lights. The caves were awe-inspiring. There were colossal columns, silent pools of water, and ornate details dripped into the rock formations over millions of years. As we walked past one display of stalactites and stalagmites, David saw a pair of them growing from the floor and the ceiling that looked like they were about to touch. He said, “Look at that! Maybe that will be a column. Maybe in a thousand years.” Nora said, “Nope. It’s rocks.” We cracked up laughing. Also, some of the formations are called popcorn, because they are detailed little rounded drips of minerals. I commented that I really like the little popcorn ones. Nora said, “Go back to big car. Get popcorn.” She also likes trail mix, which she pronounces, “Trail Nax.” I assume she thinks “nax” is short for “snacks.”
We hiked from the natural entrance to the elevators and came up to the surface and made lunch. Then we went back down for the less-taxing tour of the “Big Room,” which consists of a fairly level walkway and much more spectacular formations, such as the Hall of Giants. I took lots of photos, but they don’t capture the scale of the place.
Our plan was to do the shorter hike in the afternoon, and then have some peaceful driving while Nora took her nap in the car. But she feel asleep on the hike, instead. When she woke up I guess she had forgotten where we were. Her eyes opened, then got really wide as she took in her dim, humid surroundings. She started pointing in circles, like she was too overwhelmed to ask what any particular thing was, and just needed to point at the whole place. So now we are in the car and she is NOT napping. We just lost another hour as we passed from Mountain Time to Central Time. We are going to stop at a supermarket up the road in Pecos, Tx., to get our food for the week. Perhaps we’ll get another jar of trail nax.
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Stopped for gas. At $2.06, it was cheaper, by a full eight cents, than any gas we’ve seen. Where was this great price, you ask? A Pilot station in Midland, Texas. There were not one, but two Halliburton trucks sitting in the gas station with us. Michael’s been crying a lot for unknown reasons today. When we got to the gas station, I took him out of his seat and took him over to see Nora. Nora’s idea of playing with Michael was first to smile at him and say hi, which was nice, and then to shove her stuffed animals in his face and make growling and barking noises with them. And by “shove” I mean literally to smoosh her stuffed animals, with their matted fur, into Michael’s nose and mouth. He responded by smiling a big smile and cooing. Kids are weird, I guess. I suppose a 2-year-old knows better than I do how to cheer up an infant. And she can make her bear say, “Roar, roar” over and over without getting bored.
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Pulled into a rest area to sleep. It was the exit right after Stink Creek Road. I am not kidding.