ALAMOGORDO, N.M. – As usual, I was the first one awake on Tuesday morning. I slowly rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and took in the silence around me. Quietly unzipping the tent’s front door, I stepped out into the cool blue morning and shook the last bits of sleep off my lagging body, giving my back and neck adequate stretches to the sound of morning doves.
Arriving at Oliver Lee Memorial campground on Monday, Taylor and I quickly fell in love with New Mexico, a state deemed “the Land of Enchantment.”
Taking a seat at our adjacent picnic table, I started the daily ritual by making myself breakfast in the form of a peanut butter sandwich and a juice box. All the while, daylight began to take its place over the prairie behind our campsite. As the warm sun crested the peaks of Dog Canyon, a clash of colossal cactus-covered hazel peaks that sit a mere few hundred feet away, the shadows quietly withdrew themselves from the vastness of the land, gentle fingers caressing the landscape as they passed by. I watched with a great sense of satisfaction, finishing the last of my breakfast with an air of gratitude.
Taylor rose soon after and together we sat and stared in awe at the magnificent and serendipitous beauty.
The stop at Oliver Lee Memorial campground, in southern New Mexico, wasn’t on the original itinerary. After leaving Austin with our wallets tucked between our legs, Taylor and I spent the weekend in San Antonio. Having visited the Alamo City once before, as well as it being the mecca of my basketball fandom, I took great pleasure in showing Taylor the breathtaking views from atop the Tower of the Americas, the vibrant lights and music of the River Walk and the displays of hand crafted gifts from below the border such as colorful sugar skulls.
Staying in a cheap hotel just outside the city limits, we spent the mornings editing our photos from previous stops and planning our next few steps. It was then that Taylor came up with the idea to spend more than our originally budgeted two days in New Mexico. At first, we were to only stop in Santa Fe as an overnight rest between San Antonio and Colorado, breaking up a would-be 14-hour travel day. However, while I was watching Shark Week, Taylor was luckily hard at work researching.
She brought before me a handful of photos showing a sea of crisp white sand reminiscent of a Caribbean island with a backdrop of jagged mountains piercing a deep blue sky. It was a pretty impressive presentation of White Sands National Park that won me over almost immediately. Since we had the time – my father had planned to meet us in Denver but was forced to postpone his departure by a few days – and since we were heading to New Mexico anyways, we added it to the calendar.
On Monday, we packed up our things for the fourth time since leaving Bradford and hit the road once again.
As we left the bustling city, with the strip malls slowly fading away and highways boiling down to just two or three lanes, we were once again reacquainted with the countryside. The plains stretched out to either side of the highway and, with Taylor driving, I closed my eyes for a brief moment. Waking up some hour-plus later, the landscape had transformed into a breathtaking panorama.
Just a short walk away from our tent lies the Sacramento Mountain range, which includes Dog Canyon and the Dog Canyon trail, an 11-mile trek that leads through Lincoln National Forest.
The land was flat and reached out to the horizon where it was met with a curled ribbon of blue mountains in the distance. The world was encapsulated by these far off peaks which eventually drew nearer. As we drove further into western Texas, myself now taking a turn behind the wheel, the terrain blessed us with a close-up look at these awesome giants.
Topped with coarse red boulders and scarred by the ages, gigantic red buttes dramatically rose out of a vast ocean of scrub grass and sand pine. Appearing in ones and twos and still backed by an ever intriguing swath of blue mountains, it was as if the world was teasing us, just giving us a brief glimpse of the magnitude of the south western topography.
As we neared our destination, we cruised alongside another strip of mountains and as I drove I found myself staring outside the passenger window at great lengths. Eventually, we took a right turn down Dog Canyon road and now faced the mountains outright. Taylor and I dropped our jaws and made speechless gestures to each other as we realized our tent would be set up at the foot of this magnificent range. We settled in quickly, pitching our tent toward the canyon so that our first view every morning would be of the many cliffs and plateaus way overhead.
While we took it easy the first night, choosing to get the lay of the land that would serve as our base camp, we woke up ready for adventure on Tuesday. Our first mission: tackle Dog Canyon.
Talking with park volunteers at the information desk, we picked up some pamphlets and maps of the surrounding area. There were three trails in the camp itself. The Riparian Trail is an easy 0.15-mile walking path that surrounds the ranger station, the Lawson Springs Trail stretches the legs just a bit more at 0.36 miles with a view over the prairie and the mighty Dog Canyon trail boasts an 11-mile trek on challenging terrain through the shelves and cliffs of the canyon. The harder it sounded, the more anxious I was to get started.
As we ascended the first bluff, we passed by several kinds of flora and fauna. Between the variations of sharp-thorned cacti, scurrying lizards and buzzing insects, I was enthralled by our findings so early on. The trail quickly escalated, covering several hundred feet of elevation in less than a half mile. Although we were warned to stay on the path lest we risk an encounter with the local rattlesnake population, Taylor and I couldn’t help sneaking to the edge, peering down at the once thriving river bed and all the nothingness in between us and the ground.
Making it to the first mile marker around 1 p.m., we decided that this would serve as a good first expedition, heading back to a camp that appeared no bigger than a penny from where we stood. Following a bit of rest and relaxation in the air conditioned Alamogordo Public Library, we set our sights on the big ticket item of White Sands National Park.
White Sands National Park was established in 2019 and covers 176,000 acres of land with fine white sand.
Driving down the strip of highway before the park, the horizon is split into thirds. Sitting atop this collage of Mother’s Nature’s making is the distant San Andres mountains while at the bottom is a flat spread of dried and cracked Earth bearing nothing but scrub brush. Between, however, is a layer of pure white, an unreal sight that looks to be a reflection of light spread across the windshield. Entering the park and following the road marked “Dunes Area,” you are met with a large wall of sand that stands as a border to the pure sandbox.
Looking to enjoy the view in peace, Taylor and I continued down the sand-packed road until we found an empty cul de sac. Evening was approaching and as we sacrificed our shoes and climbed up the first dune, we saw that a storm approached with it. In the distance, dark clouds of thunder rolled toward us with flashes of lightning and gusts of wind that peppered our legs with grains of sand. It would take only minutes for the gusts to turn to gales, as the storm lifted the desert with brute force.
By the time we left, visibility had shrunk to only a few hundred feet and it was all but impossible to face the wind. We hurried to our car, kicking the sand off as best we could and hit the road toward home. But the storm followed, casting a haze over the town as its violent winds ripped through the streets. My concern centered on one thing alone: how would our tent fare.
Racing back home, it looked as if the storm had swallowed the mountains and my worries only grew. Lightning sparked alongside the horizon and thunder rattled through the car; however, to our surprise, we arrived to a battered, but still intact, tent. We rushed inside, bringing anything of significant weight to hold down the fort.
After an hour or so of unspoken panic inside a thrashing tent, the winds finally subsided. Night broke calmly, allowing us to step out and witness the last golden and pink rays of the sun. We then huddled inside, cozy and comfortable and pleasantly exhausted. Sleep came easily and as I drifted off, I embraced the love of both the beauty and the challenges of our newfound home.
Up next: Colorado
(Hunter O. Lyle is a summer travel columnist for The Era with publications on his two-month trip across and around the United States appearing each Friday. To contact the author, email drifttrip2024@gmail.com)
