Trip to the Southwest in My 2206t

[Shaihulud2090]

I've been planning this trip for the better part of this year. Bought my 2206T just for this trip.we have two weeks of PTO that we are using, but are working remote two weeks to travel out there and two weeks to travel back. Total trip time is a month and a half.

Major points of interest are: Carlsbad Caverns, White Sands, Roswell, Petrified Forest, Meteor Crater, Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, Valley of the Gods and Mesa Verde.

The trip started on the evening of the 27th. We drove from Jacksonville, FL to just outside of Pensacola where we bedded down for the night. Then on Saturday morning we drove to see the USS Alabama. Then we were off to Baton Rouge,LA where we moochdocked at my Uncle's place for the week while we worked Monday thru Friday. Didn't have much time to see anything, but did take the opportunity to visit with family. On the evening of the 4th, Friday, we took off again headed for Shreveport to have breakfast with more famiky. We pulled into a Crackerbarrel at about 2am. We ran into our first problem, the top section wouldn't lift. There was no DC power. Fuses checked out. But we were tired and decided to sleep in the truck. The next morning we headed over to family and I pulled out the generator to power the trailer. I was able to lift the top section. Everything looked good. Had breakfast and then headed to Scurry,TX to moochdock this week at a friend's house.

We are set up to work this week. I plan on testing the battery as I suspect it it the culprit.This battery is brand new, lifepo4. I'll update as soon as I test it.

 

[sam-HILO]

Trip report

Thanks for taking us along on your adventure. My HiLo is covered up and winterized. Hope you get your battery problem sorted out.

 

[JackandJanet]

You have a 30A fuse in your tow vehicle that's in its trailer charging circuit. Probably up in the engine compartment fuse box now. I've found that fuse easily blows.

- Jack

 

[Shaihulud2090]

It's been a while since I've had the chance to post.

I tested the battery capacity running a couple of lights and the fridge on DC power. Looks like I'm getting 6 hours on battery. That's not what I'm expecting going off power specs for the lights and fridge. But nothing I can do about it now. So, I'll just be careful. So far haven't had a problem with the fuse.

Last Friday night we left Scurry, TX traveling towards Carlsbad. We spent the night in a Cracker barrel in Abilene. The next morning we took off to Brantley Lake State Park.

It's a nice place. Price is good. Bathrooms are fantastic.

We went to the caverns on the 13th, Sunday morning taking the natural entrance down. Amazing experience. Went back that evening and viewed the bats leaving the cave. Loved it. I had seen all this when I was a young child and now I'm bringing my girlfriend who has never been to the southwest. I'm glad I get to share this with her.

Monday, we spent chilling out around the camp and ran to town to take care of errands and do some wash. It's surprising how industrial Carlsbad is. Lots of oilfield work.

Tuesday we headed from Brantley off to the Dusty Boots motel in Cloudcroft. It was quite the climb up to 8600ft. My 2006Tundra did well.. I'm pleased with the performance of both my 18 year old truck and 18 year old trailer.

Wednesday morning we took off from the motel towards the cosmic campground. Along the way we stopped at the 3 Rivers petroglyphs site. We spent an hour exploring. Then headed of. Much of our travel was along highway 60. We started seeing large radio dishes. I suspected that it might be the NRAO VLA. It was. So we stopped by and checked out the site taking some pictures. If you're unfamiliar with it, it's often been seen in movies such as Contact or 2010. It was a very nice surprise and I was giddy seeing it.

Because we spent more time exploring than we thought we would it would be night before we reached our destination so decided to find another place to camp. We are currently at the Daytil Well campsite. It's a little gem and very reasonably priced. The hookup sites were taken so we are basically boondocking it.

Tomorrow we are off to Meteor Crater.

I'll post pictures as soon as I can.

Excuse any typos. This is off my phone.

 

[JackandJanet]

Glad you're having a good trip. A few years ago I spent 3 days exploring Carlsbad Caverns. Hiked down the natural entrance to the Big Room and then hiked back out. Loved that. Then, had a tour of the Left Hand Tunnel and the King's Palace tour on the other two days. I stayed at Brantley Lake State Park too, and thought it was great. I also stopped at Cloudcroft on the way back for three nights and stayed in one of the campgrounds there. That's a beautiful area and this was the second time I've camped there.

On a previous trip, we went into White Sands NM and that was quite an experience. Did a short hike up one of the dunes. For anyone going there, take and use good sunglasses!

The Trinity atomic test was not too far from that antenna field you saw, as I recall.

Hope you enjoy Meteor Crater, I have!

- Jack

 

[Shaihulud2090]

Stopped by Petrified Forest today and saw some of the sites there. Then headed up to meteor Crater rv park. It's supposed to rain tomorrow so we may just hang out at the nearest town.

We did decide to push back a day or two the latter part of our trip in favor of going back to petrified forest and do some more exploring.

 

[JackandJanet]

If you get over to Flagstaff - the Sunset Crater NM is a nice place to visit (a volcanic crater that erupted about 1,000 years ago). The Apollo astronauts trained there. And then, it's an easy trip up to the Wupatki NM, which is the site of a prehistoric Indian ruins. If you go there, be sure to visit both the Wupatki Pueblo and the Wukoki Pueblo. They are both multi-story dwellings and are worth the visit. You could cover both monuments in a day if you're short of time.

- Jack

 

[Shaihulud2090]

We are at Meteor Crater RV Park. It's cold, windy and rain is moving into the area. I think we are going to hold up here to let the storm pass. We originally reserved a night stay but will see if they let us stay another night.

Looks like a cold front is moving through the region with potential for mixed precipitation at higher elevations. We have looked along our travel area for the region and theres nowhere we want to go that wont be rainy. I've driven in snow and icey conditions both in cars and semis, but I don't look forward to it. I'm a Florida boy. Besides, I really don't want to be wet, cold and stuck in windy conditions. It's not going to be fun.

 

[JackandJanet]

The forecast I have is that this rain/snow period will last through Saturday. Sunday it should start to warm up and will be clear. I agree - camping in cold and wet is no fun and driving in snow is not something I like to do either. This is a rather unusual early cold snap - it used to stay warm and dry until close to Thanksgiving. At least you're not in a tent.

- Jack

 

[Shaihulud2090]

We stayed at the Grand Canyon from Saturday through Monday morning lucking out being able to make quick reservations for the Trailer Village first for Saturday and then again for Sunday. The altitude for us Florida folks was showing it's effects in night headaches and a general sense of everything being more physically demanding. It was a beautiful sight and I'm glad I got to see it again as well as share the experience with my girlfriend who has never been out west.

I was a miffed at a couple of things, however. The main gift shop was wildly over priced and their offerings was of the poorest quality we have seen so far. And we went to take a nice hot shower but they charge $2.50 for 5inutes of water. So, I hooked up the sewer at the site we were at in the Trailer Village and used as much as we wanted.

I plan on sleuthing the inet for vintage souvenirs since they're cheaper and appears to be higher quality. Monday morning we left for Page, AZ l. Stopped by one of the RV parks there and the cost did not sit well with us. While we were talking about it, I looked up BLM land and found a nice spot at Beehives campground in Glenn Canyon. 5 minutes from Page. No hook ups but they do have a bathroom. There is supposedly a fee of $14 a night, however we could not find a pay station, so it's free to us. Asked another camper if they saw a fee station and they also did not see one. It's such a beautiful spot overlooking mesas and the desert floor and Lake Powell. Last night we sat out and saw the Milky Way as well as Comet C/2023 A3.

Today we are off to see Antelope Canyon.

Lessons learned on this trip, there's plenty of convenient cheap camping. Just got to get out of the mindset of looking for RV camping when searching online.

 

[sam-HILO]

Enjoyed your trip report.

We stayed at Letchworth state park in August. This is a NY state park. The gift shop had the most expensive items of any state park I had been in. DD bought a $20.00 Owl necklace. We are fortunate to use DD's Autism discount at State Parks. Camping is half price. Years ago I had this pass for my Physical disability. Then the governor changed it to Mental illness or in a wheel chair. Memo we spend $ on extra groceries and gas ect. Those of us on SSD have a limited income. The advantage of camping out West is BLM and National Forest campgrounds. Not much boondocking opportunities on the east coast. MY SSD has been converted to SSR. Enjoy the rest of your trip.

 

[Shaihulud2090]

After the Beehives campground, we decided to skip Monument Valley and Mesa Verde. Though we did drive through Monument Valley and passed Valley of the Gods. My gf and I were both feeling the short amount of time we have left on our PTO and decided to start heading east. We took a quick look at Mexican Hat rock and ended up staying at Valle's RV park. The next morning we drove over to the Bandera Caldera. My gf loves caves and they have the ice cave. We arrived about an hour before close and viewed the ice cave. It's a collapsed lava tube created by the caldera and has ice there, year round. Could definitely feel the temperature drop as we decended into the opening. We headed back to the parking lot as the light was beginning to fade. The people that run the place offered for us to stay for a fee of $20. So we setup and stayed the night. This was the most impressive night sky of the trip tempered by the number of trees restricting the viewing area. I've never seen the skies so full of stars. The milky way was much more apparent.

In the morning we were both feeling the effects of the altitude so decided not to do the caldera hike. We headed east again toward Texas.We drove 11 hours ending up in Littlefield, TX home of Waylon Jennings. This is a very depressed area. However there are a couple of gems. First, we found Savannah's, a Texmex local restaurant in the downtown area. Rolling in here it looked like so many scenes in the walking dead, deserted town, boarded up shops, noone to be seen. There were a few cars congregated around Savannahs so we parked and went in. The place was lively. The service friendly. The food good. 10/10 would do again. Next we headed over to the Waylon Jennings RV Park. Surprising that it is free for 4 nights with hookups. We setup and stayed overnight, uneventful. In the morning we headed to Scurry, TX to moochdock at a friend's. The next day we headed to Baton Rouge where we are moochdocking at my Uncle's for the remainder of the week until next weekend when we will drive back to Jacksonville and resume our normal lives, sigh.

Looks like the age of the trailer is catching up to it after this trip. We put just over 4000 miles on it so far. Last night the AC was tripping my Uncle's 20 Amp breaker. It had not done this when we went through the first time. I also noticed that AC sounded like it was sagging when it starts and my power extension cord is heating up more than usual, nothing serious though. I suspect it's the starter capacitor, hopefully. I also noticed squeaking when I raised the camper. So today will lube the pulley and cables, something I had not done yet.

I promised pictures but have not had time to sort and post them. They are coming. I plan to backfill my posts with them when I have time.

 

[Shaihulud2090]

I promised pictures. So here they are in order:

Eiffel Tower - so not France. It's a little restaurant outside of Lofty Pursuits in Tallahassee. Lofty Pursuits has a Youtube channel where they make candy on +100 year old equipment.


USS Alabama:


Brantley Lake State Park in NM - first taste of the desert:


Carlsbad Caverns. Not really the caverns. We lost some pictures from the trip.

 

[Shaihulud2090]

The Cowboy Cafe in Carlsbad, NM. Nice place. Would do again:


3 River's Petroglyphs:


My rig at Daytil Well campground, a jewel of a place:


Petrified Forest, lost pictures, so sad:

 

[Shaihulud2090]

Meteor Crater RV Park. I took this because of the contrast of weather in the sky. You just don't get that in Florida.


Meteor Crater:


Snow at the Grand Canyon. We're from Florida, we'll take what we can get. We put a little in a ziplock to take home to show everyone what snow looks like, but it was just water when we got back:


The Grand Canyon - these kids were enjoying the view. There are two more steps down on this ledge before the edge and the guy in the hat had both hands in his pockets bunny hopping down to the second to last one. My GF and I decided to move on before he ruined our vacation with having to provide witness accounts of his death.

 

[Shaihulud2090]

This is my favorite picture of the Grand Canyon. It was taken at sunrise on the Hermit road route. I wasn't feeling well the night before and my girlfriend went to an astronomy/geology discussion while I was laid up. On her way back she made friends with a bus driver who gave her a special permit to allow us to drive on the Hermit road route before it opened. IDK what she did to get that. I don't want to know.


Dusk - Glenn Canyon Beehives campground:


Sunrise - Glenn Canyon Beehives campground:


Horseshoe Bend:

 

[Shaihulud2090]

After Horseshoe we set out to find a tour for Antelope Canyon. They were all booked up so we skipped it. Also skipped Monument Valley. We were both feeling the end of the trip at this point. Here's a picture from the road of Monument Valley:


Bandera Volcano Ice Cave:



And that's it. I think I have another cache of pictures somewhere. When I find them I'll add a few more.

 

[Shaihulud2090]

Total trip distance: 5400 miles
MPG: 13.9
Cruise speed: 55 to 60
Major problems: ZERO - not bad for an 18 year old truck with an 18 year old camper.
Enjoyment: 11
Cost: don't make me cry

I crunched some numbers on fuel usage and costs:
AVG $/Gallon $3.00
Total Miles 5400
AVG MPG 13.9
# of Gallons 388.5
Total Fuel Cost $1,167.19