Friday, February 21, 2020

Day 44 Friday February 21




all I have from

chatty tour group at Tanks


A day of fails: discovered that van has no brake lights whatsoever and at some point after that S found that the fridge had stopped fridging. Off for a return to Hueco Tanks of yore for the guided tour which also turned out to be a fail or a waste of time for our guy Carlos, a nice young man, knew little about much that would have made the walk interesting and the 10 others on the tour included too many chatters. So into El Paso to the swank Mercedes dealer for a diagnosis of van issue but that was not worth much as the diagnosis was a short in the wiring and unless we wanted to spend days in El Paso they couldn't do squat for which we paid $80 which I am sure was the least that place made on a service, ever. While all this was going on we had a nice lunch at Johnny Carina's Italian Restaurant across a killing field of an expressway. One good thing about the non-repair was that the guy who actually worked on the van and I bonded a little because B became his buddy while he worked in the van and he had a 14 year chihuahua. Anyway took out of there with an eye on the following traffic of which there was plenty and shot west on hwy 9, another lonely two-laner, to Pancho Villa State Park. On the way I developed a substitute brake light which involved turning on the lights as I hit the brake. At the strangely full camp we found that we were also missing the right turn signal. Had a nice shower and a terrific BLT however.

Day 43 Thursday February 20

   
Heading right for that mountain on the left
from the Devil's Hall trail
almost at the Hall
The Hall itself
Back down from trail parking lot camp ahead van on left


     Ran out of Fort Stockton on I 10 and turned north at Van Horn on hwy 54 to Guadalupe Mountains National Park for an afternoon and evening stay. Rambled up the Devil's Hall trail for a 4 mile walk before dinner. Temp dropping into the 20's with a mean wind so no awning. Camp was a parking lot in a beautiful setting. Put in the reflective window dressings and had the heater on all night, comfy and cozy. S still sick but a trooper as we already knew.