Carlsbad Caverns and Guadeloupe National Parks

After we left Austin, our next home base was Colorado Springs. We decided to check out two National Parks on our way from Texas to Colorado: Carlsbad Caverns in southern New Mexico and Guadalupe Mountains on the very western edge of Texas. We rented a small converted garage Airbnb in Carlsbad, NM for two nights. When we arrived, we brought our bags inside, and Tyler went to sit down on the bed. He looked up at me immediately with a look of surprise and shock on his face. I asked him what was wrong. He told me I had to feel the bed because it was a water bed! We cracked up; neither of us had ever slept on a water bed before, unique for sure. A big reason I decided to blog was to help myself remember all the funny little things that happened on our adventures too. The surprise water bed was certainly one of those funny little memories.

 We got in later in the day, so after checking in we spent our first evening by the river, letting Bailey swim and play since he wouldn't be allowed in either National Park. We found a beautiful local park along the river that Bailey loved. The park also had a skate park that Tyler surf skated on. The perfect park for my two boys. 

Guadeloupe Mountains: Devil's Hall

Found a heart shaped cactus <3

After taking Bailey on a long walk in the morning, we headed out and drove the 40 minutes from our Airbnb to Guadalupe. We stopped in the visitor center right off the bat to get recommendations from the rangers on which hikes we should do within our time constraints. The rangers recommended a few different options, but we ultimately decided to start with Devil's Hall, a hike through the desert to a slot canyon.

The hike was just over 4 miles round trip; there was some elevation gain, but it wasn't extremely strenuous. A good portion of the hike was through the wash, so it was a bit tricky navigating the rocks. You needed to watch where you placed your foot pretty consistently.

The payoff of the hike was wonderful! The hike ends in a large slot canyon with a natural opening of steps. You can hike approximately 200 feet into the slot canyon as well. This was the first slot canyon I had ever hiked, so I was mesmerized. Slot canyons are now one of my favorite types of hikes. We did several in New Mexico and Arizona. I expected most slot canyons to look the same, but every one that I have done has been so unique.

Guadeloupe Mountains: Smith Springs Oasis Hike

We had time for one more hike after Devil's Hall, so we decided to do one of the hikes the ranger said was her favorite, Smith Springs. The beginning of the hike was similar to Devil's Hall with open desert terrain. The hike was on the outside of the park up against one of the mountains. We slowly began hiking up the side of the mountain, and as we climbed, the views of the desert stretching away from the park became better and better.

After about a mile of desert trekking, we took a turn, and all of a sudden we were in a beautiful forest that felt a lot like the Blue Ridge. It was one of the most magical things I have ever experienced. I think the magic was partly because the vegetation changed so drastically so quickly, and partly because it felt like a piece of home in the middle of the Southwest desert. There were several pools of fresh ice-cold water fed by a spring that came from the mountain. We went for a quick swim, which was so refreshing after hours of sweaty hiking. The whole hike back down, we marveled at how magical the oasis was.

 Carlsbad Caverns

We were on a bit of a time crunch for Carlsbad Caverns because you can only go into the cave with a reservation, and we had to be mindful of our Airbnb checkout time. Our Airbnb host was wonderful and allowed us to have a later checkout so that we could make our reservation time to see the caverns.

Our reservation allowed us to hike 2 miles down into the caverns and then take an elevator back up. This was great since our legs were sore from hiking all day the previous day, and it saved us time. The trail starts at the mouth of the caverns with winding switchbacks, descending quickly. We booked it down the caverns so we could spend as much time down at the bottom exploring before we had to head back.

As we descended, we saw beautiful stalactites, stalagmites, and cave formations. There was a large wall of bumpy rocks that we noticed looked like ground beef. I was trying to be clever and said they should name that wall "cave beef." Tyler just shook his head at me and said, "Annie, you were so close; you should have said 'underground beef'!" We cracked up for the next few minutes.

The bottom of the cave had signs all through the formations sharing the names and explaining how they were formed. Sadly, we didn't have as much time as we would have liked to read all the signs, so we picked our favorite formations to read about as we walked through.

The lighting in the cave was not photo
friendly, so we only have a few blurry selfies!

Before we left to pick up Bailey and head to Colorado, we stopped in the gift shop. We have a tradition where we buy a Christmas ornament at every National Park. We picked out an ornament as well as a jigsaw puzzle of Carlsbad Caverns. We had so much fun working on the puzzle during our stay in Colorado.