After leaving Lubbock, we headed farther west toward New Mexico to visit Carlsbad Caverns! We weren't sure we would get a trip in this summer since John Mark was trying to finish his dissertation. He finished earlier in July (woot!), so we got to have a small getaway.
All of my little spelunkers
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| About to enter through the Natural Entrance |
We were in the cavern for a few hours and Evie became VERY tired of being down there! She was much happier to get back into daylight.
After dinner, we went to the entrance of the cavern to wait for the nightly bat flight. We weren't allowed to take pictures once the bats started flying out of the entrance, but I got some as we were leaving. It takes a few hours for all of the bats to leave the cave since they estimate about 400,000 live there during the summer.
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| Waiting for the bats. Those are cave sparrows flying around the entrance. |
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| Bats! It was quite a sight. |
Balmorhea
After leaving Carlsbad, we got back into Texas to go for a dip in Balmorhea's spring-fed pool. The weather had cooled off a little for our trip, so I was nervous about this stop. It ended up being really great, even though Curtis did end up shaking like a leaf toward the end of our stay. Both boys tackled the high dive first thing. Curtis would give himself a count down every time he went off it. :) The sides and steps were really slippery with algae. Walking in the shallow end was pretty tough, especially trying not to fall while holding Evie! And we got to swim with fish. The boys loved it!
Fort Davis
We decided to make a quick stop at Fort Davis on the way down to Marfa. They were about 45 minutes from closing when we arrived, so we got in for free! We had plenty of time to tour some of the main Officer's quarters, the barracks, and the animal stables. When we were about to leave, one of the park rangers asked the boys if they would help him fold the flag. That was a cool experience for them.
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| Beautiful views |
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| Trying on some "hats" in the museum! |
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| Stables |
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| On the porch of the Officer's quarters |
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| Evie did quality control |
Marfa/Alpine
Our last stop of the day was Marfa. We went at a pretty slow time of day so most touristy things were closed. We did enjoy walking around a little. We checked out a few restaurants, but things were fancier than we were up to with kids. The "fancy" restaurants seemed a little out of place in such a small town. We had an Air BnB reserved in Alpine, so we just drove there and found a lovely little Italian place to eat. It really hit the spot.
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| Notice the cute Marfa water tower |
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| The boys had a morning game of chess before starting our trek home. |
All 3 kids did pretty great in the car throughout the trip. There were a few times Evie was fit-to-be-tied, but we kept her mostly happy with food pouches. The boys read a lot and enjoyed seeing the Texas mountains. On our way home, we stopped at the Stonehenge replica in Odessa! Ha! I had no idea this was around. The good thing about this Stonehenge is that you can run and play on it. It was a wonderful rest stop on our way to Abilene. Misha and Gin-Gin let us stay the night before heading on home the next day. We had a wonderful vacation! I loved spending time away with our little family.
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