Valley of Fires, 3 Rivers Petroglyphs and White Sands National Monument

We decide to stay a couple of days at Valley of Fire National Recreation Areawhich is covered inextinct lava flows

From there we take the tracker to the 3 Rivers Petroglyph Site where there are 20,000 petroglyphs along a 1 mile trail.





It looks on the Map that the road continues on to Ruidoso but apparently not. We end up at a dead end in the forest. Pretty dry here as well - parts of New Mexico have not seen rain since September.

As long as we are this far and our loop has reached a dead end we opt to go the extra 35 miles to White Sands National Monument - Did I mention the White Sands Missile Site - where the first atomic bomb was detonated? It is open twice a year the 1st Saturday in April and October - we missed it - darn!

The Dunes are 275 square miles of pure white gypsum sand.





You can buy sleds in the visitors center for $14.50 but we decided to just hike and maybe play a little too!