Day 20 - Tucson, AZ to Alamogordo, NM

Our adventures in Tucson totaled 250 driving miles during our three full days there. This final morning of chef John's breakfast featured a vegetable and ham frittata. We were the first guests to dig in as it was served hot out of the oven at 7:30am. After, we packed up the car, said goodbye, and hit the road at 8:15am. Temps were chilly at 42 degrees. 

We forgot to mention that a few days ago when we met the French Canadian couple, the lady told us they planned to visit Tom Stone. None of us know where/what that was, but then someone realized she was saying Tombstone, the famous western tourist town. She was good-natured about her pronunciation.  

Back on I-10, we headed east for most of the day with light traffic. Since we drove I-40 West on our way out to California, today's sights were all new. We saw a paraglider in the sky, the type with the fan behind the seat. 

Along our route we passed signs for Chiricahua National Monument in Arizona, 45 mins off I-10 East in Willcox. It is known for rhyolite pinnacles. We made a note of this for a possible future visit should we be in the area again someday. The scenery started to change and we went up over 4,000 feet in elevation.

A bit before 10am we saw what we think are pecan trees. The region we drove through today was agriculture and grazing land, very flat and arid. Because of this, we saw many signs warning of dust storm areas. As precaution, a succession of road signs read: In a dust storm, pull off roadway, turn vehicle off, feet off brakes, stay buckled. 

We also saw various trucks with sketchy hauling methods. 

At 10:15am in San Simon we took a rest stop. It was a well-maintained area with clean bathrooms and "Trees for travelers" planted by the Arizona Federation of Garden Clubs. 

We crossed into New Mexico soon after and saw the longest train we’ve ever seen, with so many cars that there were two engines in the middle to keep it going (six engines in all).

At 11:45 in Deming, NM we were ready for fuel, then stopped for lunch at the Sunrise Kitchen. We liked their map with state mugs.

A woman in the booth behind us kept asking about the half and half sandwich/soup special. Neither the hostess or the waiter, who spoke excellent English, understood her as she was a bit garbled speaking in a drawl. Michele quietly whispered to Rob that had we worked on more of our Spanish lessons we could help translate. Rob said, “It’s going to be awhile before we can use our new skills in the wild.”

Back in the car, we drove for about 30 minutes and needed a stop at the Las Cruces Love's. The bathrooms were very clean, and Michele pushed the green happy bathroom feedback button on her way out. Outside, a woman washed her entire car using the windshield sponge. We definitely see odd sights on the road. Such as learning that in this region the injury lawyers have their own handle.

Another billboard said to call The Tank. Speaking of tanks, these are nicely decorated.

Around 1:30pm we turned on I-25 North and then on to Highway 70 East. The rest of the day we drove through the expanse of the White Sands Missile Range area and started to see the famous white sand. 

There was a mandatory Customs and Border Patrol checkpoint. The agent asked, "Are you all U.S. citizens?" [affirmative from Rob] "Have a great day." That was it. Didn't seem to be a very effective security check as they just took Rob's word for it. 

Since we were ahead of schedule to check in to our hotel, we couldn't resist a detour to nearby Pistachio Land, home of the world’s largest pistachio. 

We arrived at our hotel in Alamogordo, NM at 3:20pm. The mileage today was 366 miles. We took the hotel's recommendation for dinner at D.H Lescombes, just a few minutes' walk from our hotel. We shared pecan chicken with mustard sauce, vegetables, mashed potatoes, and a salad. We got strawberry cheesecake to go.

During dinner, we firmed up our plans for tomorrow. We learned about the nearby White Sands Missile Range Museum upon our arrival, and want to visit it after visiting White Sands National Park in the morning. The museum requires a federal criminal background check onsite for anyone without an active military ID as it is an active DoD installation. We'll see if their check is more thorough than the security checkpoint we received by the CBP earlier today. Tomorrow should be a fun sightseeing day with good weather in the low 60s. Our route map from today.