10-4-11 Edmond, OK to Storrie Lake, NM (512 miles)

We drove past many hundreds of windmills all across the plains of TX and NM.

We were a day late in setting off, due to an electrical issue with the car. She spent a day in the shop at the mercy of mechanics who never did figure out the problem. A fuse kept blowing and no one could figure out why. We set off anyway, and a few days later Louis discovered the source of the problem when he saw sparks flying from the cigarette lighter one night. Turns out the lighter-to-USB thingamajobber wasn’t in tight enough. A many-weeks mystery solved!

Most of New Mexico is dotted with these green shrubs with varying density, depending on local rain levels.

So we’d initially planned to stop in Palo Duro Canyon, Texas, for a night, but since we got there early enough and wanted to make up some time, we drove on through to Las Vegas, New Mexico (not to be confused with Las Vegas, Nevada). We’d crossed another time zone, so were starving by the time we got to Las Vegas around 6pm and stopped in at a diner for some authentic mexican fare.

Sometimes things were very flat and dry

I’d never had huevos rancheros before, so I figured I’d expand my gustatory horizons and give it a try. With my meagre Spanish abilities, I knew the dish would involve an egg, but I had no idea what else! Turns out it has beans and cheese swimming in some kind of spicy green sauce with hashed browns and a sunny-side down egg all on top of a tortilla. Heart-stopping, but tasty!

Some very interesting cloud formations. Don't see much of this in the Northeast.

Four miles North of Las Vegas is Storrie Lake State Park, where we stayed for the night. It was already dark and raining hard by the time we finished dinner, so it was a bit of an adventure trying to navigate the campsite to find a suitable spot, but we finally did.

Mercifully, the park has lean-tos with room for a picnic table and a roomy two-person tent, so we didn’t get totally soaked! Somehow every time we’ve camped in the rain we’ve lucked out with one or more mitigating factors (lean-tos, or sandy water-absorbant ground). I hate to think when our luck will inevitably run out.