Let's Just Go Somewhere: Alamo Lake State Park

Where do we go next? Our conversations about where to go next are generally something like this:

"Where do you want to go next?"

"I don't know. Where do you want to go?"

"I don't know. Where would you really like to go?"

"I don't know."

"Well, let's just go somewhere!"

And that's how we came up with the name for our blog. :)

We weren't sure which way we wanted to go. The only thing we knew for sure is that we wanted to go some place WARMER.

On RV.net, I had read that Arizona has some very good state parks. We chose to visit the only one I had found that had full hookups and still be way out in the desert: Alamo Lake State Park.

We headed west on I-40. We have really been surprised at how mountainous Arizona is in places.

We headed south on Hwy 93 and were pleasantly surprised how much smoother the road was than I-40. The views were great too!

We also began to see the cacti dotting the landscape.

Then, we kind of ran out of the lone tall cacti and started seeing Joshua trees.

We turned off on Hwy 71...

...and then drove through two towns, Aguila and Gladden on Hwy 60. Aguila and Gladden were so small that if we had blinked we would have missed them. We stopped at a very small grocery store in Winslow to pick up some cokes and then turned north on Alamo Lake Road for another 35 miles to the entrance of the park.

We kept driving further,

and further,

into the desert.

As we got close to the park entrance, we saw these wild burros on the side of a hill.

There were plenty of sites to choose from after we arrived at Alamo Lake SP. After disconnecting the car, we drove around the campground and decided on Site #12. Pretty nice, don't you agree?

Here, we had the security of a campground, the comforts of full hookups, and the luxury of satellite TV, out in the middle of the desert. The only thing we didn't have was cell service or internet.

There were all kinds of cacti surrounding us:

Yeah, I think we are going to enjoy Alamo Lake SP for the next few days.

Later that afternoon, we walked down to the boat ramp...

...only to find that the lake was so low that this ramp didn't work!

I found out from the ranger that they are at the end of a drought, they hope. With a good rain, the lake can rise as much as 20 feet in an hour and is normally much closer to the campsites.

A lot of fishermen must visit this lake because there were two big parking lots for boats and trailers and these very nice fish cleaning tables.

As we walked back to our campsite, we noticed what we thought were partridges but found out later they are quail. Chuck said they didn't look like any quail he had ever hunted in Tennessee.

A dripping water hydrant next to our site was a watering hole for the birds...

...and this rabbit.

I saw a coyote crossing the road in front of us but I wasn't fast enough to get a picture of ol' Wiley E. Coyote. :)

We were looking forward to sitting outside our first night here hoping for a beautiful night sky full of stars. We weren't disappointed.

You really didn't think I could get a picture of all those stars, did you? My camera is pretty good but it's not that good. I did get these pictures of the bright evening star also known as Venus.

We could see the Milky Way too. While we were sitting out there, we saw a couple of shooting stars. And then off to the northeast this series of bright lights in sequence and then shooting off and disappearing. Chuck likes to think they were aliens. I like to think they were some type of high-tech Army helicopters on training. Whatever they were, it was pretty neat to see.

The next morning, I got up early to work on the blog and watched the sun come up on the mountains...

...and the cactus.

Later in the morning, we went on a 5 mile walk through the campground and on the road. We found another boat ramp where the boats could get in.

And we saw another burro..

...and more cactus.

Chuck grilled some pork steaks and we had a nice fire on Wednesday evening. We saw the strange looking lights in the northeast horizon again for a few minutes but by the time I got my camera they were gone again. I don't know if my camera would have picked them up but I was able to zoom up and get the evening star so I should have been able to have gotten something.

We sat outside until we burned all our firewood enjoying the beautiful night sky.

On Thursday, we decided to go for a bike ride. The weather was just a little cool but there was no wind so it should be a perfect day for a bike ride.

We rode out to an overlook where we could see the Alamo Dam.