Framedlight

 We had one thing to do before we left the Guadaloupe Mountain area. It meant back tracking, but a little way up the road was the remnants of one of the Butterfield Overland Mail staging posts. The Butterfield Mail was the first stage coach services set up to carry mail and goods across the continent of the USA. It travelled between St Louis and San Francisco and initially must have been a hell of a scary ride. Because of the access to water one of the stations was located in the Guadaloupe Mountains. There is little left remaining to mark the spot except for some walling and timber, but there is a monument and an information board. As we left the shelter of the mountains we passed through a vast salt flat. It was so unexpected, we had not noticed it on the map, that we had to stop to take some photos. Alan even spotted sone sandhill cranes in the distance. It was late when we got to our destination of Las Cruces in southern New Mexico. We had thought of getting a take away but learnt

 The road we were travelling back to El Paso passes the main chain of the Guadeloupe Mountains which rise to a height of 8000 ft. Below is the Chihuahuan Desert that runs south for hundreds of miles into Mexico. The mountains were populated by the native Nde Apache who valued the water and shelter they provided. Unfortunately white settlers also saw the advantages of the Guadaloupe and in 1849 the US Army started a campaign to drive the Nde out. By 1880 they had all gone.  The area is immensely important as one of the best examples of a marine fossil reef in the world and the highlands provide homes for numerous species of animals, such as mountain lions, bears, golden eagles and deer. We drove into the visitor centre at Pine Springs and decided to do the Smith Spring trail. This is only 2.3 miles long, but despite it being mid October it was very hot, and in our just post-Covid state, going uphill was difficult. It was worth it though. We passed the the Frijole ranch which was being r