Time to leave Texas and head north. This is my nephew Alex. I decided to bring him along as my personal photographer. Most, if not all of the following pictures were taken by him. Alex was out of school for the summer and between jobs so jumped at the opportunity to travel with Uncle.
Always tight with two people in the van. Alex did a great job of keeping his stuff tidy. I’m a stickler for not having to dig through layers of stuff to get what you need.
First stop, Pedernales State Park in Texas. Just a way to get the timing of the trip to work out. From here Carlsbad was doable. Not a real scenic camp spot. We needed the power though since it was over a hundred degrees out.
This is the main attraction at Pedernales. We lounged in the river for most of the afternoon waiting for the van A/C to finally beat the heat.
Made it to Carlsbad Caverns the next day. We walked through the cave from the bat entrance. My favorite part is always the bats and birds at the entrance.
The main room in Carlsbad. Alex did a great job capturing these shots with no tripod.
I kept telling Alex how great it was to see the bats leave the cave. Turns out there are only 5000 bats here now. Drought and fire have kept them away. Last time I was here there were some 600,000 bats leaving for their evening commute. Big difference, disappointing.
