New Mexico Road Trip - Ruidoso to Socorro

Tuesday, October 29, 2024

Today we’re moving on to our next destination, Socorro, New Mexico.  We were up, packed and ready to go by nine and after getting our car from the valet and getting some tea and juice, we hit the road.  We really enjoyed our stay at the Inn of the Mountain Gods and would stay here again.  The hotel is very nice, there is a friendly and helpful staff, a number of options for eating, and a beautiful location.

Our travel route for the day.  We aren't checking off any scenic byways from our list, but we are visiting the Bosque del Apache Wildlife Refuge (the red line) that we think should have been on the list.

Instead of heading directly to Socorro, we are taking a longer route that will take us back through the town of Tularosa so Val can continue her search for chile ristras.  A chile ristra is a string of chile peppers that is used for drying chile peppers and decoration.  On our first pass through town, we didn’t see any roadside stands selling them, but as we turned around and headed back, we saw a place we had missed.  Val found exactly what she wanted and bought a chile ristra and two wreaths made out of chile peppers, from Felix Lopez, the very nice owner of the shop.  Mission accomplished and we were on our way to Socorro.

Entering Tularosa

Felix holding Val's ristra.

The first part of the drive was through very plain looking high desert terrain and the wind continued to blow so there was a lot of dust.  Driving north we reached the crossroads of US-54 (the road we’re on) and US 380 in the town of Carrizozo.  On our way to Ruidosos we had taken US 54 South and turned east on US 380, and now we will be turning west on US-380, so we have gone in all directions at this crossroads in the middle of nowhere.

Not a very interesting drive north to Carrizozo.

US-380 west was very desolate, but much more scenic than our drive north as the drive was through rolling hills and grasslands.  As we neared Socorro it was only 12:30 and we knew our room wouldn’t be ready, so we decided to visit the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.

We made it to San Antonito.

The main intersection in town - straight ahead to I-25, turn right to go to Socorro, and turn left to go to the Wildlife Refuge.  That's the Owl Bar & Cafe to the right ahead, more on that in a minute.

The Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge is twenty miles south of Socorro, the winter home of thousands of sandhill cranes, snow geese, ducks and other waterfowl. The 57,000+ acre refuge opened in 1939 to “provide a refuge and breeding ground for migratory birds and other wildlife” as well as wintering grounds for the then-endangered greater sandhill cranes. Today it is one of the most highly managed refuges in the national system.

We planned on visiting the refuge later in the day, but since we got here so early, we decided to go to the visitor center and get some information.  This is the winter home of many birds, particularly the sandhill cranes, but it is still a little early and we were told there wouldn’t be many birds until late November or December.  Getting a map, we headed back towards Socorro and stopped in the small town of San Antonio just south of Socorro where we had lunch at the Owl Bar & Café for lunch.

The Owl Bar & Café is a very unassuming restaurant at a very rural intersection but is nationally known for its green chili cheeseburgers and actually won an award this year for the best in New Mexico.  The interior of the café is quite eclectic and reflective of its rural location.  Val had a green chili cheeseburger and said it was very good, but I declined and got a grilled ham and cheese sandwich, because I have found in New Mexico when they say something is mild it is generally too hot for me.

Val's lunch, now I wish I had gotten one.

After lunch, we took the short drive up I-25 to Socorro and by this time our room was ready, and we checked into the Best Western Socorro for the next two nights.  We wanted to wait until late afternoon to return to the Bosque del Apache National Refuge so we relaxed a bit until around 3:30.  It was a half hour drive south back to the refuge where we intended to take both the north and south loops drives.

The back road to Socorro.

Entering Socorro

We head back south to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.

 

The Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.

We started on the north drive and immediately saw a pond with quite a few cranes in it, but it was so far away we could barely see them and even with our telephoto lenses we couldn’t see much detail.  It was still very windy and since the roads were all unpaved, it was very dusty.  It made getting out of the car to take pictures or walk to the viewpoints a bit uncomfortable, but we did it anyway.

There aren't many sandhill cranes here yet and the ones we saw like these were staying put.

We saw only two groups of cranes, and both were far away.  We didn’t see any of them flying, which may have been because of the winds or maybe they were just happy to stay where they were.  Despite the lack of birds, it was still a beautiful drive with great scenery and a blue sky with very distinctive clouds.

We completed the north loop and continued on to the south loop where we didn’t see any birds.  We did see a strange animal at one point that we couldn’t identify, but it looked like some kind of wild boar.  Val did a little research when we got back to the hotel and found out it is called a Javelina and although it looks like a pig, it is in the Peccary family.  We took some pictures, but they were not very clear as we took them through the car window.  This drive was also beautiful with an abundance of fall color made even more beautiful by the late day sun.

Not very good picture, but this is a Javelina with two young one.

It's getting late in the day and time to head back to Socorro and our hotel.

We completed the loop and started back to Socorro, and despite the lack of birds, we were still very happy that we had made this side trip today and thoroughly enjoyed it.  The area is beautiful and maybe someday we’ll visit during the winter and see the large number of birds that winter here.

It was nearing seven by the time we got back to Socorro, and we were both tired and didn’t feel like going to a restaurant, so we stopped at a grocery store and got a vegetable plate and some crackers and cheese for our dinner tonight.  We bought enough for lunch tomorrow since we probably won’t be near any place to eat as we are going to do two or three of our scenic drives tomorrow.

We got back to our hotel, had our “dinner” and relaxed for the rest of the evening.  Tomorrow we’ll be heading west of here hoping to do three of the scenic byways.

Scenic Drives Completed: 21 of 35

Scenic Drives Missed: 3

The overview map of our trip.  No scenic byways today, but a very scenic day of driving.