2026 New Mexico – Day 8 – Valley of Fire

Megan’s Take

Today we said goodbye to the fun swimming pool at the Alamogordo/ White Sands KOA and headed northward. Our final destination was Manzano Mountains State Park, but we did not take the quickest or most direct route. 

We stopped at the Valley of Fire Recreation Area – very cool valley filled with black volcanic rock formations. We hiked a 1-mile nature loop and completed a Junior Ranger packet to earn another badge.

Then we drove westward along the northern edge of the White Sands Missile Range. The big excitement was running low on fuel in the middle of the desert, going uphill against strong winds. Phil had to drive very slowly to conserve fuel, and we made it to the nearest gas station about 50 miles away with “1 mile to empty” on the dashboard. 

Then we drove by Old San Miguel Catholic Church (built in the 1600s) in Socorro for a few exterior photos

and decided to stop at the New Mexico Bureau of Geology Mineral Museum. This small, free museum has a world-class collection and is an absolute *gem* of a museum.

Honestly, it has such a cool collection.

I could have spent a couple hours looking at the specimens, but the kids have a short attention span. So I told Phil that I want to come back someday on an adults-only rock hounding trip and visit this museum again.

The last stretch of our trip was driving eastward again to Manzano Mountains State Park.

It’s our first time trying a “primitive” campsite (no electric). However, Phil has set up a solar panel system with battery, so we can run everything we need to while being careful to conserve. We even microwaved hot dogs and turned on a TV show after dinner – not terribly primitive. The site itself is beautiful – trees, rocks, cool breezes – a nice reprieve from the desert.

Phil’s Take

Valley of Fire reminded me very much of our visit to Craters of the Moon on our first sabbatical trip, though there is significantly more vegetation in the Valley of Fire. I took this panorama at the top of the ridge before we descended to the nature walk.

This was a very nice trail with plenty of explanation of what we saw along the way. Our timing was awesome, giving us views of beautiful blooms on the cacti.

I thought it was incredible how life finds a way to live in this hostile looking environment.

Megan also forgot to mention another lizard sighting in this crazy place.

After that was the aforementioned gas guzzling experience. Never underestimate the fuel consumption of a Ford F-150 3.5L EcoBoost towing a 7000 lb camper up a hill into a 30 MPH wind. I wasn’t paying close enough attention on our ascent. When we started the day, the wind was at our back and I was more looking at the sights than I was looking at fuel consumption. We had more than enough fuel to make it to the gas stations along the route, if fuel consumption was reasonable. It was not reasonable.

Knowing what we had and how far we traveled, consumption had to be ~4MPG for a while before I noticed. I noticed after we got back in the truck after a pit stop that we had about the same amount of miles to go as we had remaining fuel, and it was at this pit stop that I also noticed how hard the wind was blowing, since it took my hat off as soon as I opened the door and stepped out. I also noticed that we had more ascent, and anyone that has traveled in mountains much knows that it’s never really clear where the top of a ridge is. Needless to say, I was concerned, and proceeded to drive as efficiently as possible. Even going downhill we were burning serious fuel if I tried to go over 60. So we drove slow, but I made sure the numbers added up so that we’d make it to the gas station. I was willing to go as slow as was needed to make sure we made it.

Anyway, I managed to stop and grab a picture of the Trinity Site signs. I turned the engine off, even though it was a brief stop, because fuel was so scarce. Anyway, some miles in this direction is where the first nuclear bomb was detonated.

Out in front of the museum we saw one of the largest petrified wood specimens I’ve ever seen.

That was followed by one of the largest geodes I’ve ever seen.

I’m not sure how it turned out, but I even took a panorama inside it.

I liked that there were some specimens we were allowed to touch, so the kids could get involved. Most everything else was behind glass, as you would expect.

This place was really great. I would have liked more time to look at some of the more exotic specimens that you just don’t see very often. Almost every display is going to have pyrite, fluorite, and the like, but there were things here I had never seen before.

As Megan said, this is a primitive site, so we’re relying on solar and the power bank for electricity. As we approached, it looked like an ideal setup.

However, as we got closer and closer, the vegetation got taller and taller.

While I don’t have a picture of it, our campground is basically in the only forest in the entire state of New Mexico, and I have solar panels as our source of power. Miraculously we somehow ended up in one of the least shaded spots in the entire campground, so we should get several hours of sunlight to recharge the battery. I hear the next primitive campground is desert, so sunlight should not be an issue. Heat however…

Here’s the gallery for today: