Mt. San Jacinto Outdoor Recreation

Hello all my hiking friends,

I have not been active for a while, not hiking too much (I have been surfing and snowboarding a lot) but I have gone on a few overnight solo trips into the desert.

I am writing to ask for recommendations of interesting places to visit on a road trip from San Diego to Carlsbad New Mexico to see the Carlsbad Caverns. I am quite interested in the Trinity nuclear test site and I might have to stop in Roswell because ALIENS, but what sort of interesting and scenic places are there in the vicinity of my travels?

I would like to stop at White Sands of course, and maybe camp there a night. But I am sure there are tons of amazing places to see in Arizona and New Mexico along my route. I love the desert.

Thank you very much

VLA radio telescopes if you're into astronomy/science things.

You may already know this, but Trinity is open one day each spring and one day each fall to the public. This fall it's open on

Saturday October 6, 2018
8:00 am - 2:00 pm

I haven't been there myself, but I'm hoping to go in the next couple of years. I hope you'll post about the experience when you get back if you have the chance to actually visit ground zero. Apparently it is crowded and there's not much to see, but it still sounds interesting to me, and admission is free.

If you're a Breaking Bad fan there's a Breaking Bad tour somewhere near Albuquerque. I've only seen a few episodes, but if you're one of those people who's seen every episode twice then it might be fun.

z

Places more or less close to the San Diego - Carlsbad, NM route that come to mind:

- Titan Missile museum south of Tucson; toured the silo there years ago, very interesting
- Bisbee is a cool old mining town
- Fort Bowie historic site.
- Chiricahua National Monument in the south eastern corner of AZ is a cool place for some hiking, unusual rock formations
- The Gila north of Silver city has good hikes and the Gila Cliff Dwellings NM
- Get some Chili in Hatch, NM
- If you go to White Sands NM don't miss New Mexico Museum of Space History in Alamogordo

Hopefully this reaches you before your trip. There is more, but these are some of the not so commonly mentioned places that come to mind.