Austin, Texas to Taos, New Mexico
One of the more taxing days of the journey, we had to travel almost the entire length of Texas, 1 Time zone, 1250 Km’s (just shy of 19 hours) to get to Taos which is home to The Rio Grande which house a set of gorges where the Colorado river passes through and creates a series of white water rapids.
Leaving at 07:45 we made our way to our first stop, Lubbock, 8 hours north-west. Our initial plans were to stay over-night if we didn’t feel like punching out the next leg to Taos, these plans were quickly scuppered when we saw Lubbock. Dashing into walmart quickly for booze and the cheapest rafting outfits we could find, we hit the road for the desert plains of Texas where the team encountered our first RV issues since Miami Airport ran into us. Driving along the plains of Texas we encountered high winds cutting across our 13’5” high RV which began to smash our slide-out’s boom against the RV and tore its cover. Three emergency stops in the desert and half an hour later Nic and ABN managed to fix the booms and we continued into the sunset, headed for the Texas/New Mexico border.
Man tasks
The desert sunset quickly made way for Texas Chainsaw Massacre territory and headlights while Dean serenaded us through the majesty of a stuttering harmonica.
One way ticket...
Our 22:30 initial arrival time elapsing and blowing out to 00:30 we drove through the pitch black countryside of New Mexico at snails pace with high winds and lunatic truckers dominating the road. Our arrival time again blowing out to 02:00 we tried to make our way to our launch point for the days white water rafting excursion at the bottom of a rocky valley in the middle of nowhere, not an excellent idea.
Finally admitting defeat, we managed to find a casino which also doubled as a heavily patronised truck stop.
At 03:00 we were finally able to put the jacks down, level out the cab, extend the slide-outs and we slept to the gentle hum of big rigs and truckers making love to each other.
Grizzling across the states 