Thursday February 1st 2018

I got started from Las Cruces a little before ten this morning. My first stop was one exit east on Interstate 10 at the Pilot gas station. Fifty two gallons of gas later I was on my way at ten thirty. The pump was slow and picky. It cut out several times requiring me to hold the handle most of the time.

Site E-13 at the Van Horn RV Park. By night fall I was surrounded by neighbors.

I turned off Interstate 10 just before the Texas border on New Mexico route 404. It crosses the mountains at via a gentle low pass before intersecting New Mexico route 213 south into Texas where the route turns into Texas Farm road 3255. A brief section of US 54 south follows before intersecting with Loop road 375. I followed 375 clockwise which is east and south all the way to Interstate 10 west southwest of EL Paso. Traffic was light on this route and the road surface was OK. I’ll use it from now on to get around El Paso on a weekday. Once the construction on I-10 in El Paso finishes I might go through the city on a Sunday.

East of El Paso Interstate 10 parallels the border with Mexico for many miles. Looking south across open land Mexico is between 2 and 5 miles away. At least as I read the scale on a Map. I didn’t venture off to see how close it was. I kept driving east. My cell phone jumped to central time soon after leaving El Paso. I didn’t pass the road sign indicating the change in time zones for another forty miles.

I stopped for the day in Van Horn TX. The overnight options get thin the next 200 miles on my route east. The Van Horn RV Park is the new name of the former KOA. It has many level pull through sites that don’t require me to unhook the car to fit. I was one of the early arrivals in a long line of overnight visitors.

Sunset to the west of Van Horn TX.