guadaloupe national park

our last full day spent on our trip was actually back in texas. we drove past carlsbad national park across the NM/TX border to another national park...

 

28 weeks!

look how close we were to getting the sign in the picture with us! haha

 we decided to do a four mile hike here called Devil's Hall.

the hike was kind of separated into three portions. the first was regular hiking on a trail through brush and trees with not much shade.

the second portion was through a wash which meant we were climbing lots of big boulders and following cairns to know where to go since there wasn't a trail. i didn't mind this on the way up, but the way down was kind of difficult with my belly. downhill in general really isn't that great, it starts to hurt under my belly and i wasn't wearing a bellyband or anything. there was pretty much no shade while in the wash.

 

the third portion was short but through these step-looking things!! it all looked manmade to me and was so cool!

here i am standing in devil's hall itself! i don't know why it is named that because the cool breeze blowing through the hall felt heavenly. we ate lunch on some of the stairs at the end of the trail and it was so relaxing. we were the only people there! we saw maybe 7 people the whole hike, it was great. this canyon really reminded us of slot canyon in anza borrego, ca where jon liked to off road. 

doesn't this look like the facade of a building or museum or something? so pretty. it is layers upon layers of sediment. 

 the whole guadaloupe mountain range is an ancient reef. at one point it was all underwater; the ranger described it as one big fossil. it was a pretty hike with great weather, difficult but not too strenuous. we drove back to the hotel to rest for a bit and then swam at carlsbad lake again. my back was hurting a bit after the hike and i felt great after swimming, it is so amazing how that works. we finished the night off with some little caesars and television, haha.

believe them when people tell you there is not much to see in west texas. we wanted to take a different route home than we took to carlsbad so we could sightsee, but this was literally the only stop worthwhile. this stonehenge replica was in Odessa, texas and it was awesome! neither of us have been to the real thing, but we did appreciate this pretty good replica.
our trip was so much fun, we are grateful to be able to spend some quality time alone together before the baby arrives. 12 weeks and counting...