The Southwest - Winter 2007 The storm again, we got the ice!
Lou says.....
We woke up to a coating of ice! It wasn't supposed to happen but it did. A eighth inch coating of ice and a temperature of 32 degrees greeted us when we woke up. The RV and branches had ice but the ground was free of ice. So the question was do we leave or do we sit it out for a while?
Outside there was a gathering of campers discussing road conditions. Going north or east would be into the storm and travel to the south would require going over the Guadeloupe pass at 5600 feet. The temperature drops 3 degrees every thousand up in altitude, which calculates to well below freezing at the pass.
Out on the highway trucks, busses and cars were coming from the south. As there are no other roads between us and the pass that meant they had traveled over the pass. Assuming the pass was clear we decided to proceed... with caution.
Once on the road the temperature held steady at 32 degrees as we drove south into a foggy mist. To our surprise as we gained altitude the temperature started to rise! By the time we reached the summit the temperature was 40 degrees and the skies were clearing. We were driving out of the storm. Fortunately, that would be the last of this storm we would see!
We had clear sailing all the way to Deming NM, our next stop-over.
