Roswell and Carlsbad Caverns

Roswell was fun.  The International UFO Museum and Research Center is strange to say the least.  There are tons of displays of "evidence" supporting that a alien craft crashed in a field nearby and a large collection of art and such of what the aliens would have looked like and what they look like in the popular imagination.  Along with the evidence of the Roswell crash there is support of alien life forms interacting this us in other forms.  IE abductions, ancient civilizations, crop circles and flying saucers.  All you would expect from the place.  Only cost $5 to got in and had free WiFi so it was all was good.  Overall, the town of Roswell, New Mexico is cute and dry.  Pretty much what you would expect from a desert city.  The village, what the signs say instead of city in New Mexico, is larger than expected and the people in this state have been some of the friendlyest I have met so far.  Today, after buying a fanny pack at Walmart, I headed to Carlsbad Caverns.  This place would have been worth the money but since it was covered by my federal parks pass it was free to get in for myself and the two random strangers that I met in line and haven't seen since.  My pass cover three people so I shared.  It is beautiful down in that cave.  The big room is a little over a mile of walking but not really strenuous and has tons of great formations.  I didn't do any of the ranger led tours.  The big room and the original entrance are self guided and were enough for me.  I went down the elevator, walked very slowly around the big room loop, went up the elevator, then walked down the original entrance that smells rather strongly of what I'm sure is bat poop, around the big room loop very quickly then up the elevator.  I thought about trying to walk up the original entrance but two things prevented me from doing it.  One, it was too late when I got back to the main room and two, it was over a mile walk going up a 20% grade 750 feet.  Down was good enough.  I highly recommend coming to the caverns though because as cool as the caves in the hills are this one is a totally different experience.  I'm told that the ranger led bat show is awesome but it is only from May to October when the Mexican flat tail bats are migrating to this area but the bats are mostly in Mexico now.  They still let you sit and watch the bats come out, I saw at least five, but there is no range there to answer questions.  They told me that the colony of bats that live there in the summer is from 250,000 to 500,000 bats strong, which is why the entrance is covered in poop and smells funky. Anyway, this place was splendid and it was an experience that I loved.  Oh, and I almost forgot to say, Carlsbad Caverns has flush toilets in the cave.  Yes folks, flush toilets 750 feet below the surface.  How could I not love them?  Off to Texas tomorrow.  Lone star state, prepare yourself.