We're in the mountains--with the mountain animals!

After weeks in the desert, we headed up into the mountains near Cloudcroft, New Mexico. As we turned onto Highway 82, we started seeing the signs that warned us of the elevation changes ahead of us. They weren't warning us of the gentle rise that we would be driving for the next 70 miles to our campground. They were already warning of the steep downhill that happens on the other side of the mountain village of Cloudcroft--past our campground. Vehicles that continue past Cloudcroft's 8,650 feet elevation are required to have the appropriate braking systems as they will have steep 6% grades as they go down to 4,335 feet in elevation to Alamogordo at the other end of Highway 82. We had plans to stay in the mountains, so we weren't worried about those steep downhill warnings. We want to stay in the mountains!

After weeks of looking at desert cactus, we were excited to head into the mountain pine trees. We rolled into our site at Cool Pines Campground at over 8,000 feet in elevation, and it felt like home. This was another Passport America campground that offered half-price rates during the off-season. We were here for three nights, and we can't say enough about how neat and clean this campground was. We immediately liked the couple that had purchased this park several years ago and have made lots of improvements.

The welcoming committee also included several groups of mule deer that meandered through the campground. They would be the first of the mountain animals that we would enjoy during our stay.

If we didn't already like our campground enough, we were invited to the Saturday morning gathering in the activity room. Gail makes dozens of homemade cinnamon rolls every weekend. Campers are encouraged to get to know each other over a warm roll straight out of the oven. It doesn't get any better than that!

Cool Pines Campground is just 14 miles east of the town of Cloudcroft, which has some good hiking options. One evening we started a loop hike that started at the Zinker Canyon trailhead. We got to enjoy a beautiful blue sky day in the mountains!

The pine trees were so tall that it is hard to even see Mark standing at the bottom of it.

We hadn't been hiking long when we started seeing huge piles of horse poop. We didn't realize that this was such a good trail for horse-back riders, and why are all the horses stopping at the same place to make these big piles of poop?

We were pondering all these questions, when we caught our first view of the wild horses in the valley below us.

We were so excited to see this group of three wild horses grazing! We were tip-toeing down the trail so we didn't spook them.

This guy was in charge of security. Once he caught site of our movement, he gave a couple disapproving snorts and stared us down.

The other two seemed to be a mare and her adolescent colt. Finding more mountain animals made this little hike so much more fun!

As we continued to tip-toe down the trail, we were surprised to see another larger herd of wild horses just coming out of the forest above the first group of three.

Something in the forest spooked them, and that herd suddenly took off in a run towards us. As they ran, they kicked up the dust in this dry valley.

They came to a stop below us, and the stallion in charge of this bigger group spotted us. Again, we got a warning snort to let us know that we weren't welcome.

While the other horses started grazing as they settled down, he kept watch on the two-legged hikers that had wandered into his territory.

This was a pretty valley with a pond nestled between two hill tops. No wonder the wild horses like hanging out here.

It was fun to watch the horses, observing their behaviors and relationships. The stallion in charge continued to watch us until we decided it was going to get dark if we didn't pull ourselves away from these mountain animals.

As we hiked back to the pickup, only the tips of the tall pine trees were still in the sunlight.

The drive back to our campground took us down a forest service road. We saw a small group of elk moving through the trees.

We have wandered through more of God's wonders today as we took a couple pictures of more mountain animals.

A few miles further, and we drove by yet another group of wild horses!

In the last few miles of our evening drive, we saw a whole herd of elk bulls grazing their way along the valley.

We had to stop and admire their antlers, as we were glad to see yet another group of mountain animals. Yes, we're in the mountains now!