Our drive to El Paso, Texas and Fort Bliss was uneventful and beautiful with clear skies and some areas with carpets of yellow flowers as far as the eye could see on both sides of the road. We drove on I-10 through El Paso and then proceeded north on Highway 54 to the Fort Bliss RV Park which is located off-base for the Army post. It is a very nice RV Park that was pretty easy to access and full services. The cost is only $19 per day with full services. The only drawback is that is sits right next to the busy Highway 54, so the traffic noise is quite high.

High winds and rain through the night that pelted the roof of the RV and made it rock quite a bit. The wind was directly perpendicular to the length of the trailer which made the situation pretty bad. We understand that we had gusts in the 40-50 mph range. Luckily, the trailer did not blow over. We were both glad that we were not trying to travel through this wind storm.

Well, we are beginning to see impacts from the Corona virus on our sightseeing plans. We are planning to go to the White Sands National Park tomorrow, but the visitation center is closed and so is the restroom there. Looks like we can still visit the park, but we will just be able to drive through and, possibly, take a couple of hikes. We also had reservations at the Hueco Tanks State Park just east of El Paso. These tanks are deep pits in the rocks that capture water that the native Americans used as reservoirs of water for the hot summer months. We had a guided tour on Saturday that normally involves up to 25 people, but had been cut down to 10 people due to the virus. Now we have learned that the tours and the park have been closed due to the Corona Virus. Bummer!! We were able to extend our reservations at Big Bend National Park from two days to five days. We think that there may have been some cancellations due to the virus or fewer "spring breakers" due to the virus. Either way, we now have more time to visit this park.

Yesterday we drove to Alamogordo, New Mexico and the White Sands National Monument. We drove through the city of Alamogordo to see what it is like. We are not sure what the major draw is for the people who live there. Mining was important in the past, but I'm not sure if it is still an active mining region. We then went to the White Sands National Monument where the visitors center is closed to due to the Corona Virus. The roads into the park and all the remote restrooms/picnic areas are still accessible by the public. We drove into the park found a nice walkway to the dunes. A lot of good info on the why the dunes are there and why they are white. The dunes are made of gypsum, the material used to make sheet-rock or wallboard for building homes. There are two major areas of white qypsum dunes; one here at White Sands and another about 400 miles away in Mexico. The water table here is only two to three feet beneath the surface and this tends to hold the dunes in place. When you get into the dune area, you think it is snow. It has all of the same characteristics except that it is not cold. It drifts, it is pure white, and it can be move with a snowblower. We went on a five mile hike across the dunes with many fairly challenging climbs up the dunes. It was a lot of fun. At abut the two mile point in the hike we met two young ladies from Austin, Texas. We all walked together and visited for the remainder of the hike. Emerson and Aerica are in their low twenties and traveling about the country. Emerson is 24 years old and a landscape architect. Aerica is 20 years old is currently a web designer. Be sure to see the photos of our visit to White Sands. It was pretty impressive and we are both glad that we made the trip and took the hike.

Corona Virus Update - Our next two scheduled RV parks at Alpine, Texas and and Lajitas, Texas have both been ordered to close by their county officials. They are even forcing all residents to leave by tomorrow, Monday, March 23rd. That cuts out a national and state park visit that we really wanted to see. Also, military Family RV Parks are not taking new residents. If you are there, you can stay as long as you like, but if you leave you cannot get back into the park. We tried to get onto Holliman AFB in Alamagordo, New Mexico yesterday, but they would not even let us on base unless we were family camp members or going to the base hospital. We have other reservations in central Texas, but we are going to wait to see if they close too. So, where does that leave us? For now, we plan to stay at the military Family Camp here at Fort Bliss, Texas. We can stay here indefinitely, but we would much rather be on the road. If we go on the road, we will not be able to stay on military bases and we will not be assured a place to stay at commercial facilities either. "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush!"

Well, we are still stuck in El Paso, Texas at the Fort Bliss RV Park. The good news is that we have a place to stay, The bad news is that we don't have anywhere we can go. Most of the RV Resorts near sights to see are closed and won't take newcomers. For this reason, we cannot get close enough to the National Parks and recreation areas to camp and still get to the parks. We can stay as a few RV parks along Interstate 10, but there is nothing open to see in these areas. If we get to San Antonio, we cannot see the Alamo because it is closed. The famous San Antonio River Walk is open for strolling, but none of the stores and restaurants on the walk are open. So, we are just "hunkered down" here at Fort Bliss waiting for the Corona virus to settle down and make travel okay again. We are still allowed to hike at some of the local State Parks, and those hikes are excellent. We have taken several and are trying to stay fit and in shape (even if the shape is like a pear!!).

We had three or four great days with relatively calm winds and sunshine. For the last two days, the winds have been very high and rocking "The Beast" from side to side. Also, there is a lot of fine dust in the air and it tends to get into everything. I washed the truck two days ago even though I knew that the winds were going to come up. Going to need a rinsing for sure when the winds die down tomorrow afternoon or evening. There was a 5.0 earthquake in the area yesterday. Lisa and I were sitting on the couch and felt the movement. There was no wind at the time, so we were quite curious about what was going on. Nothing like the wind's impact though. I would estimate that the winds have periodic gusts to 50 miles per hour with 30 MPH very common. I have taken down the satellite dish, since I am not sure it can withstand these gusts. So, no TV either (probably good). Our neighbors, two ladies and two kids, decided to leave the park today. Not sure where their destination is, but they had better watch out for the winds as "high profile" wind warnings are posted all over the freeways. We are really getting rocked around right now. Lisa is nervous! She checked the weather reports for the area and wind gusts to 60 mph are projected for today and tonight. Should be an exciting evening. Buttoned up everything on the trailer. Major gust of wind "rocking the boat" in a manner of speaking. Pretty amazing. My neighbor has to keep chasing her stabilizer blocks because the wind is rocking one side of her trailer up in the air and the blocks are then blown out from under the jacks. Then her trailer is supported by three rather than four stabilizers. Got to be rocking in there. Her husband is stationed at Fort Bliss and they have four girls under six years of age.

What we can do is run errands and work on the trailer. I am about halfway done with waxing the entire rig. I have completed some repairs that I have procrastinated on for some time. Nice to get things done. We also finished our taxes today and sent them off to the feds and the State of California. Amounted to 20% of our gross income just for the feds and CA. We still have sales, property, vehicle and a myriad of other taxes that we pay. Bummer. We also sent the last of the paperwork to South Dakota to register our vehicles and the RV in that state. What costs us $2000 in CA, we are getting done for about $500 in South Dakota. We will visit South Dakota in the spring (if we ever get out of Corona prison) and get our drivers licenses converted over and establish residency. This way of doing things works out quite well while we are traveling about the country and do not, "technically," have a permanent home. We will also establish South Dakota as our voting state.