In yesterday's blog we said that if we could stay awake long enough we would take a picture of the view from our trailer overlooking Las Cruces at night.

Last night was beautiful but today has not been nice - plenty of sunshine but a nasty wind (gusts to 49 mph) creating dust storms. We were not interested in being outside so we drove around some to get a feel for the Las Cruces area (the second largest city in New Mexico). At times the dust storms were so bad that our GPS would blank out because the satellite signals could not penetrate the cloud. We did stop at one of the local wineries - the La Viña Winery - and sampled a few wines.

The winery is located in the Mesilla Valley south of Las Cruces. "Mesilla" in Spanish means "little table" and the wine is named the Little Table Cabernet Sauvignon. There are a few other wineries around but they were not open today. On our drive we crossed over the Rio Grande a few times. It really should be called the Rio de Arena (River of Sand) - not a drop of water in sight.

While driving around we saw thousands of acres of pecan orchards. We have been seeing lots of them over the last several days ever since we arrived in the Tempe area. There are smaller orchards of other trees and vines but nothing like the vast expanses of pecan trees.

The above photos don't show the gusty wind and dust clouds that followed us around. But they kept us in our vehicle trying to stay away from the grit that was clogging our sinuses. The weather is supposed to be much calmer tomorrow for our drive to Midland, Texas. Hopefully the forecast is accurate because pulling our trailer in winds in excess of 40 mph is no fun, and could be dangerous. We will keep you posted.