SW Trek - 5 Nat'l. Parks

We had another wonderful vacation (aren't they all?), this time visiting five NP's in the South and West. We left Chicago on the 28th of March and got home the 15th of April. Clocked a total of 4,348 miles. We normally don't do a long trip this early in the season, but we had the opportunity so we took it. Our goal is to visit as many National Parks as we can before we keel over, and as this is a good time of year to visit the distant Big Bend in Texas, we mapped out a route to include the parks that could be done comfortably in the time we had to spend and headed South.
First was Hot Springs in Arkansas - not your typical 'National Park' per se, as the bathhouses are right in the city of Hot Springs. Most are not open, and even the visitor center is still closed due to Covid, but the history is interesting and the architecture is quite nice. We also managed to get a nice hike in at the Gulpha Gorge Campground in the park while there.
On to Texas, where we stayed at Cedar Hills State Park between Dallas & Ft Worth for a couple nights. Beautiful park with some nice trails to hike. Nice facilities. We since found that it was impossible to get into State Parks in Texas as they were booked solid, so we stayed at a few RV 'Resorts' along the way - we were the David among the Goliaths for sure...
When we originally decided to go for Big Bend, there were no campsites available until July, but I kept checking (2 & 3 times a day) and was able to snag 5 days in early April. Getting a site in the park saved us driving at least 90 minutes each day from the nearest private campground. I then called the concession run campground in the park the day before we arrived to see if they had availability and they did, so we stayed in the sites with electric and water instead. Pricier, but actually more trees than our non-electric site would have had. Neither has showers at this time, SO... we bathed in the Rio Grande for the 6 days that we we there. Big Bend is an incredible park - great hikes; Boquillas Canyon, Chisos Mountain area, Santa Elena Canyon - all beautiful. And the night sky is like nothing we've ever seen! Billed as one of the darkest skies in the lower 48, and I believe it.
From there we headed to White Sands NP in New Mexico, which was an unexpected gem. We live close to Indiana Dunes National Park and have been there countless times over the years, but there is no comparison to the size and feel of White Sands! 23.5 square miles vs 275 square miles; hot silica vs cool gypsum, tan vs white, etc. It was truly like standing in the middle of a desert, along with several hundred other people... We did a hike along a boardwalk, and to the top of one of the dunes to see the mountains in the distance... As there is not much more than gypsum as far as the eye can see, we were off to Guadalupe Mountains National Park.
Camping in the park is first come first serve, and there were no available sites. So we stayed at the White City RV 'Resort', VERY loosely termed. A gravel lot with tightly spaced 'sites', but it's located right at the entrance to Carlsbad Caverns NP, which is about 30 miles from Guadalupe. Very handy. Guadalupe Mountains has many great hiking opportunities; we decided to hike up the McKittrick Canyon trail, about an 8 mile round trip. Packed a lunch, took our time and enjoyed a nice 4.5 to 5 hour hike.
The next day we had tickets for the self guided Carlsbad Caverns tour (which we learned about from fellow campers while in Big Bend. You need to buy them at recreation.gov in advance. They're $1 a piece.) What a phenomenal experience THAT was! We've hiked caves/caverns in the past, but nothing like this - there are spaces in Carlsbad where I swear you could park a plane. Incredible formations, well lit, easy walking - all ramps - and an elevator to take you the 750 feet or so back to the surface. Amazing.
Took our time getting home from there, staying at state parks in Oklahoma and Missouri on the way. A very relaxing enjoyable vacation.

Here's a link to my Flickr album of the trip: Spring 2021 Nat'l. Parks | Flickr

 

It sure would have been nice to get into one of the bathhouses. We were to Budapest a couple years ago so told ourselves it was probably just like that. We may make it back some day...

 

Thanks, it was a great time! And only rained twice - once at Hot Springs and once overnight on the way home. Just about perfect.

 

It's actually mounted to the tow vehicle using a dual hitch receiver like this one- Dual Hitch Extender We actually use an extra 12 in. Hitch Extender to push the trailer back another foot or so for clearance.

We tried mounting the bike rack behind the trailer but found it caused too much sway. And, having the rack mounted to the truck makes more sense since we aren't always going to ride the bikes where we're camping.

 

John, I am not that familiar with how the tongue weights get affected, but my guess is that with the bike behind the trailer the tongue weight would decrease vs the way I've got them set up. The stability became a much bigger issue very quickly for us. Now, that being said, I could have reduced the sway a bit by removing the dual hitch receiver from my setup. It would have shortened things by probably 18". But the sway was so bad that the reduction gained would not be great enough to come close to eliminating it.

 

I didn't put the dual hitch receiver behind the trailer with the bike rack. I meant that simply having it installed between the tow vehicle and the trailer adds length to the entire setup. I put the rack and bikes behind the trailer while I still had the dual hitch receiver installed between the truck and trailer. That extra length surely added a bit of sway to my setup, but it's not what caused it - the bikes behind the trailer did.

 

Exactly. Looks to be about a $50 experiment...

 

We're all clamped down, no 'bouncies'. I hear what you're saying regarding tongue weight, and am sure I may be a bit heavy, but the alternative of putting the bikes behind the trailer is clearly much less stable. That's why it is so important to be familiar with your particular setup and spend the time and/or money to be sure you've got close to that sweet spot of stability and handling.

 

I'm not quite sure I follow you. It seems to me that no matter how the weight is added, either in front of or behind the trailer axle, the tongue weight will either increase or decrease, respectively. Yes?