Mar 27 Sunday White Sands Missile Range test facility near Las Cruces New Mexico

Mar 27 Sun. Day 69 - bright & sunny, mid to high 70’s forecast

The Passport America El Rancho Lobo Park we were in last night charges for electricity over the flat camping rate, which includes water & sewer connections plus free WiFi. They charge 12 cents per KW used. They read the meter on entry then in the morning. Our total bill for the night was $11.87, of that 72 cents was power; (we used 6 KW). We weren’t trying to save power; we ran the fridge on electricity and whatever lights we felt like, plus the microwave for supper and the furnace in the morning. I did switch the hot water over to propane from electricity. It stayed warm here in the evening so we didn’t need the furnace at night at all.

We left El Rancho Lobo Park @ 137665 @ 10:40 am and arrived at Coachlight RV Park @ 123745 @ 11:45. We settled in, hooked up, had lunch & then headed out to the White Sands Missile Range museum about 20 miles north up Hwy 70, which had a sign saying it was the “Bataan Memorial Highway”. Once on the entrance road we saw a large number of people, some in military fatigues walking along the side of the hwy. There were police - state, city & military, directing traffic around cones set up to mark the route. We found out this was the 22nd annual Memorial Bataan Death March. The Death March occurred in 1942 after 72,000 US forces were taken prisoner after the 3 month Battle of Bataan in the Philippines. The POW’s were marched 60 miles (97 kms) without food & almost no water) and were routinely abused & murdered. Records show that only 54,000 survived the march. The memorial march has 2 routes, 26.2 miles & 15.2 miles. We saw a large number of people still on the road when we left a cpl hours later. The dashboard temp read out at 2:40 pm was 24C, that’s just over 75F. We passed a water & medical station that had military ambulances standing by & we saw more than one person limping or lying on a stretcher off the road. Unfortunately the museum at the missile range was closed Sat. & Sun. but the outdoor display of assorted missiles was open so we walked around. It was amazing, the number & variety of missiles that had been developed over the years & tested in the area surrounding this base. Each one had a placard showing its name, size, weight, range & what it had been developed for. After we left, we drove home to have supper & do journal entries etc.