The Difference Between

I don't know how many people know this, but I am claustrophobic (hence why I mention claustrophobia all through the blog). Where does a grandmother of someone who is claustrophobic send her on her trip southwest?

All sorts of Native American pueblos, and places like White Sands (that I will be visiting tomorrow, but because of the wonders of technology and my inability to keep up with blogging, you will get to see a day early):

I know it looks like snow, but its really not. Here are my feet digging into the white sand to prove it!

Now that was a strange site. There were all of these picnic benches not facing the ocean. That's the one thing this place really needed, a large body of water. It was just too hot and dry without one (hence it being a desert, I know I know).

And yes, while that really makes it look like a snow plow, it really was a sand plow. Pretty cool.

Now to where a mother of a claustrophobic daughter?

Carlsbad Caverns:

Don't get me wrong, both places are beautiful, but come on... I was freaking out. It was about an hour hike into the big section of the cave, and to get there, it was steep, dark, and in some places tighter than I would have preferred. To top it off, remember that I am alone here in off season, so while I would see the occasional person, there weren't that many. It added to the majesty of the place, but I did notice that just by knowing that other people were there I would start to breath easier. Then there was this:

An original rope later used to explore the caves. Yeah, they didn't let us go into that part.

I started to breath normal again once I got into the Big Room partly b/c it was so spacious, and partly b/c I was getting accustomed to the fact that I was more than 3 Statue of Liberty's worth of distance beneath the surface of the ground. I kinda blacked out a half dozen times or so, but there were plenty of railings for me to hold onto until I got my sight and head back on straight. Then there was the coup de grace, which for anyone who has ever been in any building with me over 2 stories, you will know why this was just the cherry on top:

Taking the elevator was pretty much the only way back up. On the way up the woman operating the lift began talking about her training for car to car rescue for when the elevators break down... and I just had to laugh. It actually made the ride less of a problem to hear her unknowing attempt to make me cry. But when the elevator doors opened, I still ran out just as quickly as I usually do.

I wanted to watch the bats fly out of the cave at night, but they had flown south to Mexico about 2 weeks before I got there. So I left after watching a video where they show the bats leaving for the night to hunt. Then I slept in a camp ground in the Guadalupe Mountains above Carlsbad Caverns (which was surprisingly the warmest nights sleep on my entire week vacation from Joe.