A hike down Luchini Trail 1.6 miles
On our last day at Elephant Butte Lake State Park we finally walked this trail. Only took me three months to get to it! It was nice too. The clouds in distance looked like they might storm, but they never did.
This Luchini trail is named after Frank Luchini who lived in Truth or Consequences, called T or C by the locals, who helped build the dam. The dam was finished in 1916. We watched it rise between October and February which was kind of cool. The dam was built for irrigation but the lake, the largest in the state, is used for recreation. People apparently get irate some years when the water is low and complain to the rangers but the rangers remind them that the lake was never built for recreation in the first place. There was a shooting here in August. Yes. A ranger killed a man. There had been drinking (not the ranger of course), and the man wouldn't pay his fee, all of $14.00. It's a sad and horrible incident. The ranger has a family, a wife and very young children. I don't know why the ranger shot to kill, but I'm guessing since I wasn't there, that he surely must have felt endangered. Sad. It's going to trial.
Well, we're in Texas now and I suppose we plan to return to New Mexico next winter. We liked it there. The only thing is, it's pretty senior. I didn't find a church with young children. I only checked out two churches but I didn't really see one that I liked a lot. But we made wonderful friends at the campground. Some of them plan to return next year and we all have tentative plans to meet up there.
All the following pics are from the hike on the Luchini nature trail.
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