| It's a 10 hour drive from Austin to Las Cruces but we were psyched for the wheeling. In west Texas the clouds were doing weird stuff, first with interesting patterns...
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| ...then sudden gaps in the cloud cover...
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| ...and finally some impressive ray action down into the Rio Grande valley near El Paso. We got to the motel about the same time John and his dad got there. Sean from LC and the NM TTORA chapter met us there. We went to eat then Sean showed us the trail head for Patz Revenge, the trail John and I were running the next morning.
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| Since everybody else had adult responsibilities on Friday morning, just John and I hit Patz. This is the second obstacle on the trail. There was a dug-out area just before the fall which combined with the steady light rain made it harder than it looks in this pic.
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| This is the third obstacle and a bit taller than the earlier ones. I was able to get this far under my own power but I was hard on a slider and there were big muddy holes that Sean said some big-tired throttle-happy wankers had recently dug out.
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| Out comes the cable. I needed all of my winch cable -and- a strap to reach the permanent anchor set farther up the ravine.
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| This is John's dad under the slightly harder side... Ha ha!
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| John makes it about as far as I did on the "easy" side before the cable comes out.
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| A little fall foliage, Las Cruces style.
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| A smaller ledge up the trail.
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| Yet another opportunity to winch. Ha ha!
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| VIew out the passenger window... Sophia looks pretty calm, judging from what little you can see of her! About this time Sean, Adam, and Eli caught up with us.
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| This is an interesting spillway sort of section farther up the trail.
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