CARLSBAD, NM - Living Desert Zoo and Gardens State Parks in Carlsbad, New Mexico will celebrate its 21st annual “Mescal Roast and Mountain Spirit Dance” from May 10-13. This event, which celebrates the culture and history of the Mescalero Apache people, received a Dorothy Mullins Arts and Humanities Award from the National Recreation and Parks Association. The Mescal Roast is sponsored by the Friends of Living Desert.

The flora and the fauna come together in the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens State Park at the north edge of Carlsbad, New Mexico, on U.S. Highway 285. It takes visitors through the diverse Chihuahuan Desert, the largest in North America, that spans Southeast New Mexico into the rugged terrain of the Guadalupe Mountains and Mexico. The Park is located on top of the Ocotillo Hills overlooking Carlsbad and the Pecos River valley.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park runs five guided off-trail tours. They are so different it’s hard to imagine they are in the same park. Spider Cave delivers an intimate caving experience, wriggling into the hidden underworld, coming face-to-face with earth’s inner secrets. Lower Cave is back stage at the opera.

Recently I wriggled my way, not into a cave, but into a goals-setting retreat of Carlsbad Caverns National Park staff - three long days trying to articulate the park’s mission, renew its vision, turn sweeping desires into measurable goals, tasks, and work assignments. We were 24, nearly a quarter of the park staff, including superintendent, division heads, rangers, maintenance men, administrative aides. We talked much about team building, but the underlying theme is how we balance the contradictory mandates of preserving the park’s fragile caves with that of encouraging tourist visitation.

I’m flat on my belly inching through the crawl space into Spider Cave. My head lamp casts a shadowy glow into this twisting channel, but I can’t raise my head far enough to see where I’m going. The cave ceiling scrapes my back. The cave floor is rocky as a mountain stream, and jagged stones nip into my chest and thighs. I’m dragging myself - there’s not enough room to crawl - trying to follow the soles of the size ten boots ahead of me. The boots disappear around a corner.

These five off-trail tours take you off the beaten path. Plan time for them. They offer an intriguing glimpse into Carlsbad's world of caving.

Winter in Carlsbad isn't about snow, ice or cold. It's about warmth. The warmth of the holiday season. And families coming together. Carlsbad is alive with the ultimate celebration of the season - Christmas on the Pecos River.

The ideal visit to Carlsbad Caverns starts by hiking down the natural entrance: We plunge into the earth; light into darkness, summer heat into cool shadow. We're explorers, wending our way to the center of the earth. The air turns musty; water drips. We imagine the cave's first explorer, Jim White, descending by rope, home-made kerosene lantern in hand. We wonder how, without this trail, without these lights, he managed to find his way out safely.

Known as the Southeastern Gateway to the Land of Enchantment, the small town of Jal offers services for tourists passing through or for anyone wanting to call it home. Located 22 miles south of Eunice on New Mexico Highway 18 at the crossroads of New Mexico Highway 128, it is less than ten miles from the Texas border to the east. Kermit, Texas is 18 miles south.

Anyone who has visited or will visit Carlsbad Caverns will pass through the settlement of White’s City, New Mexico. It is at the crossroads of U. S. Highway 62/180 and NM Highway 7, the highway into Carlsbad Caverns. Named for Charlie White from Kentucky who homesteaded south of Carlsbad about 1927, it began with a small store and service station and has expanded to a tourist center. Ironically the young cowboy who is credited with discovering the Caverns was also named White, although probably no relation to the White’s City family.

In 1903 when artesian wells were discovered, the town known as Stegman was renamed Artesia. Water spouted as high as twenty feet. Early settlers were attracted to this plentiful water supply and established an agricultural and farming community. Unfortunately the wells were allowed to flow unchecked and the water table dropped. Now, however, in this city of 12,000, the water supply is continually replenished with runoff from the Sacramento Mountains about 90 miles to the west. Originally Artesia was a part of John Chisum's ranching empire in the late 1870s. Today cattle and sheep ranching, alfalfa, cotton, chile and pecan farming are important staples of the economy. In addition, oil was discovered in 1924 and opened up the regional Permian Basin. The Navajo Refinery dominates the eastern side of U. S. Highway 285 as you enter the city.

Carlsbad was originally christened Eddy about 1888 with a bottle of champagne. Long before that, around 25,000 B.C., its occupants were representatives of Sandia Man. Other nomadic hunters, including the Apache, followed hunting buffalo. Spanish explorers were next until the conquest by the United States which resulted in the Territory of New Mexico about 1850.

It's a desolate, barren landscape - one of chalky, alkaline soil, mesquite, prickly-pear cactus, wind, and sun - lots of sun. Engulfed on all sides by a semi-arid desert is the dusty little town of Jal, New Mexico, population 2,156. The natives there may raise an eyebrow, laugh, or frown if you mispronounce the name of their town, and they will definitely correct you. It isn't "Jall", nor "Jail". Some visitors to New Mexico, thinking that all "Js" are pronounced as a Spanish "J", will say "Hall". That's wrong, too. It rhymes with "gal."

Summer: 1966. The powdery sand blew off the rock face I was clinging to and into my eyes. I blinked and squinted into the sun, craning my neck up to look up the steeply canted rock. Through dusty glasses I looked between my outstretched arms at the stretch of the rock face above and suddenly felt utterly alone. I could not see anyone above me, only hot white rock. My fingers were jammed into a crack and my knuckles were bloodless from the grip.

What is a flume, you may ask? According to the dictionary, it is a narrow gorge with a stream flowing through it, usually, or an artificial channel or chute for a stream of water. The latter describes the Flume at Carlsbad, New Mexico. Irrigation was a necessity for the arid Southwest as it couldn't depend on rainfall and snow for moisture to grow crops. For centuries Native Americans and Hispanic peoples regularly watered small fields with canal networks, acequias and brush diversion dams.