Percha Dam State Park and nearby areas continued

I mentioned there were some areas near Percha that we visited. About 6 miles away is Caballo Dam State Park.  Another 17 miles farther north is the town of Truth or Consequences, and near there is Elephant Butte Dam State Park.  I'll show a few of the pictures we took in some of those places.  

No, we did not tour all of these areas on our bikes, but we did ride around the campground with them. Margaret's bike is the three wheeler.  She couldn't keep her balance on her two wheel bike so we got her this three wheel bike.  She has gotten strong enough to ride over 5 miles per day.  There is a paved road just outside the park at Percha where we often rode.  We were pleased to find mulberry trees with ripe fruit.  We hadn't seen those since we left California.

This is one of the boat docks on Elephant Butte Lake.  The main boat dock is closer to the town of Truth or Consequences.

This island is in Elephant Butte Lake.  I wondered if this is how it got its name.  With a little imagination it could be thought to look like an elephant.  It is a volcanic core, similar to Devil's Tower in Wyomming.

Here is Elephant Butte Dam.  It is a concrete gravity filled dam. 
The construction was begun in 1911 and completed in 1916.  It began to be filled in 1915.  It was part of the Rio Grande Project to provide irrigation and power to south-central New Mexico and west Texas.  There was an effort to name it the Woodrow Wilson Dam, but the name Elephan Butte prevailed.

The series of dams stop the flow of the Rio Grande River except when they are releasing water for irrigation.

The river looks like this below the dam.  The picture is taken in the Elephant Butte Dam Recreation area.  There is a nice foot path along the river.

Here is a view of the camping and day-use area.  Most of the campsites did not provide much shade, and I did not see any electric or water hook-ups.

This a typical campsite available at Elephant Butte State Park. Unfortunately, there is not much shade available.  Most campers are probably more interested in playing on the lake.  There was no shortage of power boats, jet skies and water skies.