An Unexpected Turn of Events at the Caverns of Sonora, Texas

I hate to state the obvious, but Texas is huge. Unless you’re a drive-o-maniac (which I never was to begin with), you can count on spending a couple/few/several days in the Lone Star State. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, just driving the point home. For our last stop before we headed into New Mexico on our summer RV trip, my route planning indicated a stop somewhere between San Antonio and Carlsbad. None of the options were terribly appealing until I found the web site for the Caverns of Sonora RV Park. Unfortunately, our stop there proved anything but routine.

The Caverns at Sonora looks like it should be a pretty cool place, with a gift shop that turned out to be quite interesting, guided tours of the caverns, and a collocated RV park. All in all, it seemed like a great place to hang our hats for the evening on an overnight stop in the middle of nowhere in Texas.

Unfortunately, things didn’t turn out quite as we’d planned. First of all, when we arrived around 4:30 PM and checked in (note: they don’t take reservations), we were told by the gent at the counter that the last tour of the caverns was at 6 PM and it was already booked full. Looking around, there wasn’t anybody else in the gift shop area, and maybe half a dozen cars outside (which, by the way, disappeared over the next hour). Hmm. The next tour, the guy told us, was at 8 AM the next morning, when we could sign up, but the tour itself wouldn’t actually start until around 8:45.

Now, I hate to think ill of anyone, least of all people I’ve barely met, but if I had to make a wager, I’d have to say that the 6 PM tour that day would have really only had two people: myself and Jan. We didn’t want to wait for the sorta-8 AM tour, because we wanted to leave early to be sure to get to Carlsbad in time to see the caverns there.

In the end, we shrugged, I bought a t-shirt (I’m trying to get one at every stop to replenish my ragged wardrobe), and retired to the RV to chill out for the evening.

Aside from our rig and a fifth wheel trailer (that was probably being stored there, as no one was in it), the RV part of the campground was completely empty, and only two tent campers were in the tent part.

Then, not long after the office closed at 6 PM, a big rig rolled in. A BIG rig, probably 45 feet long with two rear axles. You know, the full-size bus kind. Towing a Jeep.

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As soon as I saw it, I got a bad feeling. The RV part of the campground isn’t very big, with maybe eight pull through sites, a tight turn at the far end, and hookups between the sites that are guarded by four sawed-off telephone poles that stick up a couple feet from the ground. Our RV is 38 feet long, and while we didn’t have any problem getting into our site, I wouldn’t have wanted to try it in a rig that was much bigger. And I certainly wouldn’t have left the car attached: there’s absolutely no way you could make the turn from the loop ringing the RV park area into the site itself (even in a much smaller rig).

Well, this guy came barreling around the turn at the far end, came along the rear of the loop and then tried to turn into his site, a few down from us. Way. Too. Fast.

The outcome was inevitable. There was a big bang and he jammed on the brakes. I didn’t need to see the far side of his rig to know that he must have hit the pedestal on the far side. And the guard posts. Then he tried to unstick himself, backing up the rig in fits and starts. The RV was bouncing like it was going over rocks, which I later determined was actually the rear tires bouncing over the telephone pole guard posts that had been uprooted when he drove over them in forward gear.

He finally stopped the thing, and that’s when we saw the water, lots of water, streaming from under their RV and running downhill toward us. He’d ripped out the water pipe for his hookup, and it was gushing like crazy.

And his rig…well, it had a huge chunk ripped out of the side panel between one of the compartment doors and the main rear axle on the passenger side, and heaven only knows what kind of damage might have been done to his suspension.

Turns out that they’d just gotten the rig a few days before and were on vacation out of Denver, grandparents, adult daughter, and two teenage boys. They said that they’d owned three RVs before, but it was hard for me to imagine someone having owned and driven RVs for any length of time handling a big rig like he did (at one point after taking out the pedestal and water line, he had taken the rig, without the Jeep, out of the RV loop and up to the back-in section, where he went six-wheeling over the grass trying to turn the thing around to bring it back down).

So, I went out to give him a hand. First to get the water shut off. There was NOBODY left at the park, nor was there an emergency number anywhere, and he’d already called the park’s regular number and only gotten a recording. Water was just pouring out of the water connection (running downhill and flooding our site), and we spent about an hour (fruitlessly) searching for the shut off valves.

Seeing that we couldn’t solve that, I helped him get his rig turned around and lined up so he could at least plug into one of the other pedestals. He was just going to leave his name and number on a note at the park office, but decided to stay the night, anyway.

At last, the caretaker guy showed up, and he was far less than pleased to return from a Father’s Day dinner to this mess! I can’t blame him, I suppose. But at least he was able to get the water shut off, and after that I beat a hasty retreat to our RV while he and the big rig driver had words.

Now, we all make mistakes, but this sort of accident can easily be avoided. First, learn how to drive your rig, especially if it’s a big one. Unfortunately, most states don’t require any special training or licensing to drive one of these behemoths. You just go buy it, get the keys, and drive away. Second, and a lesson we learned the hard way in the Boston KOA a couple years ago, is to always detach your towed car when entering an unfamiliar campground. I know many people don’t, but it only takes a few minutes and is worth the peace of mind. Third, drive slowly and take your time. Last but not least, always – ALWAYS – have another person guiding you into the site and watching your blind spots (which are many in most RVs). The rig these folks were driving had side-looking cameras and they were relying on them to keep them out of trouble, but it’s not the same.

Anyway, I’m sorry to digress into RV-speak for you if you’re not into that sort of thing, but this was sort of a spectacular ending to our stay in Texas!

Next up: Carlsbad, New Mexico…

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