Carlsbad ( KARLZ-bad) is a city in and the county seat of Eddy County, New Mexico, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 26,138. Carlsbad is centered at the intersection of U.S. Routes 62/180 and 285, and is the principal city of the Carlsbad-Artesia Micropolitan Statistical Area, which has a total population of 55,435. Located in the southeastern part of New Mexico, Carlsbad straddles the Pecos River and sits at the eastern edge of the Guadalupe Mountains. Carlsbad is a hub for potash mining, petroleum production, and tourism. Carlsbad Caverns National Park is located 20 miles (32 km) southwest of the city, and Guadalupe Mountains National Park lies 54 miles (87 km) southwest across the Texas border. The Lincoln National Forest is to the northwest of town.

Pecos ( PAY-kəs) is the largest city in and the county seat of Reeves County, Texas, United States. It is in the valley on the west bank of the Pecos River at the eastern edge of the Chihuahuan Desert, in the Trans-Pecos region of West Texas and just south of New Mexico's border. Its population was 8,780 at the 2010 census. On January 24, 2012, Pecos City appeared on the Forbes 400 as the second-fastest growing small town in the United States. The city is a regional commercial center for ranching, oil and gas production, and agriculture. The city is most recognized for its association with the local cultivation of cantaloupes. Pecos claims to be the site of the world's first rodeo on July 4, 1883.

Roswell () is a city in, and the seat of, Chaves County in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Chaves County forms the entirety of the Roswell micropolitan area. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 48,411, making it the fifth-largest city in New Mexico. It is home of the New Mexico Military Institute (NMMI), founded in 1891. The city is also the location of an Eastern New Mexico University campus. Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge is located a few miles northeast of the city on the Pecos River. Bottomless Lakes State Park is located 12 miles (19 km) east of Roswell on US 380. The Roswell UFO incident was named after the town, though the crash site of the alleged UFO was some 75 miles (121 km) from Roswell and closer to Corona. The investigation and debris recovery was handled by the local Roswell Army Air Field. In the 1930s, Roswell was a site for much of Robert H. Goddard's early rocketry work. The Roswell Museum and Art Center maintains an exhibit that includes a recreation of Goddard's rocket engine development workshop. Roswell's tourism industry is based on aerospace engineering and ufology museums and businesses, as well as alien-themed and spacecraft-themed iconography. The city also relies on New Mexico and Americana related tourism. New Mexican cuisine restaurants, such as Martin's Capitol Café, are located near downtown on Main Street, near the International UFO Museum and Research Center. Local American folk and New Mexico music performances occur near Pioneer Plaza and in parks around the city. It is a center for acequia-similar irrigated farming, dairying, and ranching, it also the location of several manufacturing, distribution, and petroleum related facilities. This regional pride has resulted in Roswell receiving the All-America City Award multiple times, in 1978–79 and 2002.

Ruidoso is a village in Lincoln County, New Mexico, United States, adjacent to the Lincoln National Forest. The population was 8,029 at the 2010 census. The city of Ruidoso Downs and the unincorporated area of Alto are suburbs of Ruidoso, and contribute to the Ruidoso Micropolitan Statistical Area's population of 21,223. A mountain resort town, Ruidoso lies in the Sierra Blanca mountain range of south-central New Mexico, where it merges with the Sacramento Mountains to the south. Ruidoso is a resort community close to the slopes of Ski Apache, the Mescalero Apache Tribe-owned ski resort on Sierra Blanca, an almost 12,000-foot (3,700 m) mountain. The tribe also operates the Inn of the Mountain Gods resort in the area, which includes a casino, hotel, arcade room and golf course. Ruidoso is the largest community in Lincoln County, and serves as the regional economic hub. In recent years the village is contending with serious questions about the adequacy of the local water supply and zoning enforcement. Like many small communities that have been recently "discovered", there is an ongoing debate about how best to plan for additional growth. The village received its name from the Rio Ruidoso (Spanish for "Noisy River"), a small stream that weaves through the city.

El Paso (; Spanish: [el ˈpaso] "the pass") is a city in and the county seat of El Paso County in the far western part of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 23rd-largest city in the United States, the sixth-largest city in Texas, and the second-largest city in the Southwest behind Phoenix, Arizona. El Paso ranks 5th in the nation with the largest proportion of Hispanic population. Its metropolitan statistical area covers all of El Paso and Hudspeth counties in Texas, and had a population of 843,725 in 2019.El Paso stands on the Rio Grande across the Mexico–United States border from Ciudad Juárez, the most-populous city in the Mexican state of Chihuahua with over 1.4 million people. Las Cruces, in the neighboring U.S. state of New Mexico, has a population of 215,579. On the U.S. side, the El Paso metropolitan area forms part of the larger El Paso-Las Cruces combined statistical area, with a population of 1,060,397.These three cities form a combined international metropolitan area sometimes referred to as the Paso del Norte or the Borderplex. The region of 2.5 million people constitutes the largest bilingual and binational work force in the Western Hemisphere.The city is home to three publicly traded companies, and former Western Refining, now Marathon Petroleum, as well as home to the Medical Center of the Americas, the only medical research and care provider complex in West Texas and Southern New Mexico, and the University of Texas at El Paso, the city's primary university. The city hosts the annual Sun Bowl college football postseason game, the second-oldest bowl game in the country.El Paso has a strong federal and military presence. William Beaumont Army Medical Center, Biggs Army Airfield, and Fort Bliss are located in the area. Fort Bliss is one of the largest military complexes of the United States Army and the second largest training area in the United States behind nearby White Sands Missile Range. The fort is headquartered in El Paso but a large part of the training area is in New Mexico. Also headquartered in El Paso are the Drug Enforcement Administration domestic field division 7, El Paso Intelligence Center, Joint Task Force North, United States Border Patrol El Paso Sector, and U.S. Border Patrol Special Operations Group. El Paso is a five-time All-America City Award winner, winning in 1969, 2010, 2018, 2020, and 2021, and Congressional Quarterly ranked it in the top-three safest large cities in the United States between 1997 and 2014, including holding the title of safest city between 2011 and 2014.