Driving across west Texas and Big Bend NP Day 1

Monday feb 25. Driving across west Texas. Crazy windy. In and out of scattered showers. Absolutely needed two hands, because gusts would try to push you off the road. Texas hill country is just what we were looking for. Wild and rugged. East of Stockton there were MILES of windmills on ridges on both sides of the highways. Good use of all that wind. The towers for the power lines were under construction. We got to Big Bend at three pm, and stopped to add to our series of yoga poses at entrance signs. We were checked into our room at the Chisos lodge by 5pm. We provisioned ourselves at the store with a quart of milk, a loaf of bread, a package of ham, and a block of cheese. This provided us with two breakfasts and two picnic lunches, so we only had to buy suppers out. We also had one breakfast of oatmeal for me, cereal for Bobbi, from the store.We walked up to the lodge dining room at sunset to enjoy dinner and the glowing sky through the Window, a break in the mountains forming the Chisos basin.

Tues feb 26
Today was our day in the river. It was my first time steering a canoe. I've always been the brawn in the front seat. God I loved turning that boat where I wanted it to go. (also, it let Bobbi be the photographer). I loved going down the green river in the yellow brown desert., slipping through the water like I was a corpuscle in a vein of blood, part of the river, part of the earth. The Rio Grand ( Rio Brave del Norte) is a gentle stream, it just slides along quietly, with occasional little shoots. Patrick, the guide, resplendent in his rasta hat, said the rapids were category 1.37 (he made that up). Often we would sit with the paddles across our laps, just gliding, listening to the quiet. Soft water sounds, bird calls, plop of a turtle, our own breath, looking up at the river cliffs, or in open areas, out across the desert to the jagged mountains, this is harmony. Patrick also taught us two sayings to express his river philosophy...."no hurries, no worries," and " we're on our agenda of total flexibility."

The morning started cool, and we had lots of clothes. They came off piece by piece. Unfortunately we came to the first hot springs early in the trip, and the air was still cool. Bobbi and I were afraid to get all the way in, because we thought we'd freeze when we got out, so we just stood in it to our knees. Even that was wonderful. We came to the second hot springs at midday. We stayed there about an hour and a half. Unfortunately, this springs has easy road access, so there are always people there.

 It is a developed hot springs from early 1900s. There are ruins of a small hotel, store and the owner's house. He ceded the land to the future park in 1939. (it became a park in 1944). There were picto- and petroglyphs on the cliffs dated 1000 to 200 BCE. The springs are enclosed by the foundation of the now gone bathhouse. We could sit on the rim, float around in the middle, or recline in the built in concrete tubs on the edge. People kept coming and going, and talking too much, but it's their pool too. The best was three young girls from Austin on a camping adventure. They covered themselves in river mud. They were feeling the Goddess!
Patrick served an elaborate picnic on the river beach, cold cuts, cheese, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, fritos and salsa, apples oranges, and cookies. And PEANUT BUTTER. We acted like we'd never seen peanut butter before. We spread it on apples til they were gone. Then we spread it on chocolate chip cookies. We were eyeing the fritos as a peanut butter delivery medium, but finally restrained ourselves, and waddled back to the hot springs.

After taking out at Rio Grand campground, Patrick took us to an area where he knew javelinas hung out, and we had our first sighting of the piglike animals.

After a brief rest at the lodge, we took off again for Terlingua, a tiny town just west of the park. People live humbly in this ramshackle town. Patrick called it "a drinking town with a boating problem." We drove on to Terlingua Ghost Town., stopping first at the cemetery, where the graves were all mounds, covered in small flat rocks, and there were many shrines and candles and plain weathered wooden crosses stuck in the mounds. People have built new houses within the ruined walls of old houses. Our destination was the Starlight Theater, a restaurant reconstructed from an old theater, which for many years was just roofless walls. It is now an upscale restaurant. We tried out beer from Big Bend Brewery, and sausage made from wild boar and deer. On the night drive home we had three wildlife sightings: a rabbit ran across the road with a smooth, non hopping gait, a small rodent (kangaroo rat?) scurried across the road, and a large bird, great horned owl? Labored across the road, making all sorts of flappings, and just barely making the crossing in front of us. Don't know how it was for him, but we were pretty scared.