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Published: March 7th 2009
Photo 1
Me before heading into the Mule Ears trail.“Decisions are only the beginning of something. When someone makes a decision he is, in fact, plunging into a powerful current that carries him to a place he had never even dreamed of when he made that initial decision.” The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho
It is January 26th and I am sitting hoisted up in my car while they change my oil and I am trying to decide whether to continue going west or take a detour south. As they bring me down, I decide to go south. It was the best decision I ever made. The minute I turned on to highway 385 I was blown away. I have never been to the desert before so this was all so new to me. Seeing the wide open ranges with cattle that go on for miles, the mountains and hillsides which were baron but still beautiful , it was all so breathtaking.
I arrived to Big Bend National Park around 3pm and I decided to camp here for a few days. After I set my tent up on one of the most beautiful locations overlooking a mountain, I wandered around and discovered the local wildlife. The first thing I
Photo 2
Along the roads towards Big Bend National Park. This was the typical hydro wire encountered was an awkward looking bird. I later found out that this was actually a roadrunner. I walked a little further into the campground and discovered deer just roaming around. They were quite comfortable with us humans.
George had mentioned that he was staying at the lodge tonight so I decided to take a little hike up to the lodge and see if he had arrived. He arrived shortly after I got there and had registered me to stay in the lodge. After some thought, I decided I would stay with him the one night as I would still have the opportunity to sleep under the stars the next night. Besides, at this point in my trip, some might think it crazy to give up an offer of a bed for the ground.
The next day, George and I were doing different trails so we said our goodbyes. I went off to see the west end of the park and hike the Mule Ears trail. I actually did not arrive to the trailhead until 2:30pm as there were so many spectacular views along the way that I had to stop for. The Mule Ears trail was great. It
Photo 3
Finally arrived. was a fairly easy trail about 2 hours long that lead through the desert to a spring. When arriving at the spring, it was so spectacular. Imagine that you are wandering in mostly greys, blacks, dark greens, beiges etc then you come upon a spring that is lush with bright greens, and full of life with fish and frogs. To top this off, I am all alone to sit and enjoy the peace, simply listening to the flowing water of the spring. After about 20 minutes, I head back as it looks like there may be some rain coming in. In fact, it did rain and it was interesting to watch the temperature change drop while I was driving from 25 Celcius down to 10 within 5 mins.
That evening, it had stopped raining in the middle of the night so I was able to open the tent so I can watch the stars. In the morning, it was quite cold. It got down to about 5 Celcius which was fine for sleeping, but when I awoke and was sitting having breakfast with the cool breeze blowing through me, I decided I would not stay another night.
Today I
Photo 4
Subtle reminders of where I am. would explore the East side of the park which was completely different, but still amazing. I did a little trail that lead down to the Rio Grande so I could actually touch the river. It was interesting to picture people crossing this river to get into the USA. I never realized how easy it was. Of course, the difficult part is they then have to cross the desert for days to make it to civilization.
The drive out of Big Bend National Park was great. Along the way, I drove the scenic route through one of the State Parks. I eventually made it to Presidio where I decided to have dinner and get a hotel room. I relaxed, watched the sunset from my room, watched a little TV then went to bed. For some reason though, I couldn’t sleep and I didn’t get to sleep until 5am.
It is now Jan 29th and I left Presidio around 11:30am, much later than I planned. Today was a day for mostly driving. I stopped in Marfa for lunch and then made my way to the famous loop of 166 and 18. And it lived up to all my expectations ….
Photo 5
The beautiful view from my tent very beautiful.
It was time to get to El Paso. I arrived in El Paso just as the sun was setting so that was nice to see from the highway. I settled into the hostel, did some laundry and got caught up on the journal. The next day, I explored El Paso during the morning. The streets are full of stores with cheap clothes. I bought myself a new (non-wrinkling) top for 10 bucks. I then walked down to the bridge to the USA and did some people watching for a good half an hour. I grabbed some lunch at KFC then it was time to head to New Mexico.
My time in Texas was now complete. I was here for a total of 17 days. When I entered the state, a lot of people had warned me that it would take so long to cross the state and it would feel like it went on forever. Well, they were more right than they thought. It did feel like it went on forever and that is exactly how long I wanted to stay there.
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