Sanderson, TX to Langtry, TX

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Shawne and Jo say...
Day 35
Mileage Today: 62.3
Total Mileage: 1452.6
Flats Today: 2
Total Flats: 40
Tubes Used Today: 2
Total Tubes Used: 8
Tires Used Today: 1
Total Tires Used: 2

After cleaning up camp, we travelled back into town to find a breakfast spot. Most of the buildings were unoccupied and the restaurants we did find were closed. We were afraid it was going to be another gas station breakfast when we spotted a building with a sandwich board on the sidewalk that simply read, "OPEN". A banner across the store front read, "Welcome Hunters", but there was no other signage to indicate what the business was. An old woman waved to us from inside the store, so we decided to check it out. Once inside, we realized it was an eating establishment so we promptly took a table. We enjoyed a great meal at a reasonable price.
Back on the road, we ran into another couple on bicycles. Rick and Barbara had flown into Del Rio to start their ride Westbound to the Big Bend National Park. We spoke for a while, exchanging stories and touring tips. We had to say goodbye since we had a sixty mile day ahead of us. With our late start, we would be hard pressed to get to Langtry before dark.
Liz, in Alpine, has relatives in Langtry. She'd called her parents and told them all about us, then invited us to stay with them when we reached Langtry. We couldn't wait to meet her parents, so we pushed hard with the sun beating down on us.
We saw metal drums elevated on tripods of steel legs in open fields on the sides of the road. Shawne figured they must be some sort of water storage tanks or something, but he wasn't sure. More steep uphills and short downhills dotted the route. We noticed a pickup on the side of the road with a load of what looked like bags of concrete stacked high in the bed. A woman was unlocking a gate on a dirt road in front of the pickup. It seemed like a strange place to be using a load of concrete...out in the middle of nowhere.
We reached a small dot on the map called Dryden, TX. A gas station, at that point, was a welcome sight. Shawne was craving an ice cream and a cold drink. We entered the store to find one of those big drums on a tripod set up inside the store. It turns out that it was a deer feeder. It is filled with Deer Corn and set up on property to attract the animals. They also had Deer Grass Seed for sale at twelve dollars a pound. We purchased Gatorade, ice cream sandwiches, and popsicles. We sat outside on the very comfortable chairs to take a break. A pickup pulled up with a trailer behind it. In the bed of the truck was an entire pallet of Deer Corn. A quad and a stack of firewood took up the trailer. That's when we realized that the pickup we saw earlier didn't have a load of concrete, but a load of Deer Corn!
All of the feeders we've been seeing must be filled by someone! We talked to the two gentlemen in the truck and they told us that Deer Season was just around the corner, so they were filling the feeders and setting up their hunting blinds. During the time we sat in front of the gas station, we noticed truck after truck drive by with bags of Deer Corn heaping out of the beds, and quads on trailers were everywhere. We never thought that out here in Nowhere, Texas, there would be good deer hunting.
We finished our treats and headed down the road. Shawne looked down and noticed that his odometer wasn't working. He yelled at Jo to stop and pulled off the road to diagnose the problem. After about half an hour of checking the magnet, sensor, and display mount, he finally found the broken wire on the inside of his front forks. We didn't have any crimp connectors or heat-shrink tubing to properly fix it. We didn't even have any electrical tape. He temporarily repaired it by stripping the wires and simply twisting them together in an exposed connection. "Yey! It works!", he cheered...but he was disappointed that he was unable to log the last few miles on his odometer.
Finally back on the road, we made it another mile when, BANG!!! A deafening explosion was followed by the horrible sound of Shawne's rear rim riding on the pavement as the tire began to dismount the wheel.
"What the hell caused that?", he yelled to Jo. The action was too violent to have just been another flat tire. Plus, it was the tire he just put on in Superior, Arizona. For a second we both thought that maybe someone was shooting at us. We scanned the horizon, peering at the many deer blinds we could see. Those notions quickly vanished, though, as we looked down at the road to see that the chip-sealed pavement had gone from bad to worse. The gravel seemed more jagged and less concentrated, creating dips and holes that led to sharp rocks pointing straight up out of the adhesive tar. Shawne rotated the rear wheel to find a 3/4 inch cut in the center tread of the three-week-old tire.
Changing a flat on our rear tires is always painstaking and time consuming. The B.O.B. trailer must be detached from the bike before we can even start taking apart the rear wheel. We're very thankful we have quick release levers on our wheels. After disassembly, he found that the rock had cut through the tire, the tire liner, and the tube! It was a mess. Luckily, we were prepared. We'd purchased another spare tire and some tubes in El Paso. This was the last straw in deciding that we would purchase the super-duper "Armadillo" brand tires at our next bike shop. These flats were getting out of control. With another new tire, a trimmed tire liner, and another new tube all mounted on his rear wheel, and the trailer reattached, we once again started pedalling. The dropping sun shattered our hopes of reaching Lantry before dark.
We approached a rest area on the opposite side of the road. We stopped for a break and noticed some threatening clouds approaching from the West. Jo made the argument that we should just camp at the rest stop, by the side of the highway, so that we could take cover under the shelter of the picnic table if the clouds decided to dump heavy rain or hail. Shawne really didn't want to stop riding so early. He argued that the weather did look like it could turn sour, but we'd ridden in the rain before. It didn't seem like we would have to worry about hail. Jo hemmed and hawed about it for half an hour, then fiinally decided to get back on the road.
Another beautiful sunset scattered warm colors across the open sky. We only had another twenty miles or so to go, and the terrain had been somewhat forgiving so far. However, then we started on a very long and steep descent which could only mean one thing...there was a very long and steep ascent at the other side of this canyon. We raced down the hill with all of our lights on. A deer had become so frightened by our stealthy approach and sudden appearance, it ran straight into the barbed wire fence by the roadside, violently bucking and fighting the strong metal wire. It became so tangled that it's legs were swept out from underneath it, and it cried out. Shawne slammed on his brakes that, with the heavy load, took a good distance to stop his bike. After waiting for a big rig to pass, he turned around and headed back up the hill to help the animal. By the time he got back to the spot in the fence, the deer had already freed itself. It was a good thing too, because he wasn't sure if he would be able to help, even though his dad's K-Bar knife has a barbed wire cutter built into it.
We continued back down into the canyon, cursing the "Texas Hill Country", gravity, and the uphill grade that lay ahead of us. It was getting dark, but our map showed only four more uphill sections ahead. The hill was so long and steep, Shawne felt that there should have been a summit sign at the top. Back down into another canyon we went, in total darkness. The lack of light was disorienting...what looked uphill couldn't possibly be since we were coasting. It was a slow pace either way. Strange noises caught our attention; loud pops and pings sounded off the guardrail, and animals hooted and hollered from invisible canyons and gulleys. Vehicles flashed their high beams from both directions, trying to figure out what this strange group of flashing red and white lights could be...out here in the middle of nowhere...in the dark...all alone. The sounds started getting to us, and we wondered what they could be. Were the guardrails popping due to contractions? Did the daytime sunlight heat the steel and expand it, and now the cool night air was causing the opposite? Was someone throwing rocks at us? Where were the animals that were howling? Just over the edge of the road? Climbing over the guardrails?...Their claws scraping across the sharp edge of the steel sections? Why were we going so slow? If something came after us, would we turn around and head downhill to escape? Then what? Where would we go from there? Too many things were running through Shawne's head. That hill was taking way too long.
At the top of another hill, there was a historical marker that told the tale of a town called Pumpville. It used to be a major stop on the railroad where steam locomotives would refill with water. As we stopped to read the sign, an old van passed by us and slammed on the brakes. This was one of those creepy, full-size vans with the small bubble windows on the side and curtains hiding everything from view. Shawne calls them "Molester Vans" since they seem to have no use in movies other than to abduct victims through the large sliding door. Jo says don't ever let your daughter date a guy with one of those vans. The van sat idle for a few seconds, then turned around, using the entire road to make a full U-Turn. When the beams of the headlights shone upon us, the driver kicked on the high beams and stopped. He sat there for a good fifteen seconds, studying us. Shawne was already past "creeped-out", and this guy wasn't helping things. He picked up his Maglite and flashed the van a few times. Then, with another U-Turn, the van was gone!
"What the hell was that about?", Jo asked.
"Maybe he couldn't figure out what we were.", Shawne guessed, "Maybe he thought we were a crashed UFO with all our lights and reflectors."
We could see the flashing red lights of an antenna up ahead, which is usually a good indicator of civilization, and we knew it must be Langtry! After pushing the last few miles, we reached a gas station and the turn off to Langtry, just a mile down the road. It was 8:30 pm by then, and the place was closed. We had no way to get ahold of Liz's parents. We were supposed to stay with them tonight. The gas station was our contact point, and the store owner was to call them upon our arrival. Luckily our maps showed a free camping spot at the community center down the road.
Everything was dark and shut down. The brightest building was the Judge Roy Bean Historic Museum which, according to our trusty maps, was the only public restroom in town. We looked up and down the dark streets of the town. We had to go exploring to finally find the community center. A large dirt lot complete with a barking dog at one end, and the beloved sound of the freight train wailing from the other end would be our home for the night. Jo set up the tent as Shawne prepared a dinner of Nacho Cheese Doritos, chili burritos, and canned green beans.
We enjoyed our meal as we looked at the lights of the surrounding homes, wondering which house would have been our final destination for the evening. We hoped Liz's parents weren't too disappointed that we didn't show. We were also concerned that they may have prepared a large meal for us, and it would all have to be put in the fridge to be eaten as leftovers.
The dog finally stopped barking. The train was silent long enough to fall asleep as we thought about the next day's adventures.

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Photos

Rick and Barbara
on the way to the Big Bend.

Shawne's odometer crapped out
A little troubleshooting found a broken wire under the headtube.

BANG!
Shawne's tire exploded

After disassembly
A rock from the pavement sliced through the tire, the liner and the tube!

Perspectives
this is how the motorists see the road

Our view
The gravel in the chip seal can stand on-end, with a sharp edge pointing up.

Chip seal may be cheap....
but it sucks for cyclists.

We see yet another susnset
riding in the dark once again.