Excellent Adventure

Hello from next to nowhere!

This past weekend Sherry flew back to Louisiana with her granddaughter leaving me with some time to fill. Not that I was glad that Patience(the granddaughter) was leaving but I am too old to play parent anymore. This year of course we had a ready made playmate for her in Lena. She's the 3 year old Iraqi child living with us. So at least I didn't have to entertain Patience all day, everyday, day in and day out...no, I could push the almost 5 year old off on the not quite, almost, 4 year old and let her Mother worry about things. Somehow it did not work out as smoothly as that though. On the upside, Lena became much more proficient in English although most of the time I still can't understand her. Then again, how many 3 year olds can I understand?
So, like I was saying, I had this time to fill this weekend and after 3 or 4 weeks of over 100 degree temps I decided I could forsake yard work and go to the great American southwest desert. How much hotter could it be?
First of all, I've been here for 13 months now. I thought I had an idea how big Texas is. It's 5 hours to Dallas, 3 to Houston, 8 to the Louisiana border. These are all assuming good conditions. My intention was to drive to Big Bend National Park. It is situated on the Rio Grande, west of SA-TX and on the map it looks like a bit longer that Houston. The thing is that there is East Texas and West Texas. That's how the maps divide the state. Scale is slightly skewed because there seems to be fewer towns and cities in West Texas. Turns out, that is a gross understatement.
I dutifully google-mapped my route to the Park and was dismayed when it said the ride would be 7 hours and that one-way mileage was 450! Now think for a minute how many towns and cities you would pass if you were to drive 450 miles in any direction. I could count the number of towns (believe me, there were NO cities) using my fingers and have some left over. Not only that. I certainly did not think of it at the time but, after about an hour of driving west the speed limit goes to 80 MPH and Google assumes that in the travel time. I was driving a 2005 Chevy Malibu and I set the cruise control at 78. It took 7 hours to get there.
The Park is the size of Rhode Island. Something difficult to appreciate by looking at a map of Texas. According to Park literature Big Bend National Park is the least visited National Park in the country. It is like nothing I have ever seen. The geology of the area is desert lowlands throughout ancient volcanic ridges and mesas. The scale of everything is not what an east coast person can easily grasp. I stopped at an overview and the information posted there said that a certain landmark was 14 air miles away and it looked to me like it was maybe 4 or 5 miles! The park has bears, mountain lions, rattlesnakes and a long list of other things that can either be enjoyed or kill you. Fortunately, I didn't see any of the big things. One of my goals in going to the park was to obtain some night sky photos. I hoped it would be pretty dark there. Another understatement.
I parked at another overview shortly after sunset and waited for darkness, and waited and waited. Seems that when you are on high ground in an area the size of a small state that has maybe 200 lightbulbs (including indoor lights) the sunset can take a long time. Fully 90 minutes after the sun went below the horizon I could still see significant light in the western sky. However, it did get dark and my photos were disappointing. There was a strong wind and even holding my tripod down couldn't steady the camera enough for time exposures.
There were more stars then I ever saw. Some constellations were difficult to pick out because there were so many stars in and around the usual outlines. When I looked around, I guessed that I could see 15 or 20 miles in three directions. North to North east was blocked by mountains. For 3 hours I saw NO LIGHTS, no people...nothing! The available light was a moonless sky. My guess is that if there were a full moon visible it would be like a flood light in your bedroom. Every time the thought of a creature or boogeyman lurking in the vegetation surrounding me popped up I fought it down. I was 30 miles from the Visitor center (which was closed) and the Park camping centers and lodge. No sense Freakin' out and running screaming into the night. No one would hear me. Then my cell phone rang! It was God. He said we needed to talk. It was then that I realized I shouldn't have eaten those roadside "raspberries."
Just kidding about raspberries and God. But my cell phone did ring. Now, I had driven through this area during daylight and I had not seen a utility pole or any sign of communications. How could I be in such an isolated place and have my cell phone ringing?
It was Hani, Lena's father, and he wanted to make sure I was Ok. Not that he or anyone else could help if I needed it. The concept of time and space, the kind we live in, not Einstein's, is different when you are out in the great American southwest.
I am sure I am not overstating how isolated this place is. When you exit the park enroute home there is a road sign with 2 towns listed. The nearest is 39 miles the next is 97 miles and believe me, there is nothing else out there. The highway is a straight line with ridges on either side ranging between 500 to 2000 feet above the valley floor I was driving on. The ridges are 5 to 20 miles apart. There are ranches along the way. Although I saw several "driveways" I only saw a handful of homes and they weren't what you might see on "Ponderosa". The dwellings I saw were small and most did not have any trees around them. Leaving them to the mercy of an unrelenting sun.
So anyway, if your still awake and reading this you can see some photos at my flickr site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mckora/
I doubt if the photos capture the scale either.
It was great fun to be in a place where I was alone for hours at a time. Even when I was in a populated area the numbers were small. It was 4:30PM or so when I arrived at the park. I left the park the next day at about 10:30AM. During that time I may have seen 50 people.
I highly recommend the park. Come when you have time. The closest City is El Paso, 330 miles by road. So you need time to visit.

I understand that the Northeast USA is having a cool-wet summer. They say that down here the average is very misleading because any given year will either be very hot and dry or much cooler( like the high 80s)and very wet. Those extremes average out to nice looking numbers though. Since we've been here the hot dry has ruled.