An Almost Mexican Adventure

So, perhaps I shouldn’t have titled this an “adventure,” as this blog post is less about an adventure, and more just a random set of pictures and phrases describing a nice day visiting the Big Bend area of Texas.

After our evening in Fort Stockton, yesterday Choppy and I headed in the car to the nearby Big Bend National Park. Note: there are few areas of the country where a nearly 130 mile trip is considered “nearby.” West Texas is one of those areas. Happily, thanks to a rather high speed limit, the 130 miles flew by, despite being traveled entirely on a two lane highway.

The entrance to Big Bend National Park. As you can see from the random spots on the picture, (a) I did not get out of the car to take this picture, and (b) I have a dirty windshield.

Although we visited many of the major westerm National Parks as a family when I was a kid, one park we did not visit was Big Bend National Park. So, everything I was going to see here was going to be new and exciting. However, my knowledge of Big Bend basically extended only so far as to know that it is on the “big bend” of the Rio Grande along the border of the United States and Mexico. So, pretty much, I expected a giant river, quite likely with border patrol agents vigilantly patrolling said river to catch any people attempting to smuggle drugs into the United States. Also, I was pretty convinced that I was risking life and limb by getting so close to Mexico and its raging drug wars. As you can tell from this paragraph, someone needs to watch less television.

It turns out, Big Bend did not really meet my expectations on many of these fronts. I saw no border patrol agents (at least in the park – I did get stopped at a border checkpoint after leaving the park, so I did get to see some border-patrolling activity, even if it consisted mostly of the agent and I shouting over Choppy and his drug sniffing dog going crazy barking at each other, which suggests that perhaps drug sniffing dogs may be easily thwarted by bringing a dog with you to distract the drug sniffing dog from its job), nor was I killed by any feuding drug cartels.

However, the park was absolutely stunning. At some point, it felt as if every curve in the road exposed yet another incredible mountain or desert vista. And my impression of the Rio Grande as a giant river along the border? Not so much giant, despite the name. At some point, I saw kids walking back and forth across a shallow part of the river, shouting at their parents that they were illegally crossing the border (I wonder how that will go over if the kids decide to mention it to the border patrol check after leaving the park).

A beautiful vista, with the Rio Grande flowing through. Confession: This is not actually in Big Bend National Park, but the next door Big Bend Ranch State Park. Texas 170 runs along the river through the State Park, and is absolutely stunning for parts of the drive from Terlingua to Presidio. At other points, it starts worrying you, as you pick up the Mexican cell towers without realizing you are going to do so, and get a lovely message from your cell provider telling you that it is going to start charging you for data roaming.

As we were in a National Park, Choppy was sadly prevented from taking many hikes, as Big Bend, like most National Parks, doesn’t allow dogs to go much of anywhere except multi-use trails and roads. However, I did ditch her for a few minutes to hike up to Santa Elena Canyon, where the Rio Grande cuts through a huge canyon, per the suggestion of a ranger.

The entrance to Santa Elena Canyon. Not pictured: the girls who were crossing the river right about here, going back and forth from the United States to Mexico. Pictured: yet another absolutely stunning vista.

As Choppy was allowed on the roads, and there were many roads leading to stunning vistas (none of which Choppy paid attention to, much preferring to sniff every plant encountered to see what sort of dogs had come before her), I did use the chance to take some self-portraits with the camera on timer.

Look at this picture! Stunning vista! Well-behaved dog! Awesome!

Not pictured: The approximately 30 pictures similar to this one, where I did things like (a) took a picture of the ground, (b) failed to properly set the timer and took a picture of nothing and/or Choppy alone, (c) took a picture of Choppy wandering out of the picture to go sniff something, (d) took a picture of Choppy not looking at the camera, (e) took a picture of me not looking at the camera, or (f) some combination of the above. I particularly enjoy this one, where it looks like I am going to strangle Choppy.

The day ended in a hotel room (yeah, it’s super cold. I am not camping. Even in the car), which normally wouldn’t be worth mentioning, except for something I saw on TV. I turned on King of the Hill, which was, appropriately, the episode where Hank, Dale, and Kahn have to sneak back into the United States from Mexico (though, as anyone who is around me very long ends up finding out, I can relate anything to an episode of King of the Hill. That one of the more appropriate episodes happened to be on tonight was just a fun coincidence). I have no idea what the plan is for Wednesday, so I guess I’ll just get on the road and see what strikes me as fun.