Our Manly Trip to Big Bend

This past Thanksgiving week I took Gerrit, Nathan, and Mason on a manly adventure to Big Bend.  We headed out after dinner and made it almost to Ft Stockton before pitching camp.  3 ENO hammocks and a small tent at a rest area along I-10.  Short sleep then onto the road before the sun so we made it onto the park before sunrise.

Up to the Ranger Station to check in, have a bit of a look around, and secure a camping spot.  The South Rim will wait a day.  We took a remote Rio Grande campsite way down a 4WD road for that night.  Let's go find Balanced Rock first!
Along the way, I used my judo chop to see what is inside these big rocks:

Nathan located water in the top of one of the rocks.  Bet that is where animals find a drink at night.

Wonder what kind of animals?  We look for tracks...

Oh, a cat.
We get back to hiking toward Balanced Rock.  It's a little hard to locate...

There it is!  We looked it over and under and around.
Moving on we saw some other spectacular views, then back to the Land Rover to see more of the park on the way to the campsite.

Santa Elena Canyon after a detour to Lajitas for gas and beef jerky resupply for Nathan.  There was nice light in the canyon, but we got distracted trying to reach Mexican soil with out small flat projectiles.  The goal was to skip a stone in international waters and reach dry land in Mexico, meaning the first skip had to be less than halfway across the Rio Grande, at least one more skip past halfway, then hit land on the other side.  Not an easy challenge as it turned out.  Gerrit remained determined long after the rest of us wore out our arms trying.  Eventually he drew a small audience.

Finally, Gerrit hit Mexican territory and we could go catch up with Mason and Nathan, who had grown tired of waiting and started down the trail into the canyon.

I'm thinking we got a few calendar images....

We stayed a bit long at Santa Elena and realized we needed to get started down the 4WD road to the camp site.  How far is it again?  I might add one of Mason's videos here, but most of the drive was done in the dark.  This made the potholes, rocks, and ledges look bigger than they really are.  The cargo shelf did a bit of road grading behind us on a few on the downhills.  We lost the "road" once and had to backtrack in a dry creek bed to get back on track.   A couple hours into the darkness we saw a sign for the turnoff.  "Wait.  That's not our site.  We're only halfway!"
With an apology to the park rangers that they could not hear (and no cell service) we switched to this campsite.  Woke up to find we had chosen a beautiful spot by the river.

Wandering below the ruin of an old stone building we found the remains of an abandoned old car.  Not thinking it had 4WD back then.  Easier to imagine it getting stuck than how it made it this far.

"Hey boys!  Just to the right of that highest peak is tonight's camp site."

Stopped for a shot of this view and noticed the new pin striping on the Rover 
   ...and Nathan was looking more and more like a mountain man!

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Off to the high country.  Notice the length of our shadows?  Think we learned anything about cramming way too much into a couple of days and starting down a long trail way too late?  Nope!  We'll just hurry straight up.  And up.  And up...

Long story in a nutshell:  Sunrise photos because you can't see the views from the South Rim as well in the dark.  Nathan learned that when you go on ahead and reach a fork in the trail that points to your destination both right and left you should wait instead of guess.  Those eyes watching you set up camp are just deer.  It gets cold quickly at 7,000'.  Wake up early or you miss a beautiful sunrise.

After a hurried breakfast we broke camp, hiked back to the truck, and headed home.  If you are on my calendar postcard list you will see a few of these images again.  And others I have held back.
If you are heading to Big Bend and want to talk about some of the places I know before you go just give me a call or email.  I love just talking about the prettier parts of God's creation that I have visited.  I might have some good tips.  You might help me make more time to get back soon.
My other motive for posting images of our trip is to show off my talent for photographing a place in a way that helps you imagine being there.  This skill has been so valuable when it comes to selling a home.  Granted, making you think "I want to go see that!" is easier with a National Park than a living room.
When someone you know has a beautiful home they want to sell, please remember to introduce us.
Happy Trails!
John