The Behlens Head West
Viva Terlingua!
What a drive. I intended to get here Monday. Life got in the way. On top of that, Janessa needed a new pair of shoes for this trip. There would be some hiking involved. Women and shoe shopping - we spent way too much time in San Antonio.
I had plans to camp at Seminole Canyon that night. Maybe we’d have enough light to see some of the rock art. The sun set in front of us on Highway 90, somewhere between Brackettville and Del Rio. We settled for the Rugged Canyon Campground, which is managed by the National Parks Service. It was completely dark when we got there. I feel like it was the best $6 I ever spent. We woke up to a spectacular view - a massive bluff overlooking the spot where the Devil’s River enters Lake Amistad.
We were the only people camping there. A friendly park ranger checked on us around 7 a.m. Tuesday, mostly to make sure we paid the $6, I suppose. By 8 a.m. we were back on Hwy. 90 heading west.
The view from the bridge over the Pecos River blew us away. Janessa wanted to stop. But we still had a few hundred miles ahead of us, and I had a different stop planned - in Langtry.
We stopped the Visitor’s Center and the famous Jersey Lilly Saloon, where Judge Roy Bean dispensed the Law West of the Pecos. Down the one street in town, we passed ruins of adobe buildings and gazed from the cliff overlooking the Rio Grande. Fuel prices jumped about $1 a gallon when we got to Sanderson.
There, we saw the first “Defend Big Bend” signs. The people who actually live out here don’t strike me as particularly liberal. They’re a motley assemblage of cowboys, hippies, cowboyhippies, stargazers, river rats, chili connoisseurs, handymen, and cactus farmers. Their political ethos seems to be “leave me the —— alone” more than anything else. Folks out here aren’t too happy about the border wall. Standing atop some of these canyons, I think I can see their point. There’s already a wall. The Republican running for Congress in this district, Brandon Herrera, is a huge supporter of President Trump, but even he questions the utility of the project.
We stopped in Dryden around noon for a tailgate picnic, then turned south at Marathon. The road narrowed as we entered the national park. We checked out the fossil exhibit. It’s hard to imagine this landscape as seaside marsh, but it was once. Skeletons of giant fish, crocodiles, and the largest oyster shells I’ve ever seen tell the story.
Our check-in at the cabin was 3 p.m. so we headed that way, past the Chisos Basin and into Study Butte. The cabin lies about 16 miles north towards Alpine. Our host, Mike, introduced us to his donkeys and explained the finer points of living in an off-grid cabin - military-style showers to conserve the rainwater and judicious use of the air conditioning. It’s quite cool at night here, so we slept with the windows open at night.
We drove back into Terlingua for some supplies Tuesday evening and stopped for a few drinks at La Kiva, which is perhaps the best dive bar in town. We’ll be back for karaoke on Thursday.
As I write, the sun is rising over the mountains to our east. Today we’re heading to the river. I brought some poles. Maybe we’ll fish, if there’s any water. I’ll let you know if we caught anything next week.