Big Bend 2024 (Day 6)

Ah, the day begins with a beautiful view of the morning moon. After breakfast and loading up the suitcases for our return to Marfa, we head for our morning hike, Santa Elena Canyon. It’s a 30-mile drive along a scenic road within the park to get there. Lots to look at along the way, and then this gash in the mountain range appears in the distance. Just in front of the canyon is the Rio Grande and a lower valley that is green compared to all the other landscape around it.

There’s a nice little park area near the parking lot where the trail begins. It has overall trail info as usual, and see that sandwich board with the red section in the second picture? That’s all warnings about possible effects of heat and such. We came at a great time, though. The weather’s not overly hot. It’s in the upper 70s with a breeze. The sun exposure is about normal for Texas. For me, at least, pretty perfect conditions for a hike, especially since at this time of day most of the canyon will be in shade.

When we got through the trees, we catch our first views of this part of the river. All of the area is under drought conditions and has been for some time, so it was really wonderful to see flowing water!

We walked along the water for a while to get to a place where we could scramble up the bank. Lizelle was there to help us navigate up the bank’s temporary “steps.” This was really just a place where people had carved out some footholds to make it easier to climb the bank. I’m sure the configuration changes from year to year.

After walking back along the path to the real start of the trail and climbing a little while, we start to get high enough to get good views of the river. This is the only time we saw the canoes on the water.

The start of the trail has a bunch of switchbacks, all paved, so it was an easy climb. There were informational displays at some of the turns. Great views of the area just outside the canyon, and the horizon.

After the switchbacks, the trail is quite easy with some rocks and some sand/dirt surfaces. After a while, there’s just one kind of tricky switchback around a rock, but other than that, it’s easy walking. And then we came to a point close to the water that’s great for photos. Someone caught me looking the the end of the canyon, and I caught Scott and Mary posing for a picture.

I’m lousy at selfies, but you can’t beat that background, huh? We could have gone down to the water here, but just a little way further was the end of the trail, so we pressed on.

Through the big rocks and down the trail further was the end, the beach! The Rio Grande is quite shallow here and Lizelle enjoyed a stroll through the water. I caught Lois taking a picture. Then Mary decided to take the plunge, too, but she did it barefoot! Ouch! She made it to the other side, which means she made it to Mexico. 🙂 Lizelle got a picture of this moment.

It was just lovely here at the end of the trail with the cool breeze and the water. But finally it was time to head back. That’s Marilyn about to walk through the big rocks. As we were heading back down the paved switchbacks (kind of treacherous since you have to look carefully to know if it’s a step or a flat path in front of you), we saw a lizard. He did a good job posing for pictures. Ha!

We had lunch here at the park, then headed off on our drive to Marfa–a little over 2 hours. It felt longer, though, I guess because we’re coming to the end of our busy week and long drives. I know I was ready for a shower!

We got to Marfa in time for a shower, then we had our farewell dinner at an excellent restaurant. Food was great!

Then we were off to the McDonald observatory for a Star Party. You know those t-shirts that say, “My friend went to [fill in the blank] and all I got was this lousy t-shirt”? Well, the party was interesting. Because it was a partly cloudy night, seeing heavenly objects directly was a dicey proposition, but the observatory folks had a back-up plan. There were two inside presentations. Several of us went to the one in the theater that was a talk by an astronomer showing what was visible on that very night; what we might have seen through the telescopes. At the end of that presentation, we learned that the clouds were clearing a bit and that we had a good chance to see things directly, so we headed to where several telescopes were set up.

Looking through the telescopes was fun. We saw Saturn with its rings showing vertically (unlike most pictures which show them more or less horizontal). The Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS as it’s becoming less and less visible in the sky. A double star that I don’t remember the name of (started with an “A”). And the moon at 50x magnification.

It was, of course, dark, so I didn’t take any pictures. But I did get this sticker!

Travel day tomorrow. Looks to be another longish day, but I’ll get to see the kitties and sleep in my own bed at the end of it. 🙂