Isolated and Magnificent – Big Bend National Park, Texas (March 17-19, 2019)

The Sierra del Carmen mountains

The Rio Grande valley

The Chihuahuan Desert in bloom, barren cliffs of volcanic mountains looming in the distance, dramatic canyons carved by the Rio Grande River – it is almost impossible to describe this gorgeous, magnificent, enormous, unique, and isolated park.  To get to Big Bend you travel almost 100 miles down a very straight highway from the nearest big town, Fort Stockton, Texas (population 8,500).  The Park is about the size of Rhode Island.  Once you have entered the park through the Persimmon Gap Entrance to the north, you drive another 29 miles to the Park Headquarters in the center.  From there it is 20 miles south and east to Rio Grande Village or 29 miles to the western entrance and the tiny hamlet of Trelingua on the west. 

On the way to the Rio Grande, standing by a yucca blossom

Most of Big Bend is vast expanses of the Chihuahuan Desert.  The desert was in bloom with bright Big Bend Bluebonnets decorating the roadside, tiny yellow Desert Marigolds, tall white Yucca blossoms standing atop spiny yucca plants, and brightly colored cactus flowers.  Upon arrival, we saw Road Runner birds race across the road (they look and move just like the cartoons).  The clear, dry high desert air made features that were actually far away seem very near.  Volcanic intrusions into ancient limestone have been exposed as walls and outcroppings as the limestone was eroded away.  The gorgeous, striped Sierra del Carmen mountains in Mexico frame the vista to the east.

Casa Grande (elevation 7,325 feet) Chisos Mountains, as seen from the Basin

Emory Peak (elevation 7,825 feet), tallest point in the Chisos

In the center of the park stands the Chisos Mountain range.  The only mountain range totally encompassed in one park.  Rugged and dramatic, the mountains have sufficient rainfall to support hardwood trees, grasses, panthers, and bears.  They also are volcanic in origin.  Some of the mountains, cluster in a circle with a valley called the Chisos Basin in the middle.  The drive up to the Basin is steep and wiggly.  There is a lodge, campground and restaurant at the Basin, and many people stay there to hike the more temperate slopes and take in the amazing views.  We visited the Basin on our second day in the park.

The view through the "Window" at the Basin to the desert below

Rainbow cactus (notice the stripes) in bloom

At the southern edge of the park, the Rio Grande has carved its way through limestone and volcanic outcroppings leaving dramatic canyons.  We camped down in Rio Grande Village for the first night.  Tiki took a dip in the Rio Grande.  Our first morning we hiked up along the Hot Springs Trail to a high point overlooking the river.  What an amazing view!  The Rio Grande wanders its way in gentle bends, leaving silted patches on edges of the curves.  Sometimes the bank is low and accessible, sometimes it has sheer cliffs.  We saw Mexican goats grazing on the other side.

The Rio Grande

Boquillas Canyon

We also hiked to Boquillas Canyon.  We climbed up one side of an escarpment, down the other side and along the river into the canyon until there was no dry place left to walk.  The canyon walls are 1500 feet high and marked by years of erosion.  We did not want to leave the quiet beauty.  This was a very popular hike and the only place in the park where we felt the presence of other visitors.

Blooming cactus

Between the lodge, 4 campgrounds and assorted back country campsites, there are spots for about 2,000 people to stay in the park.  Additionally, the tiny crossroads of Trelingua, where we stayed for our second and third nights, houses about 1000 more.  That is not many people visiting a park the size of Rhode Island!  We were visiting during the busiest three weeks in the year, it is “Spring Break” in Texas.  Very few people visit in the summer, the desert is just too hot.  Most of the visitors we saw were active hikers, even the oldsters like us.

Hiking in the Basin

Boquillas is also the name of the Mexican town located near the canyon.  You can be ferried over the river in small boats rowed by Mexicans.  It is an official border crossing.  Boquillas and several other Mexican communities have strong historic ties to the park.  Some of them used to receive water and electricity from the US side.  Los Diablos firefighters are called by a siren to cross the river to help fight fires in the park.  After 9-11 the informal relationship between the two sides ended.  Water and electricity was cut off from the tiny hamlets, and formal visa protocols put in place for Los Diablos.  While you can cross by foot, horseback, or canoe this is not an area rampant with illegal crossing.  Much of the Mexican side is also park land, so perhaps the Mexican villages are just too remote from the rest of Mexico.  We were impressed how every visitor to the park that we spoke with cringed at the thought of constructing a border wall in this beautiful place.

Boquillas Canyon

Big Bend is not “on the way” to anywhere.  It is quite literally at the end of the road.  It is a place to revel in the unique ecosystems located so close together, and be awed by the majestic beauty of the contrasting environments.  It is a place to be outdoors, breathe clean air, and watch a vivid Vermillion Flycatcher flit from tree to tree.  With great distances, time slows down.  You can see a car coming down the road toward you long before it arrives.  You leave your cell phone behind on your hike because there is no cell service here.  What a very special, unique, immense, and isolated spot.  

That is Mexico behind us...