Big Bend National Park Day Two

Or, Parque National Grande Curva Dia Dos

Day Two’s weather forecast  at Big Bend N.P. was just as predicted, clear skies, sunny all day, and hot, with a chance of even hotter.

          This is why the recommended time for hiking is early morning with a goal of being off the trail by mid-morning, noon at the absolute latest. Our destination for the day was Santa Elena Canyon Trail, probably the most popular hike in the Park. The Canyon was 56 miles away, so we left early so that we could hike in the recommended time frame.

          But not too early, not because we didn’t want to get up, but because the light in the canyon would not be good until mid-morning. The Canyon runs kind of North/South so that means that the sun needs to be high enough to work its way down the Canyon walls in order to illuminate it nicely.

          Unfortunately, I am a Light-is-Everything snob when it comes to photography, so this makes a lot of our adventures Sun-Angle-Dependent. Most of the time it works out fine, as it did for this hike.          Hopefully you will agree when you see the photos.

          On the flip side, there is no doubting the advantage of hiking down here in the only shade in the Park.

           This shade is provided by Mother Nature only in the canyons and higher hills. Otherwise, the vistas need to be admired in broad daylight which after about 20 minutes becomes an issue. Fortunately, the hiker-gods were being nice that day as you will see.

          The Rio Grande may be Grande in some ways on its almost 1900-mile sojourn from the high mountains of Colorado down thru the deserts of New Mexico but at times it seems like just a small brook running over a pebbled bottom. It is ‘muy facil’ (very easy) to just walk across it. Hence the issues that our Border Patrol faces.

          It is hard to believe that this ‘rambling brook’ could carve out such beautiful canyons in this rugged landscape.

          But it did!

          There are three of these such canyons in the Park and we were fortunate enough to visit two of them. We were a tad more prepared for this hike than the one of the previous night.

          No, that’s wrong.

          We were way more prepared for this hike!

          Two backpacks filled with plenty of water, first-aid kit, sunscreen, more water, snacks, and of course lunch! Even my headlamp made the trip! And of course, our Leki Poles which came in handy when we crossed the “usually dry” Terlingua Creek. They helped us look for the best route across because both the hike and Canyon were on the other side of it.

          When hiking down here,  most of the time you encounter folks that are returning as you are going in. These “veterans” are very helpful if engaged in conversation. Most will impart their knowledge about the best and not-so-good parts laying before you. We then, return the favor by paying it forward on our way out.

          This practice was extremely helpful.

          Example:

          We needed to cross the aforementioned “dry” brook to get to the trail  on the other side. The problem was that unless you were following someone who knew the way, it was easy to go the wrong way as the destination on the other bank was not readily obvious.

          We started out and some folks let us know that “You’re going to have to get wet, no worries, it’s not too deep and your poles will help you look for the best spots to place your feet.”

          OK, good advice.

          We got to the edge and had to decide walk across with, or without, our hiking shoes on. Now these shoes can get wet, no issues there, but that means that the rest of the hike is in wet, squishy footwear. Not optimal. Surveying the situation from our vantage point, it didn’t look too bad. We spied what we thought was the destination on the far bank. We elected to go barefoot. This meant dealing with all of the rocks, etc. walking with feet that are only used to going barefoot around the house. This where the term “Tenderfoot” come in when you first join the Boy Scouts.  This was also the term the Indians called anyone who normally wore shoes as compared to their shoeless way of life, we definitely fell into that category!

          We slowly inched, (ouch!) our way across, shoes slung around our necks. When we got almost to our destination, a Voice from High Above, (no not That one!) yelled out, “Hey! You’re going the wrong way! Look there!” he said pointing. I looked up to a precipice high above the river to see one of the “People Who Had Gone Before Us” gesturing with his arms like C3-PO yelling at the Jawa’s transport, “Over here, over here!”

          It was a good thing that he advised us as we were heading for Mexico and a small beach that actually went nowhere! Reversing our course, we were able to find “The Way” and traverse the very wet “usually dry” brook and clamper up the other side, safely still on US soil, with only our Navigations Skill’s ego slightly damaged.

          Once there, we put our nicely dry footwear back on and proceeded down (up) the trail, up because it immediately gained probably 100 ft of elevation, using a set of very nice switchbacks that gave us the bird’s (hawks, eagle’s, you choose) eye view of where we had been and more importantly, where we did not go. It also afforded us a magnificent vista looking eastward.

          From there, the hike went about as smooth as can be, mostly in the shade, but with the sun creeping over the canyon walls, we could see that the further we went and the longer we stayed, the light would wash the western wall and afford us some beautiful views of the  morning sun-illuminated canyon cliffs

          We were not disappointed.

          When we were almost to the turn-around point, we met a nice young couple. They were perched out on a large rock, overlooking the river. I yelled to them, “Look over here!” and I snapped a few pics of them. “Give me your email” I yelled over. “And I’ll send them to you!” We’ve done this before; In Joshua Tree we saw two climbers scaling a vertical mini version of Yosemite’s El Capitan. I took some great pics of them climbing and then resting at the summit. We found them as they were walking out, and they were thrilled to have some photos of themselves.

          It’s hard to yell down to a random person happening by and ask to have your photo taken, so doing this was a nice way to surprise a stranger.                                                             

          On the return trip, we met our fellow hikers on their way in and gladly conveyed all of the trail factoids that we had learned and passed them on to them.

          When we clambered down to the edge of the “dry creek” and removed our footwear once more, we felt like seasoned pros. Reaching the other side, we advised all of the new soon to be “wet-backs” on the best route across. We ended the morning with our lunch where we shared a picnic table with a group of cyclists that made us feel like our cycling experiences were on tricycles. But they were very nice, (Hi, where ya’ from?) and I just silently drooled over the carbon-fiber frames of their bicycles.

          56 miles later, back in our home, we continued our binge-watching of Season One of ‘24’. We finished Season Two last week (because that was the set we found in storage) and decided that we needed to start from the beginning, so I ordered it and thankfully it came right before we left! This binge thing is way too easy to do when its miserably hot outside and there is no phone or internet service.

          Season Three has already been ordered.

          Big Bend National Park is one of the darkest places in all of North America and attracts sky watchers from all over. I went outside around 4 AM and was treated to a show that is not normally available to us. It is easy to see why astronomer’s like coming here. The photo was taken with just my cell phone.

          We had some decisions to make as we only had one more day here. A furious round of planning ensued as we got ready for the next day. Details to follow!