Big Bend 2

 This was an entertaining day of sorts.  Lots of +/_.

Early laundry day, they are only open Wed-Sun.  So had to git er done.  No big deal.

I went to get fuel after dropping Carlene off at the laundromat.  No diesel!  They ran out last night.  Waiting for someone to bring some more.  No other diesel source in Terlingua.  Lajitas is the next village to the west, about 15 miles, but they say it is very expensive.  It’s $4.44/gal here!  Or Panther Jct in the park, about 25 miles east.  Fine, we were going into the park anyway.  We get to that station and find the price is only $3.55!  And talking to the other people getting gas I find out that this place way inside a national park is always cheaper and that Terlingua is often  running out of fuel!  We have not experienced  that in our previous 6 stays here.  

OK, so we are now 13 miles beyond the turn to what we wanted to do today, the Santa Elena Canyon.  No problem, there is a nice hike around Lone Mountain just a mile away, so that’s what we’ll do today.  The other idea can wait for another day.  We have hiked around Lone Mountain before and enjoyed it.  Not crowded at all.  We seemed to be the only people going counterclockwise around it.  Fine too.  We only met about 5 people on the trail.  BUT, right after Carlene spoke of never seeing wildlife I spotted 6 Mule Deer!  2 antlered bucks, 3 doe and a youngster.  They made a casual course around us and hung out for a while.  We didn’t get great photos but not too bad.  There are better shots in the regular camera but it takes a bit to download those.  You might get to see them later.

About the park; Big Bend was founded in 1944, the first National Park in Texas   It is over 800,000 acres, more than twice the size of Chittenden County   It runs along the Rio Grande for 118 miles   Where the Rio Grande runs through the Santa Elena Canyon the walls are 1500’ tall   

Then back to camp to take Skye out for her walk.  I checked this time, it’s almost 1.4 miles.