Rio Grande Village and Marathon
March 29, 2022
We awoke to a beautiful sunrise over Big Bend. We checked out of our Terlingua Agave cabin, drove back into the National Park via Study Butte, and returned to part of the Ross Maxwell Drive. We visited Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail, with a mile hike to a closed canyon and a dry waterfall.
Top picture is the Burro Mesa, and bottom in along the main
road headed towards Panther Junction (where we stopped to
put air in the tire)
From there, we drove through Panther Junction and attempted the Dagger Flat dirt road. We made it five miles before the road condition prompted us to turn around. We saw a few Yucca in bloom, but did not make it to the yucca “forest.” After this, we went to the interesting Fossil Display about ten minutes north of Panther Junction, and had a picnic lunch. We then drove about 60 miles north on US385 to Marathon for the night. The winds howled and desert dust was in the air everywhere.
Marathon is another small town that was an old railroad water stop (two stops east of Marfa). The town has fewer than 400 residents and a nice historic hotel where we stayed. You might say Marathon was sort of a company town, since the hotel owns some shops and three eating establishments, and there are not that many other businesses in town. We found a pretty patio at the hotel that was sheltered from the wind to relax for a bit before dinner in the hotel restaurant.
March 30, 2022
Today would be our last day in Big Bend, and we would tackle a bit more than yesterday. It was still windy when we left Marathon, but not too bad once we got into the park.
We spent the day in the southeast corner of the National Park, around Rio Grande Village, an hour and forty-five minute drive from Marathon. Our first stop was Boquillas Canyon, with a walk of less than one and one half miles. Unlike the first canyon, this one took time to walk to and the trail spends less time in the canyon. It wasn’t as impressive as Santa Elena, but still worthwhile. There are views across the river to some settlements in Mexico. It appeared that several people selling souvenirs had crossed the river on horseback to do so.
After the canyon, we went to Rio Grande Village and had a picnic lunch. We walked on the Nature Trail, a 1 mile loop, with nice views of the river. We saw a roadrunner but were too slow to get its photo, or at least one in focus.
Afterwards, we stopped at two overlooks on our way to the Hot Springs Historic District. This required a drive of about three miles on a dirt road, some of which was narrow and windy. We saw quite a few people in the river soaking up the hot water! The border with Mexico was very close across the narrow river. We later saw on the news that a person had passed away from the heat at the very location less than an hour after we left. Very sad. It was hot, hotter than in Marathon.
Then we returned, driving about back about an hour and a half, to Marathon, where the wind had calmed down some from yesterday.
We had chicken fried steak for our last dinner in Texas, as tomorrow we were starting the long drive back west towards home and would spend tomorrow night in New Mexico.
