Big Bend National Park

We booked a reservation outside of the park on Wednesday, staying two nights in Marathon, Texas at the Marathon Motel and RV park. We talked to a lot of people and the camping in the national park was pretty limited and they were very full so fitting our motorhome and trailer was going to be a challenge.

 After doing additional research at Marathon, we decided that we would spend more time in the area so we booked a site at the Lajitas Resort - Maverick Ranch RV park.  This resort had all the amenities   beyond just the RV park (stables, hotel, restaurants, shops, golf, enertainment along with many activities that could be booked through their activities center) and was located in between the National Park and the Big Bend State Park.  Unfortunately we only booked 3 nights, so we weren't going to have time for many activities but we both decided this is a place we would enjoy coming back to and spending a month.

Both of these parks are in Class 1 Dark Sky areas, so lights out around the motorhomes by 9:00.  The night sky is absolutely beautiful.

From Marthaton, we went into the National Park for the first time. Beautiful scenery, so different than all the other parks we've been in.  We actually ran into our neighbors we met in Marathon the first night and spent the afternoon with them in their new campsite within the park.  We enjoyed the various cactus plants throughout the park and captured a couple of them below.

On Friday we arrived in Lajitas Resort and had wonderful sunsets on our walk around the park with the "girls".  It was about 85.

On Saturday we took one of the top drives in the USA on the bike - FM170 from Lajitas to Presidio and back going over "Big Hill" which is a 15% grade.  The drive took us along the Rio Grande and we could see Mexico across the river for most of the trip.  The drive is called the Camino Del Rio and is the "Top 10 Scenic Highways in North America" according to National Geographic.

Rio Grande River - on the left side is Mexico.    

Top of the Big Hill, looking down canyon at Rio Grande

Flowers on the cliff we drove by.

On Sunday, we again drove into the National Park and enjoyed the views and the various flowers and cacti.  With our two trips into the park, we saw a little wildlife; deer, roadrunners, jack rabbits, coyote, kangaroo rats, skunks, desert lizards and lots of birds.

Yucca plants in bloom.

We also enjoyed all the wildflowers that were blooming.

Sotol Plants

When we arrived on Friday, the temperature through Sunday afternoon was in the mid to high 80's, cooling to 58 as a low.  On Sunday night a storm came in, and on Monday it was a high of 50, and a low of 41, but wind chill was about 30 in the morning.  Monday night is suppose to get colder and it was snowing towards Van Horn, our next stop.  So instead of leaving on Monday to Van Horn, we changed reservations and will travel on Tuesday.

D'Hanis and Del Rio, Texas

We arrived in D'Hanis, Texas on Thursday afternoon and stayed two nights.  We went from a view of the bay to this.  We stayed in a place called Quiet Texas RV Park and they had good accommodations for our size.  When we stop for just a couple night stays, it is hard to find parks that are away from either road noise or trains - this one had lots of train noise.  We loved the customer service here, the owner called us within an hour of our arrival to make sure everything was satisfactory and then stopped by and introduced himself within a couple of hours.  Also got a visit by the new park host, to make sure everything was going well.  Great customer service!!
























We celebrated  Valentines Day one night early at a Steakhouse Saloon that was near the park.  Luckily we were able to have a great bottle of wine, one of our favorites from Walla Walla.  This Saloon does not have a liquor license so it's bring your own bottle.  No corking fee.   They had live music and even though it was a very simple place, we enjoyed the casual cowboy atmosphere.






On Saturday we traveled to Del Rio.  We arrived in their newest RV Park called Broke Mills RV Park.  Here we had highway noise that was pretty noisy, but after a day or so, we kinda of got use to it.  Again, very nice RV park and the sites were very long.

The first day trip out we went to Amistad National Recreation area.  The water was down about 30 feet, but the views were great.  We went to the Amistad Dam which is shared by Mexico and USA on the Rio Grande river.  We did not go all the way across the dam to the Mexico port of entry, but we did walk onto the Mexico side, but when we came back across the dam, we had to go through a Port of Entry for the US.  Found out that we had not signed our passports as this was the first time we actually used them.  No concerns, the officer just told us to get them signed.

Rio Grande River coming into Da

Anytime we went west from the campground, we had to go through Inspection stations, to include having the dogs search the outsides of both the motorhome, trailer and Explorer when we left to go north.  Every 5th car we saw in the area was border Patrol, and we saw them in action with helicopters, stopped cars, driving and dragging the dirt roads to make them smooth.

















Our second outing was up to Langtry, Texas to see the Judge Roy Bean exhibits.

                                    

The caves were used by Indians for shelter and hideouts.  

Prior to leaving we went into Del Rio to explore the Whitehead Memorial museum and visited the oldest winery in Texas called Val Verde Winery which opened in 1883.  They had some really good wine.  The Whitehead Museum had buildings from1871 where the Perry family lived, and one of the first two story buildings in the area.

The "girls" still seem to enjoy the motorhome lifestyle - here is Kyna telling us that she is ready for bed.

We left on Wednesday to head towards the Big Bend National Park.

End of Portland Texas visit

We enjoyed our last two weeks in Portland, starting out with preparations for the Super Bowl.  We decided to smoke pork baby back loin ribs rather than spareribs.  They turned out great.

They had a Super Bowl party in the club house, but most of the attendees were rooting for Patriots, and I like having the option to back up the DVR to see plays over again as needed.  We watched the game in the motorhome and then joined the group for half time.  Great game, bad last play and we were quite "deflated" with the loss.


























On Monday, we took a ride to Padre Island and then went North to Mustang Island, Port Aransas, took the free ferry ride to Aransas Pass and than back to Portland.

We had another rain day on Tuesday, so we made it cleaning day and then went to another movie - Taken 3.  Two weeks in a row we went to the theatre after approx. 16 years of not seeing a movie at the theatre.

We spent one day in Kingsville, TX at King's Ranch - one of the largest ranches in the world.  They have multiple locations, but they specialize in cattle, horses, sod, citrus trees, grain, etc.  Not a lot of picture opportunities, but quite an impressive place, with a lot of history.

We also spent the day touring the following places:

Goose Island State Park where they have one of the largest oak trees:

Aransas Wildlife Refuge where we saw American Alligators.  We were hoping to see armadillos, javelinas, and wild boar, but no such luck.  We did see lots of birds in addition to the alligators.

Rockport is known for their Blue Crab, recently recreated by a local artist, it's one of the top 19 small cities in the US.

We also got a few more days of kayaking in, visited a winery but not overly impressed as they do a lot of fruit wines, and definitely enjoyed the sunsets that we had almost everyday.

On Feb. 12 we will start our trip through Northwest Texas on our way to Las Cruces, New Mexico.