Eddy had never been to Big Bend (Southwest Texas) before he met John, who had gone there with his sisters the previous December. We loved this place! It's an ancient volcanic area in the Chihuahuan desert with several different ecosystems in its boundaries. The desert floor is hot and dry, but inside a collapsed volcanic caldera, it's a temperate woodland. We loved it so much we brought a group of friends back to see it in September. Here's pictures from both trips.

February 2001

Eddy in front of the mist-shrouded peaks of the Chisos Mountains in the center of the park. The temperature gradient from the morning to the evening was quite a contrast. We'd find ourselves putting on flannel in the morning and in t-shirts in the afternoon sun.
John in front of a patch of flowers we found on the way to the ruins of an old, crumbling bath house (not THAT kind of bath house). Life tends to cling to whatever source of water might be around, in this case, seeping out through the layers of sediment.
Eddy looking "tough" (yeah right)in front of an old power generator at old Fort Castellon, an old military fort established in the days when Pancho Villa made constant raids across the Mexican border.
John pointing to veins of iron we saw in a rock in the Santa Elena canyon. When we saw them, we couldn't figure out what they were. I jokingly said, "where's a geologist when you need one!" At that moment, this guy in front of us on the trail, said, "Why, I'm a geology student". After leaping up on the rock (giving us a bit of a stage show, in the process), he declared it iron. He was cute, so we believe him.
John sitting on a rock wall, with the "Window" in the distance. The notch-like "Window" in the left of the photo is the only outlet of water from the basin of the Chisos caldera. When it rains heavily, there's a waterfall on the other side.
John with proof of the gods favor on our time of tribulation and wanderings in the desert! When we saw this rainbow, we just had to stop and take a picture.
John at Sotol Outlook, with the sun setting. It was indescribably gorgeous. And you wouldn't believe how cold it quickly got when the sun went down!
Eddy standing by one of the movie set buildings on the highway to the State Park. The movie set is along the river, and was used for films back in the 50s or so, like "Streets of Laredo".
John in front of a sand dune in Monhans Sand Dunes State Park. It's like a little bit of the Sahara here. The erosion of the mountains to the south and west seemed to blow to this point and piled up over thousands of years. It stretches on for miles.
Eddy wandering forlorn into the desert-like sand dunes at Monahans.




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