Westward Ho!

https://www.google.com/search?q=youtube%3A++amarillo+by+morning&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

Given the photo, the astute reader may surmise that I am in Texas, and you would indeed be correct.  The KOA at which I reside this evening offers free limo service to the  Free If You Can Eat It 72 Ounce Hunk of Dead Moo.   (http://bigtexan.com/72oz-steak-rules/)

No longer an eater of Dead Moo, I passed and ate my humble sandwich at a picnic table in a lovely, cool breeze. 

Last night was also a KOA night.  A KOA is a bit like Olive Garden or Reno's Roadhouse:  Nothing fancy, but you know pretty much what you'll get.  Clean bathrooms, flat sites, swimming pool, dog area, play ground, friendly (sometimes too much so at the end of a long drive) hosts, with sites a bit closer than I'd like but not too close that I get claustrophobic.  After all, I'm not backpacking in the wilderness as I did in my stronger-backed younger days.

I'm on night 3 of the 1600 mile trek from Columbia to Albuquerque.  I could have done it in 3 days rather than 4, but the last time I did that, I utterly exhausted myself.  And why rush?  It isn't as if I have to get back to work.  Tee Hee......

Unfortunately, I have only one key with me, although I will have another made in Albuquerque. 

Why???

It has been hot hot hot, and humidity to go along, and that has presented a real problem.  With the car windows even cracked, the temperature inside would reach over 100 degrees within a very, very few minutes.  Wide enough open so  they wouldn't die, Abbey would be out like a shot, trailing me to my location.  That has meant that  I cannot leave the canines in the car long enough to go to the bathroom.....
And with that to puzzle you, I'm off to bed. 

Paper or Plastic?

The medians of Interstate 10 in West Texas sparkle and glisten…. Gems, perhaps?  The last of the snow?  

No:  plastic.  Plastic bags, plastic sheeting, plastic bottles.  Shredded, torn, tattered, confetti.   Plastic dancing over the desert.  Plastic caught in the sharp tines of cacti.

How did this happen?  The Don’t Mess with Texas Texans leave a mess.  Bigger than life Texans leave a bigger than life mess.  Have they no shame?

Apparently some do.  Even the bigger than life west-Texas Texans, at least the citizens of Ft. Stockton, Texas, have taken the almost unamurican step of banning plastic bags in stores.

I’ve learned from hard experience that when camping with the canines, I need to stash my trash in a plastic bag (Sorry Diana) and hang it inside the camper where the dogs can’t reach it.   When I stopped at Wally World in Ft. Stockton (I needed a few things other than food), I left my own bags in the car, and, though seeing paper bags where mine own Wise County, Virginia, Wally World  stored the plastic, I asked for plastic.  Not to be had, so, with my own bags in the car, I accepted paper.

Why has Texas allowed such a mess?  They can’t blame it all on those of us who pass through.  They can’t blame it all on the prickly vegetation which snags it and shreds it.  They can’t blame it all on the wind, catching the bags and blowing them around like kites.

No, Texas has only itself to blame for the mess.

Bring your own bag to Texas. 

They won’t thank you, but the environment will.

Goodbye Texas

I'd wanted to go to Roswell, NM, to savor the proximity to aliens and UFOs and just general weirdness, but it was too far off my uncharted path,  Fortunately, I had a small taste of little gray men on the outskirts of Hueco Tanks.

Not a new home to be seen.

Hueco Tanks...A Disappointment

On the recommendation of the wonderful NPS staff at Guadalupe Mountain and in hopes of seeing petroglyphs, I took a side trip to Hueco Tanks, just outside El Paso.  El Paso is about a gazillion miles long, with I-10 running down the middle, and ten miles wide, except in one area which is where I turned off for Hueco Tanks and that piece of El Paso was another half a gazillion miles.  El Paso is not pretty, folks.  And the signs for Hueco Tanks State Park and Historic Site...or the lack thereof...merit attention by the State of Texas, if and when it can get its feeble little mind off  sex.

A word about state parks out west:  Because the federal government first saw the value in the areas which became our magnificent national parks, such as Grand Canyon and Yellowstone, western states, which had gained statehood later than their eastern sisters, didn't have much to choose from for state parks.  Yet many western state parks are little gems.  Hueco Tanks could be a little gem but.....

Originally, this area had been privately owned, then county owned, before it was passed on to Texas Parks and Wildlife.  In his first incarnation, it had both historic and prehistoric significance.  Prehistorically, the area attracted Native Americans, later including Mescalero Apache who drew pictographs and petroglyphs.  The tanks, or rock basins, captured always-needed water.

Later, ranching arrived, as did the Butterfield Stage.

Today, this little 800 acre park draws about 100,000 visitors from all over the world:  not for the prehistory, the history, the wildlife or vegetation, but for the rocks.  Apparently, Hueco Tanks is one of the best in the world bouldering.

It gets so crowded that the number of vehicles through the gate must, at times, be limited.  When I arrived, it was swamped with climbers:  young, healthy, cheerful -- and interested only in bouldering.

Texas parks are starved for money, and Hueco Tanks is no exception.  The entrance is not designed to handle the traffic, and the building into which we all disgorge was built for a calmer, less visited time--about 40 years ago.

The staff was very, very nice, though clearly overworked with all the young climbers trying to get permits and directions.  Cheerful voices rang out as climbers greeted one another.  Vehicles piled up outside.

Paying my entry fee, I edged my way to my car, where a pleasant ranger reminded me that under Texas law, dogs could at no time, even in the cool temperature that day, be left in the car.  Nor could they be taken on any of the trails.  That meant no petroglyphs. I was disappointed, but understood.  Texas was more concerned about the health of  dogs than about the health of Texan women. 

I headed to the interpretive center, which is in the old ranch house.  I'd been told the canines would be allowed in, and they were.  However, I left them in the car long enough to dash up to the small center and ask about the bathroom.  Very rudely, an old man who'd forgotten to shave for a few days, snarled, "We don't have one.  Use the one at the entrance."  I knew he was lying.  I turned around, and darned if the door didn't slam behind me as I walked back to the car.  I did not return to the entrance but will say no more.  When I returned with the dogs, a woman volunteer apologized and said the one they had was out of order, but she was new and hadn't known.  The nasty old coot had left by then.

The volunteer was very nice.  Her primary job was to enforce the requirement that everyone who came into the park view  a video about the park.  All parks have a video; most are well done and informative.  This video was also well-done and informative ....  with a strong threatening undertone.  

The usage of Hueco Tanks as a climbing site is overwhelming the human, historic, and natural resources.  It isn't that the climbers are bad folks; they're exuberant and excited.  And they're there to climb, with the other resources as an aside.  The video wanted all visitors to enjoy the park, but to remember that it's a fragile place.  Once I'd viewed the video, my name was entered into the Book of Doom, and I was given a ticket that granted reprieve from viewing the video again for one year.

My guess is that snarly old coot, another volunteer,  had assumed I was a climber; I was rather scruffy looking, if a bit old to be crawling over the rocks unroped.  And he was just sick and tired of climbers ignoring the history and prehistory of his beloved area, and assuming they could go anywhere....  It's either that or he was just a snarly old coot.

I do have some photos....

Waco Tanks:  Hueco, pronounced Waco, means hollows.  Tanks, huecos, are natural rock basins that catch and hold water.

I am always intrigued by these historic ranch houses, which at one time were in the back of beyond.  My mother grew up in a farm house without running water or electricity, but she could walk to school and had friends on nearby farms.  These western farms and ranches were often fairly isolated.  It's hard for me to imagine what daily life was like.

Back in ranching days, the grass would not have been allowed to grow so tall, so close to the house.  Given the fire danger today, I'm surprised that it was so high when I was there.  What I like about the house is that it blends into the environment; it looks as if it belongs.  The rocks in the background are similar to those that attract boulderers.

The romance of the overland mail and passenger stage.  In this instance, it's a fraud, which I did not find out until after I'd taken these photos.  The stage/mail stop was not here; the stones were moved from another location but there is no indication of that on the sign.  This lack of historical honesty reflects Texas in general.  Try visiting the Alamo.

Another example of underfunding:  slopping cement on top of the wall to keep the wall from eroding.  Professional preservationists weep at the sight. 

Now, however, we have two very happy mammals.  Almost no park, federal or state, could function without volunteers, who serve as campground hosts and interpreters, among other necessary tasks.  This woman lives in her RV, going from park to park, spending two or three months at each park.  Living with her are three canines. Tobey can tell......

And so we left Hueco Tanks....and Texas...on a happy note.