With all this fun going on, who's got time to blog!

Leonard in his volunteer attire. The NPS

dress code says where and when we can

appear in uniform.

When I started this blog, at the urging of a few friends who wanted to hear about our RV travels, I wasn't sure I was up to the task. After all, posting on a regular schedule, or in my case a quasi-regular one, requires some self-discipline. Indeed, my biggest challenge at present is that I'm so busy having fun that finding time to sit down and write posts can be downright difficult. Some might call this a “high-class problem.”

It's mostly the fault of Big Bend National Park's management, really. The policy here – I cannot speak to what happens at other National Park Service sites, just this one – is to allow volunteers to use part of our scheduled “work” time roving the grounds. We are encouraged to hike, wander, drive and otherwise play while getting credit for time spend doing it. How cool is that?

Why does the NPS do this? For one thing, it lets volunteers experience the park from the visitor's perspective so we might better advise folks, especially first-timers who tend to rely heavily on visitor center staff for suggestions on how to spend their time at Big Bend. Sharing something from a book or pamphlet about Trail X is one thing, telling about it from first-person perspective quite another.

An added benefit of this in-service time is that sending uniformed volunteers out into the park augments both capacity and presence of the park's limited field staff, the dedicated rangers and law enforcement charged with aiding and protecting the public.

 

I have posted pictures below from three recent treks Leonard and I made during our in-service time.

 

Happy holidays and best wishes to all!

 

 

Stop #1: The Sam Nail Ranch

The Sam Nail Ranch, one of several stops along the Ross Maxwell Scenic

Drive at Big Bend National Park, has a short walking path through the

property.

The ranch's windmill continues to pump water, which attracts birds and

other animals to the area.

This building offered ranch animals and inhabitants shelter from the elements.

Ruins of an adobe wall stand as a reminder of the bygone era of ranching at the Big Bend.

Stop #2: Cattail Falls

Next stop: a hike to Cattail Falls, one of Big Bend's lesser known treasures.

 

Not much water at the Falls. It's the dry season.

Stop #3: The Chisos Mountains and Pinnacles Trail


This plaque honoring Stephen Mather appears at the base of the Chisos. Mather was a business tycoon and conservationist who used his personal wealth to promote the establishment of the National Park Service.

Hikers on the Pinnacles Trail are rewarded with beautiful vistas, including this view of Toll Mountain, one of the Chisos'

higher peaks.



Nature add a seasonal touch: Mistletoe growing in a tree along the Pinnacles Trail.

The Chisos Mountains are the only mountain range in the U.S. to be entirely protected within the bounds of a national park. People come from all over the world to see this place.



Appetite Peak, so named because when Civilian Conservation Corps workers

helping to develop the facilities in the 1930s complained about the quality of

the food, they were hiking up the hill to improve their appetites.

 

The meaning of "old"

This year I turned 55. It didn't bother me, except for the fact that now I seem to be lumped into a sort of demographic wasteland that says to marketing agencies, “Don't bother going after her business. She's not going to buy the cute little [insert name of trendy new product here] you're selling. She's '55 and over'!”

Not to be outdone, Leonard passed his own milestone, reaching the age of Medicare eligibility. Even Sprocket got into the act, continuing to replace the tan hairs of his youth with an increasing number of white ones.

I don't want to give the impression that any of this disturbs me. It doesn't. Aging beats the hell out of the alternative. It's just that as I grow older, as I watch those around me do the same, I become more aware of the importance of doing what I can now, while body and mind still allow it. The clock's ticking has me thinking about what it means to be “old.” A recent hike at Big Bend National Park shed some light on the matter.

Persimmon Gap Draw leads to this pour off. This wall

transforms into a waterfall when rains are heavy.

Leonard and I decided to explore Persimmon Gap Draw, a little-known trail and one of the few located in the park's north end where we're parked. During the rainy season – July through September – hiking in such areas is ill-advised due to the possibility of drowning in a deluge of water rushing by as it seeks lower ground. However, in dryer times, dry waterways double as hiking trails.

As we strolled down the trail, a rock with some unusual markings caught my eye. Closer examination revealed that it 
contained a fossilized shell. We scanned the area further and soon discovered several others.

Holding those fossils, I couldn't help but think about the organisms whose remains became imprinted in the rock, left behind for all time. When did they live? What was it like here then?

Unidentified fossil. Chrinoid, perhaps?

The answers lie in geological and paleontological research. BiBe's best fossil finds have come from the Cretaceous period, 145.5 to 65.5 million years ago. (In fact, there is so much from the period to study that the men and women of BiBe's science department refer to this as “Cretaceous Park.”) The period began with the emergence of the first insects, modern mammals and flowering plants. It ended with the Great Dinosaur Die Off. Life as we know it came together in the Cretaceous Period.

It was also a time when a shallow sea covered Big Bend, with numerous aquatic life forms that disappeared as the sea slowly receded to the modern day Gulf of Mexico. It is those plants and animals whose impressions remain for explorers to discover, admire and leave behind for the next hiker to find.

 

Gazing upon the fossils we found left me feeling inspired. I was looking tens of millions of years into the past, not decades, centuries or even millennia, but millions of years.

Now that, my friends, is old. Really, truly old.

Still have to identify this one. Any clues?

At last, something I recognize! Just don't ask me to tell you what tree that leaf came from.

A small grove of Texas persimmon trees, from which Persimmon Gap derives its name. Sometime around August, these will be loaded with fruit.

 

Unauthorized removal of anything from a national park is considered

poaching and a federal offense. Take pictures; leave the rest for the

enjoyment of others.

Sheltering in place

Selecting volunteer assignments means, among other things, giving thought to climate and likely weather conditions for the locale and time of year in question. My research on Big Bend showed average temperatures for November through January ranging from highs of 60-68°F to lows of 35-42°F with less than an inch of precipitation likely during any of those months. It's the stuff that makes south Texas a prime “snow bird” destination. This year may prove to be the exception.

Big Bend's daily report advises visitors on weather and road conditions. Lower

temps in each range are for the mountains, higher for the Rio Grande.

When the National Weather Service began issuing advisories last week about a winter storm approaching our area, Leonard and I started giving serious thought as to our capacity for “sheltering in place.” We were in good shape as far as provisions were concerned, per my previous entry on stocking up, but with ice, snow and windchill temps forecast to drop into the teens, the storm would be the first serious test of Kong's insulation and heating systems. We needed to make sure we were doing everything possible to stay safe and comfortable.

Our preparations actually started before we purchased the 5^th wheel. We looked at the insulation and windows for every prospective purchase. The manufacturers we considered all offer some sort of cold weather options package. After consulting with our sales contact at DRV, we concluded that having a heated basement would be good for wintering in North Dakota but not really necessary in light of our intent to spend the colder months south of Interstate 20.

Truckzilla with a coating of ice. Good

thing we don't have to drive to "work."

Kong's standard package included two heating systems: a heat pump and a furnace. The heat pump would suffice provided a) temps remained above about 40°F, and b) there's a source of electricity. With the thermometer expected to remain below the mid-30's for several days, and considering that a power outage seemed a real possibility - the area's above-ground power lines would soon be weighed-down with ice – relying on the heat pump for warmth could become problematic.

This meant relying on Kong's furnace. We checked our LP situation and determined that we had enough gas to get us through the weekend to Monday when the nearest LP refill station reopens for the week. As long as we didn't do much more than heat a can of soup using our gas stove, we expected to be in pretty good shape.

We filled our fresh water tank and

disconnected from sewer to prevent

broken hoses. 

So, how did it go? We survived the storm just fine, leaving us feeling both snug and, dare I say, a teensy bit smug about our disaster aversion skills. Is it any surprise, then, that as I write this entry we have no power?

That's right. Thinking we had dodged the power outage bullet, we were sitting in the rig enjoying a day off from our volunteer duties when I heard a distant “pop!” A quick check of Kong's power management system revealed that we were running on batteries. The electricity was off.

Perhaps in a future post I will explain how RV batteries work. For now, I will just say that there are certain limitations when it comes to running off battery power, not the least of which is that you do not want to let them discharge below 50% capacity. Avoiding that requires the use of a generator. I can hear ours purring away outside now!

Aren't we smart for buying that generator? Better still, we have a full can of gas to keep it going.

Uh, oh. There's that smug feeling creeping up again. Better get that under control quickly lest I tempt Fate...again.

The storm left the Rosillos Mountains of Big Bend National Park dusted with snow.

 

A trip to Fort Stockup

The longest commute I ever faced was when I lived in Olathe, Kansas and worked in Topeka. Daily round trip for that ride equaled about 130 miles. My subsequent commute between north Chicago suburbs was a bit better – 40 minutes each way in city traffic – but still wore on me. Thankfully, I've discovered a remedy for healing those old commuter wounds. I walk out the door of our 5th-wheel then take 12 paces to the back door of my work station. This is one 12-step program that really works!

It takes about 10 seconds to walk from Kong to the Persimmon

Gap Visitor Center. Now that's what I call a commute!

Leonard and I began hosting at the Persimmon Gap Visitor Center near Big Bend's (“BiBe” for short) main entrance a couple of weeks ago. We're still learning and exploring the park and adjusting to our new position. Thus far, our biggest adjustment to daily life here has been that of starvation avoidance. Moving from park headquarters at Panther Junction took us 27 miles further from the nearest grocery store. (Certain basic items like milk and bread are available at various concessionaire-run convenience stores within the park, but something about being asked to pay $4 for a half-gallon of milk rubs me the wrong way.)

We arrived at BiBe stocked with enough provisions to last us three weeks. As those dwindled, it became clear that we would soon be forced to forage in more distant territory. So, we grabbed our reusable grocery bags, climbed into Truckzilla's cab and headed for the town of Fort Stockton, affectionately referred to by the locals as “Fort Stockup.” And stock up we did!

Sunset, south Texas style! Not wasting time on a long drive to

"work" leaves more time for enjoying scenes like this.

 

Eighty miles, one ridiculously overloaded grocery cart and three hours later, we filled Truckzilla's tank and headed back to Persimmon Gap. Cost for the day, excluding lunch at Fort Stockton's lone Subway restaurant, ran us $430: $390 for food and other provisions plus $40 for diesel. (Truckzilla's gotta eat too, you know!)

Having restocked Kong's limited larder, we can now relax and spend our time off taking advantage of BiBe's hiking trails. (Pictures of our latest outings follow.)

Leonard, Sprocket and I should be set for another three weeks, just long enough for me to check out routes for a provisioning trip down a different kind of road: the information highway. Twelve steps from the couch to my laptop then 12 to greet the FedEx driver delivering our order? Yup, that should do alright.

The end of the Lost Mine Trail in the Chisos Mountains. No mine, but the views are worth their weight in gold!

The Chisos are the only mountains in the United States situated

entirely within the boundaries of a national park.

It's not all about the rocks. Late fall rains produced a flourish of color, as

evidenced by this cluster of Cardinal flower.

So many trails, so little time.

Hikers heading into Dog Canyon get a close look at this rock slide from 1985. The largest boulders are said to be the size of a kitchen.

Dog Canyon Trail takes travelers along 2.5 miles of desert floor and dry creek bed. The desert is best viewed (and appreciated) up close.

Lush grasslands seen by early Anglo settlers to this area disappeared due to overgrazing, allowing creosote to take over. Even this bush, once thought indestructible, has it limits. In 2011, a severe drought hit the area, followed by a deep freeze. Dead shrubs, cacti and other plants found throughout the park serve as reminders of Nature's carnage.

Climate isn't the only danger to life in Big Bend. Buffelgrass, imported from Africa

by Anglo settlers, gravely threatens native vegetation as it competes for soil and water.

More information on self-care resources

Our work schedule has been pretty hectic here at Big Bend. That, coupled with the fact that we didn't have Internet access at our RV site until late this week, has made keeping up with my posting difficult.

I hope to have something up about our adventures in the next day or do. In the meantime, I want to share a really great entry by Nina from Wheeling It as a supplement to my musings about on-the-road health care options (GypsyCare Part I and Part II).

Nina does a nice job of pulling together information about resources that can be used by anyone, not just us RVers, so feel free to share this with those you think might benefit.

127 miles from the nearest traffic light

On most days, you can see Mexico in the distance.

The enormity, vastness and isolation of the Chihuahuan Desert and Big Bend National Park became evident miles before we entered it. The nearest traffic light can be found in the town of Ft. Stockton, Texas, a mere 127 miles away. Neither broadcast TV stations nor cable are available in the park, and rumor has it that on a really good night, if you aim your antenna just right, you might be able to pick up the NPR station broadcasting out of Marfa, Texas 131 miles away. (Again, that's just rumor.)

A park ranger leads our volunteer class on a field trip to

Indian Head, an archaeological study area at BiBe.

The nearby town of Terlingua/Study (pronounced “STOO-dee”) Butte boasts a general store – small but with a surprising selection of items available to anyone willing to make the 24 mile drive from the staff/volunteer housing area at Panther Junction. (We'll add another 20 miles to that after we relocate to Persimmon Gap at the north end of the park this weekend.)

 Not everything is remote. The park houses several hundred people living in government rental housing or RV sites. In addition to us National Park Service volunteers, this includes paid staff from the Park Service, U.S. Border Patrol, and the concessionaire that manages BiBe's (short for Big Bend) lodge, restaurant, campground stores and the park's sole non-NPS run RV campground, as well as their spouses and children. There is a public K-8 school – average attendance 20 students - although high school students must travel to Terlingua to attend classes.

Infrastructure supporting staff and park visitors includes water management facilities, a post office, fire department and emergency medical services. The latter generally aid visitors in distress, though they did assist in the unexpected home delivery of a baby born to the wife of a Park Service employee the weekend we arrived.

Despite these signs of civilization, make no mistake. We live in the wilderness. Kong backs up to a large arroyo (dry creek bed) that serves as a kind of wildlife highway, allowing all manner of critters to pass from one end of our little barrio to the other.


In October, tarantulas wander the roads looking for love

(and hoping not to get run over).

So far, we've seen one as-yet unidentified snake (non-poisonous, thank you very much) and lots of javelina – a harmless, albeit seriously near-sighted animal whose desire to move closer to unwitting pedestrians in an attempt to see them is sometimes mistaken for aggression. Tarantulas searching for mates can be seen wandering the streets and even climbing the walls of buildings. One of our neighbors was driving his son to school and spotted a Mexican black bear and her cub as they darted out from behind a dumpster. And one of our orientation presenters shared news of her encounter with a mountain lion she caught lounging in front of her car.



Encounter of the coyote kind. Sprocket made it clear he

wanted nothing to do with this beauty!

While these encounters seem interesting to me and Leonard, I can't say Sprocket shares that interest. We spotted a coyote on our way back from a shopping trip to Terlingua. Sprocket, being the scent hound that he is, slept soundly on Truckzilla's back seat, that is until we moved downwind. Then, the dog's nose and survival instincts kicked in. He started barking and pacing frantically. Once he realized he had nowhere to run, our boy collapsed into a shaking pile of fur, unable to relax until we had put several miles between us and the predator.

(Who needs TV when you can watch Animal Planet from your window?)

Although we have not quite completed orientation, Leonard and I already sense that our three months here promise to be rich, rewarding and unique. What a way to spend retirement!



Signs of pre-historic life at BiBe. Shown here are remnants of a rock oven built by Native Americans who lived in the area as long as 12,000 years ago.

Petroglyphs like this make Indian Head a tempting target for poachers seeking relics for profit.

BiBe is full of breathtaking geological features. Its rock formations are too soft for the park to be considered a climbing destination.



BiBe is home to a rich diversity of plant and animal life. The Big Bend

mosquitofish exists in the pond shown along with two others at BiBe and

nowhere else on Earth.

This border crossing links BiBe to the remote Mexican village of Boquillas.

Bring your passport, and don't stay late. The crossing closes promptly at 6:00 p.m.

Visitors not wishing to walk across the Rio Grande to Mexico can take a ferry – actually, a guy in a row boat (top right) – to a collection of mules, horses and taxis waiting to carry them to Boquillas for lunch, souvenir shopping and sightseeing.

Over the centuries, a few hardy souls scratched out a living

on settlements that are now part of BiBe. Descendants still

visit some of the graves.

Sandstone formations at Ernst Tinaja, site of one of our orientation field trips. Stunning!

 

In dryer times when the water level drops, the slick, steep sides of Ernst Tinaja make accessing the precious water within it nearly impossible, even for the most cunning of creatures, as is evidenced by claw marks in the rock.



From point A to point B: the art of RV routing

LT walks off our temporary RV site, a

good thing to do before attempting to

park your rig.

We arrived at Big Bend National Park this past Sunday, none the worse for wear, to take part in a 12-day orientation. The orientation is designed to prepare volunteers for our role as park ambassadors and features presentations by and field trips with various Park Service experts. There is a lot to learn about BBNP, and as soon as it's over and I've had a chance to sift through my photos, I'll talk about our orientation experiences. Meanwhile, I thought I would share a bit about the unique challenges Leonard and I face as RVers with respect to route planning, what tools I (as chief navigator) use, and their limitations.

Any road warrior worth his or her salt knows about Google maps and GPS. Trouble is those were designed largely for use by drivers of cars, pickups and other smaller, lighter vehicles for which height, width, length and weight aren't a concern. Think about it. When was the last time you saw a sign that read “low clearance” and panicked because you weren't sure your cute little ride wouldn't come out the other side looking like a giant can opener had just ripped off its roof?

Not so for the larger RV's. It's definitely a case where size matters!

Rand McNally's GPS for RV's comes in handy, though it

does have some limitations when it comes to routing.

Early on, we discovered an RV-specific GPS made by Rand McNally. It allows you to enter the type and dimensions of your rig then calculates routes aimed at avoiding all those nasty RV unfriendly road features, like low overpasses, narrow tunnels and weak bridges. As GPS options go, this one's proven workable for us, the occasional head-scratching “why did it tell us to make three right turns to go left” not withstanding. I've learned (the hard way) to resolve those situations by comparing Rand McNally's routing to Google maps in advance of a trip.

Not only will Google maps let me double-check the GPS' work, it also allows me to create a route map of my own which I can save on Google's servers (and return to for future reference) or print, either on paper or as a file on my laptop.

In addition, we picked up a print version of Rand McNally's road atlas for use when the high-tech gadgets just aren't practical. It also comes in handy when your driver's screaming, “This isn't the way to Tulsa! Why are we going north when Tulsa's south!” in which case you can pull out the book, flip to the appropriate map and point out that you, in fact, have not lost your marbles and are indeed en route to your destination. (Ask me how I know this.)



Google maps let you create and save route maps. It's great for

reviewing turn-by-turn directions before hitting the road. This

one's from my 2011 trip to Ireland.

Our journey from Mt. Rogers to BBNP took us over nearly 1,300 road miles. Thanks to all of the above, we are now nestled into our site at the place known as Panther Junction. We'll remain here during orientation then shift to another locale at the park entrance.

Big Bend NP promises to be a fascinating place to explore. I look forward to sharing lots about our experiences here, starting with my next post!

 

Under pressure

Grindstone Campground as of last

Sunday - an inauspicious ending to a

great experience.

Our situation at Mt. Rogers became somewhat fluid post closure of our campground. After originally being given at least a week from closure to leave, we were allowed to stay just four days.

This wouldn't have been a big deal save for the fact that once we knew we had a whole week left, Leonard and I made a few online purchases to be delivered to us at the campground. Come departure time, one package was still AWOL. Fortunately, a very kind, understanding U.S. Postal Service employee in Troutdale, VA offered to forward the parcel to my sister, who will then send it to me.

(What would the world be like without cooperative relatives?)

This tire pressure monitor lets us know

when the 5th-wheel's tires are low on air.

Thursday's exodus began smoothly enough. Thanks to a neat little towing maneuver shared by one of our fellow volunteers (a retired long-haul trucker), Leonard pulled Kong from our rather tight RV site without breaking a sweat – or hitting the assorted boulders, ditches and trees lining his route. We bade our Grindstone Campground buddies farewell and began our westward journey.

Then, as these things go, we hit a bit of a snag. It started pre-departure with the revelation that our 10-year old somewhat wimpy Craftsman air compressor was not long for this life. Even if it weren't about to crap out, it lacked the power to inflate Kong's heavy-duty Goodyear H-rated tires. Leonard cruised the information highway and found what looked like a suitable replacement: a more powerful Craftsman compressor. Once that compressor arrived, he gleefully headed out the door, pressure gauge in hand, expecting to add enough air to the tires to return them to safe towing levels.

High-quality tires make for
safer RV travel.

As with any vehicle, maintaining proper air pressure is vital to safe operation. Low pressure increases tire heat, which damages them – at best, reducing their lifespan, at worst, causing a blowout. Not good! High pressure can stress tires to the point of blowout. Again, not good!

Knowing this, Leonard spent about an hour lying on the cold ground trying to maintain the connection between various tire valves and the compressor nozzle, his arms nearly numb for lack of movement. He returned to the warm confines of our rig, his mission unfulfilled and declaring our newly-delivered tool to be, “a piece of shit!” It seems the compressor still wasn't powerful enough to fill our tires.

Pending identification of a suitable replacement, we agreed a viable solution for getting us safely out of Virginia would be to stop at the nearest travel plaza and pump those babies right up. That would have worked fine were it not for the fact that the first truck stop we hit positioned its air station in a place we couldn't reach, at least not easily; the next two had broken air pumps.

Our first stop after leaving Mt. Rogers was a nice little park

in Harriman, TN on the shores of Watts Bar Lake. Sweet!

Adding to the pressure we were feeling about our under-pressured treads was the fact that during one of our failed inflation stops Leonard discovered that one of the special tire sensors we'd purchased from our manufacturer, ostensibly to alert us in the event of a rapid deflation, was itself leaking air. What's more, the special wrench needed to remove the sensor was neatly tucked away inside Kong's cabinetry, access to which was made impossible by the fact that it lay behind the living room slide which, like all our slides, remained closed during transit.

After about 10 minutes of driving, we confirmed that Leonard's quick re-capping of the sensor had stopped the leak. Otherwise, we would have had to pull off somewhere – preferably in a spot large enough to open the living room slide – then dig out that special wrench, remove the sensor, close the slide, then return to our route.

On our second morning of travel, we located a travel plaza with a working pump, sufficiently increasing the pressure on our tires and decreasing the pressure on us.



Visitors to Yuma, TN can check out

the site where the Battle of Parker's

Crossroads.

As luck would have it, we arrived in Yuma, TN only to discover that our microwave oven was not getting any electrical juice. How it that lucky, you ask? Well, while the campground's RV technician assessed the situation, Leonard struck up a conversation about our compressor woes. Turns out the tech has the same Craftsman compressor as the one we were about to return to Sears and shared a tip that will make ours workable.

The U.S. South remains proud of its Confederate roots.

He couldn't fix the power issue, so it looks like we'll be making a stop in Dallas to get that fixed. C'est la guerre.

Our current road trip will take us through Tennessee and Arkansas. We hope to cross the Texas state line on Tuesday and reunite later in the week in the bustling metropolis of San Angelo with a couple of expat chums from our Costa Rica days. This reunion is further evidence that the world is getting flatter. Let's just hope the same won't be said of our tires.