Faces of Texas

. . .
. . .

"It was 40 miles of tarantulas. I've never seen anything like it."

.

- Robert H. Lee on riding a motorcycle in West Texas after a heavy rain. I met Robert on the Terlingua porch in the middle of one of his motorcycle roadtrips. Originally from Texas, he told of a heavy rain that slowed down a bike trip for him and his buddies. When they finally resumed the ride, they discovered that the road from Presidio to Marfa was inundated with tarantulas trying to stay away from the heavy water. With nowhere to go but onward, they drove the spider-filled road for an hour, covering their wheels with a thick layer of smelly arachnid guts.

.

Terlingua Ghost Town, Texas

. . .

. . .

"I still log on about six hours a month, say hi to people, shoot some fireballs, gain some experience, whatever."

.

- Brian Alexander on his post-"everything's about my on-line adventure game" life. I met Brian at the La Loma del Chivo hostel in Marathon while he was visiting his friend Ali. We worked together building a goat shed, volunteered for the fire department chief, judged the chili cook-off. After my week there, Brian walked with me for a few miles and talked about his former intense obsession with Everquest, an on-line adventure game. He was years into it when he realized that it might be better to branch out. His visit to Marathon only served to reinforce the decision he had made several years prior, but he still makes time to dish out the occasional fireball.

.

Marathon, Texas

. . .
. . .

"So is this some kind of free-loving hippy place?"
.
- Dan, a cross-country bicyclist, on the hostel La Loma del Chivo. Dan only stayed one night in Marathon, but we had a couple of long conversations before calling it a day. He was recently out of a career, a marriage, and a subsequent relationship, and was literally rebuilding himself as he biked across America. Dan confessed that he had never experienced the kind of intensity of the road that allowed total strangers to become close in a relatively short period of time. When the hostel caretaker told him that bikers weren't required to pay, Dan couldn't believe it and spouted the above question. He followed that with, "Hey, this is all new to me."
.
Marathon, Texas
. . .
. . .

"From the courthouse [in Sanderson], the nearest traffic signal is 65 miles."

.

- Mike Millican on the remoteness of the entire region. I met Mike in Dryden over dinner at the grocery store (we were both invitees). His friends in Marfa had told him I was coming some time ago, so he wasn't surprised at all by my arrival and invited me to crash on his couch. During the evening and following morning, he told me about his plans to create a primitive bicycle campground, something that would break up a 150-mile stretch of Adventure Cycling's southern route. He even had a name picked out: El Escondido. With nothing in all directions, "The Hideout" seems like a perfect fit.

.

Dryden, Texas

. . .
. . .

"When I'm here, you know they can't find anybody else."

.

- Keith Mann on working at the Lillie Langtry gift shop. Looking at the picture, it might not seem like Keith was working, but he most certainly was. Sitting comfortably on the porch and facing the not-so-busy Judge Roy Bean museum, he only went inside when there was a customer or two, which on this particular day happened at a rate of once per two hours. Keith lamented not being able to work on his porch on an overcast day, but there were moments playing his music when he didn't seem to mind. "This is my little Spanish guitar," he told me. Then he'd gently play another tune, looking off to see who might be blowing through his lonely West Texas town.

.

Langtry, Texas

. . .

. . .
"My son said, 'Daddy, who's that girl over there in the purple dress?'"

.

- Jesse Gonzalez on his son's witnessing an apparition in his home. Jesse lives in Casa Ortiz, a historic house in downtown Laredo. One of the first questions I asked him was if it was haunted, and he answered 'yes.' Stories, we agreed, usually have a logical explanation, but there was no explaining his son seeing another person in an otherwise empty house. Jesse gave me and Becky Garcia a tour of the house, going through all the rooms with extra history thrown in for fun, but I didn't see any girls in purple and didn't feel the air go cold. Of course, I wasn't there at night.

.

Laredo, Texas

In the News...

I just posted a big blog below, but I also have a couple of articles that have just come out across the state.

Click here to see my Corpus article on my Marathon Border Checkpoint woes.

Click here to see my self-syndicated column in the Victoria Advocate about solitude.

Sorry there's not more information, but the columns are self-explanatory once you get into them!

Until next we cross paths...

The Border Patrol and my Daytime/Nighttime Strolls down Old Mines Road

I just finished a stretch between Eagle Pass and Laredo. Twenty miles after the former, I passed a town called El Indio, an aerostat radar unit a few miles after that, and then a whole lot of nothing for the remainder of the walk. The pavement petered out, and Raisin and I walked Eagle Pass Road, though nobody calls it that. People call it the Old Mines Road, and it goes all the way into Laredo.

We met TONS of border patrol agents on this road, and because they don't communicate too much with one another and not well at all between regions, I had to introduce myself countless times. As a benchmark for comparison, anywhere else but the border I might have met one law enforcement agent in 100 miles. On Old Mines Road, I met a few dozen in 50 miles.

The BP agents all do a double take. Several pass us, then turn around to ask questions. It's usually the same conversation, but there are notable exceptions due to the agent or circumstance.

On the first day off the pavement, some agents stopped and got out of their car (You never know. Sometimes they stay in and talk to you from the comfort of an air-conditioned car; other times they get out and meet you halfway.). I thought, "Here we go again," but they didn't approach me. They were bent over something by the side of the road. When I got closer, I saw many many foot prints, fresh and about a half-inch to inch deep in the somewhat firm mud. They were trying to learn as much as they could from the prints before continuing any kind of search. I didn't stick around, but thought it was pretty interesting.

Raisin and I hunkered down in the shade on the same day and were resting when several cars passed us on the road. There were BP cars, sheriff cars, fire rescue vehicles, EMT vans. There might have been ten in all. On a lonely dusty road, ten cars turn your head.

A bit later, a couple of BP agents stumbled upon our resting spot while doing a drag pull. The Border Patrol have a system with which they identify the general location of a hiker or hikers. There are several dirt roads on which they drag several huge chained-together tires to make the road flat and mainly smooth. If a walker disturbs the road's dust and stones by crossing it, the BP agents are trained to spot the trail he leaves. This is called cutting sign. By monitoring which roads have been crossed, they can specify the general location of a hiker or hikers.

So the agents were dragging a couple of tires, and I flagged them down to ask about all the cars. Apparently, an 18-wheeler collapsed on a man changing a tire. On the 18-wheeler was a house. Yeah, think about it. All of that came crashing down on a man who, believe it or not, may have survived. But in what condition, I'll never know. Other 18-wheelers were brought out to disassemble the house and lighten the load so the emergency personnel could do their job and get the guy out.

That was day one. At the end of it, we found a decent camping spot hidden off to the side of the road. Little did I know I would be betrayed by my own.

At 2:30am, I could hear a BP truck driving slowly down the road, looking for signs of a crossing. When it got close and the slow grinding of their tires on the caliche road made the rubber growl, Raisin started barking. The car stopped, and a flashlight beam cut through the night. I called out to the men, and the first thing the driver said to me, keeping in mind that we hadn't yet seen each other, was "Do you need any water?" These guys were looking out for me, and though I think Raisin has a lot to learn about stealth camping, I felt good about the encounter. We had a brief conversation, and then on the flip-side of their tour of the road, they stopped to talk for a bit longer. It was bizarre to be having a conversation in the middle of the night while I was in my sleeping bag and these armed agents were standing nearby, but Raisin wasn't intimidated. She was wagging until they left.

The mosquitoes, by the way, were bad on Old Mines Road. They weren't terrible, but it only takes a handful to make your nighttime sleep a little harder to hold onto.

Once the guys left, I got attacked again. I hid under the sleeping bag which was rated at 20 degrees Fahrenheit and way too hot for South Texas hiking. I lasted a couple hours, then got up and took off, saving both our breakfasts for later.

I started the hike with about nine liters of water and knew that I'd have to rely most likely on either mud puddles or the Border Patrol. Since the BP agents usually keep their water cool, I preferred theirs. All the agents I encountered were very helpful with the water resupply, even giving me food in the process. Between Eagle Pass, Carrizo Springs, and Laredo, they've got a really nice team of men and women working for them.

We got stopped again, though Raisin never officially got carded. It's a good thing, too, because dogs have to have a chip in them in Laredo - city ordinance. I didn't understand the sentence, "Are you a US citizen?" due to various factors, the main one being that some agents choose to ask the question all of a sudden. Like this:

"So you're just walking?"
"Yep."
"Where'd you start?"
"Corpus."
"Where are you going?"
"Corpus."
"Where are you from?"
"Corpus."
"Are you a US citizen?"

The question is not a natural extension of the conversation and has tripped me up because of its inherent awkwardness. The majority of agents will ask, so I know it's coming. Still, I sometimes flub it, like going up a staircase carrying something big and thinking there's going to be another step.

So I flubbed, and this raised their suspicions. They asked for my ID, which I gave, and they soon realized I was telling the truth. During this time, another BP car pulled up, and the drivers got out. They walked right up and said, "We got one."

A man had been abandoned by his coyote group and wandered around for five days, totally lost. He was hungry and thirsty and needed to give himself up to survive. So he sat on the road and waited for a BP truck, which given enough time will always come.

I really wanted to see him but refrained from asking. The guys were friendly, gave me some water and a few power bars, and then the same fellow who had spoken of getting "one" warned me of the emptiness of the upcoming stretch of road: "The only people who use this road are oil men, truckers, Border Patrol, and the wets."

It's weird to hear that word "wets," but I know the crossers are using similar terms to describe their hunters like "gringos" and "migra." So strange that with just one word, hundreds of thousands of people can be summed up and brushed off, divorced from their humanity. The fact that it happens in both directions does not make it any better.

The following morning, I woke up at 2:30am again, this time from the mosquitoes alone. I packed up and left, disgusted with my inability to wipe them out (I usually fight them. I've got good techniques, too.). We hit the road and after 30 minutes or so saw the lights of a BP truck coming our way. We walked directly into the light.

While I have a hard time understanding people's general weariness of me when I show up during the day, I have absolutely no problem understanding how unusual it must have been for these men to see a hiker at 3am on a road heavily used by illegal migrants and drug-runners. They rightly had a hard time believing me. I got carded, as usual, but gained their confidence once I cleared. They gave me a refill on water and an MRE, a military "Meal Ready-to-Eat" ration. (One hour later, Raisin and I sat down to our first meal like that. We gobbled it up.) In parting, one agent said, "See you in the morning." And we did, a few hours later with the rising sun.

I was hoping we'd be done with the mosquitoes in the evening, but it just wasn't in the cards. For the third day in a row, I got up at 2:30am to 3am, and started hiking, Raisin by my side. This time, we didn't see Border Patrol for several hours. What did happen took me off guard.

We were walking by moonlight and could probably be seen for quite some ways. I know this because a vehicle honked at me. I stopped and looked off to my left and could see the brakes of a car come on and off. They were telling me, "We're over here. Now come on up." I got very tingly and continued walking, all the while glancing at the hill. They never honked again.

When we finally hit the pavement again, I felt as if several days had passed when in fact I'd only been out of touch for two and a half. We walked a few miles then sat by the road for a break from the heat. A few moments later, a BP car pulled up with a cameraman in the passenger seat. He was videotaping me! From his seat, the agent asked me a few questions, then got out and came over to us. The cameraman and two others got out, and they crowded me and Raisin all while the BP agent was giving me information and asking questions.

Turns out, the non-BP passengers were from National Geographic! They were doing a story on the border on the stretch of road I had just hiked. They asked me some questions, videotaped Raisin drinking some water, and were full of pure energy. During this time, three other BP vehicles showed up, everyone clearly excited about the presence of National Geographic. I asked the first agent about the honk that had happened earlier, and he explained that it was likely a coyote, not a drug-runner, who had called me over and that it was a common technique.

Then just as soon as they had appeared, they were off!

Raisin and I took another day to reach Laredo and stayed with my folks in a hotel for a couple of nights. We're now with a childhood and high school friend named Becky Garcia, and she too is giving us a healthy dose of Texan hospitality. R&R! Read & Raisin!

And that is that. Until next time, folks...

Del Rio, Quemado, and Eagle Pass

One of the exciting things about being on the southern boundary is the inundation of Mexican food. To be fair, though, I started noticing a lot of authentic Mexican restaurants from as far back as the north-central panhandle (yeah, think about it). As unlikely as it seems, I've been eating good Mexican food for about 1500 hundred miles.

However, facility and ease are important to me, especially being on foot. Before hitting El Paso all the way until now, I had to sort of take the Mexican food whenever I chanced upon it. I got burned a couple of times, but I also found some real gems in the desert.

In Del Rio, locals and tourists alike really enjoy Fisherman's Headquarters, a little bar-restaurant attached to a gas station. For me, I could walk there from the Broke Mill RV park where I stayed on Hwy 90 (which, as far as RV parks go, is a swank place; I still can't believe the owner Mike cut me a deal at $12 bucks a night). I've been on a chicharron kick lately (also known as 'pig skin'), and this place did a pretty good job.

In Quemado, I couldn't figure out what locals most enjoyed, but I went to a little grocery which also had a restaurant. I missed the name, but it's the only place in the north of town (and it's a really small town). I wanted some quick tacos, but they didn't have chicharron. All they had was barbacoa (barbecue) and chorizo con papas (hot sausage and potatoes). I didn't care too much for the former, but the latter was fantastic. I got the last of it, and I was glad for it. I got Raisin a scoop of barbacoa, and she was really really excited (Quick disclaimer: I'm not saying it was dog food. It was good, just not as good as the other.).

Smack in between Quemado and Eagle Pass was a little place called M&M Cafe. There was literally nothing around it, not in the way of development. I stationed Raisin in some shade and went in. It was mom and pop operation, and I greeted the woman in English. She wouldn't have it. She replied in Spanish, saying - and I'm guessing here - "Now, now. We'll have none of that in here. Why don't you speak Spanish to me?" I obliged and asked her how she was doing. She smiled and asked what I would like. Chicharron, I said. Haven't these people figured this out by now? She brought it out about ten minutes later, a single perfect taco of pig skin. The skin was crispy and mixed with eggs, and there was salsa on the side. I carefully put some aside for Raisin (if she's going to hike with me, she's going to eat pig skin). Delicious. Outside, Raisin looked at it and was skeptical at first, but in a moment devoured what I'd given her. My kind of dog.

In Eagle Pass, I foolishly filled up on camping food on the outskirts of town. I'm also wondering what happened to my infinite appetite. While I'm processing trail mix and what not, I'm keeping an eye out on every place I pass, and I've passed several. To borrow a phrase from Clerks, I feel like a salsa shark.

Anyway, we're having a good time and enjoying all this good food. Andale, perro!

Until next time...

In the News...

I'm at the Quemado Public Library. I tied Raisin up outside, but because of the amount of slack I had given her, she managed to slip inside to the air-conditioned room. I hadn't known this until I turned around and saw her lying down on the floor, being good, like she was supposed to be there. I just laughed and let it slide. The librarians haven't said anything yet.

If you're into Raisin anecdotes like the one above, you might like this. I wrote a Raisin article some time back for my self-syndicated column. Click here to read it.

Also, the Texas Country Reporter did a segment on me when I was hiking from Presidio to Terlingua. Click here for a blurb and possibly when the show will air in your area. By the way, I make no promises here. While I hopefully sound somewhat articulate, I'm scared I won't. It's a little nerve-wracking to be speaking off the cuff with a big camera in your face.

That's all for now. Until next time...

Seminole Canyon State Park

While this post should have some pics, I'm specifically not going to post any as they could potentially be submitted as evidence in a court of law. Oh no, you might be thinking, what's this rascal gone and done now? Not much admittedly, but there were signs saying to do otherwise, thus the picture ban.

Raisin and I showed up at Seminole Canyon State Park after hours. I had wanted to stock up on food, read a few interesting displays, get to know the park. Not this visit. So we hung out while I read a book and contemplated our next move.

As the sun approached seven o'clock, I decided to go into the canyon. Raisin was game. But the signs prohibit such action. "Canyon Open to Guided Tours Only." That's pretty clear to me. So I asked Raisin if I could guide her down, never mind that she's a puppy, and she said 'woof.' Done.

We went down the stairs to the bottom of the canyon and paused. It was pure magic.

The beauty was astounding. Pools of water, a wide canyon perfect for walking, trees, cool air. We went back several miles toward the Rio Grande. It was like walking through a wonderland, where every step provides a new picture perfect view.

We checked out the wall paintings, the reason the canyon is off limits, but the natural beauty of the place quite frankly put them to shame. We swam, played around, and as it got quiet and dark, found a nice overhang to camp in. The night was crisp, mosquitoless, and perfect.

I love this place.

Until next time...

A Hostel in Marathon: La Loma del Chivo

Raisin and I walked into Marathon, Texas, population roughly 450. Having seen and experienced dozens of small towns about this size, there was no reason to expect anything out of the ordinary. However, West Texas has a few tricks up its old dusty sleeves, but we didn't know that. Not yet.

.

After walking into town and sharing a few treats at the Burnt Biscuit, we headed for the library. I got some work done while Raisin took a nap outside (Just for the record, she hates libraries for the simple reason that she must wait outside.). From there, we hit the grocery store, The French Grocer, and while choosing cans of beans and bars of Snickers, our fates would become intertwined with the Hill of the Goat.

.

A man named Daniel Eaton noticed I was traveling (with a huge backpack, it's hard not to.). He was nice enough and recommended I check out a hostel a few blocks away, even offered to drive me. He told me its name fast, then repeated it slowly: "La Loma. Del Chivo." I declined the drive but made it out there anyway.

.

This is what I saw:

. . .

. . .

. . .

The fairyland quality of this place is the first thing that hits you. I could see the bright colors from several blocks away. We didn't find anyone at first, and because I'd had a short conversation with Ali on the phone, Raisin and I made ourselves comfortable in the above abode.

.

There's a lot of construction going on. I have taken a couple of shots of places that are pretty much done, but many more cool buildings are on the way.

.

The owner and manager do not call it a commune, but as far as definitions go, it basically is. Three people live and work there, 20 hours a week, in exchange for a monthly stipend and all rent and utilities paid. Their job ranges from welcoming clients, answering the phone, working in a garden, managing building projects, and general clean-up.

. . .

. . .

The above building is a bathroom. Just an FYI. If you want to put on a princess dress before entering, that's up to you.
. . .

. . .

This is Mike. Give him a good look over. He's probably the smiliest, laughiest person of the three, and for good reason: he lost much of what he had spent his life earning in the economic crunch and has made a home here at La Loma. He has three dogs, his own place, and contributes by doing lots of stone and building projects.
. . .
. . .
This is Ali. She greeted me on the phone and made me feel at home before I even got there. She's not actually sitting in La Loma in the picture (she's in another wonderful place in town, a B&B called Eve's Garden), but she is an animal lover. (Her dog Piper runs all over La Loma and played a sort of Big Brother-Big Sister role for Raisin.) Ali is a total sweetheart and loves the quiet of West Texas, a stark contrast from her native Houston. She's figuring life out from the safety and security of a small town, and even invited her best friend Brian from Houston to experience some of the same.
. . .
. . .
This is Jerot. I'm not even sure I'm spelling his name right, but I know it ends in a 't.' He too is figuring out what comes next in life, but for the moment, he's doing great. His dad and brother came out to visit him and after his dad left, Jerot was charged with taking care of Logan. Logan turned 16 while he was there and thoroughly enjoyed his visit.
. . .

. . .

This is Billy, La Loma's new mascot. It makes sense, obviously, to have a goat, but it makes even better financial sense. I think it's a ride-off.

.

I had a great week and already miss it. I shall return, hopefully to some of the same faces, in the future.
.

Until next time...

. . .