The RV Sabbatical Journal

January 30, 2008 — Fort Davis to Deming

A series of storms that attacked Southern California over the past few days created high-wind conditions at Fort Davis and all around West Texas and the southern part of New Mexico. As far as I was concerned, it was another in a long string of bad things that have been coming out of California lately. We’d seen what we wanted to see here in the Davis Mountains and were anxious to get going. However, I also didn’t want to drive in winds gusting to 60mph — not with this big ol’ slab-sided bus. So we watched the weather, extended our stay by a day, and watched the weather some more. By carefully analyzing the governments best forecasts and applying a little common sense (very little), I thought I saw an opening… a small window of opportunity between two systems. If we decided to go, it’d mean getting up early and hitting the road right after sunrise in order to do an end-run around the big winds.

We have a very democratic system for making decisions like this… I have a vote, and Dar has a vote. In the event of a tie, the Safety Director breaks the tie. Dar is the Safety Director. It’s a good system that’s gotten us this far without major incident. And the decision was made to attemp this end-around and get the heck out of Texas. I mean, Texas is a wonderful state, but 50-some days is plenty. At least in my mind, I didn’t start this lifestyle just to move to Texas. We’ll certainly be back, but it’s time for new adventures some place else. Besides, we’ve got an appointment in late March up in Vancouver, WA., and we’ve got to get ourselves a little closer.

So we got up early, fired up the big ol’ Cummins motor at the crack of 8am, and headed out from Fort Davis. Our route took us south to a litle community called Marfa, and then westward on US Hwy 90. Since we anticipated higher winds later in the day, Dar drove the first 100+ miles, which was clear and calm… a great drive. Soon after I took over, things slowly deteriorated. We stopped just north of El Paso for fuel (3.11/gallon) and we began to see clouds of dust and blowing sand off in the distance. There was no place to stop right there, so we decided to press on. Various RV Parks were along the way if we needed them, but we also were just 80 miles from our destination — Deming, NM.

Coming out of El Paso, I-10 heads north for a few miles before it turns almost due west. The wind was coming out of the west, hard. During the northerly part of the drive, that wind pushed the bus sideways and we had a lean or list toward the right. I’ve always heard that the way people get into trouble is by not recognizing the signs that point to trouble and knowing when to say “enough is enough”. But we kept seeing other campers and semi-trucks even though they all had the same lean to the right.

I slowed to 50mph when we made the bend toward the west. At this point, we only had about 50 miles to go and the wind was now a direct head-wind. But we pressed on. Now that the wind was directly in front of us, the bus’s lean had eased, but the sound of air howling over the roof and sides, past the windows, and around the air conditioners and other gear on the roof was defening. We were moving at about 50mph, but the wind, we later learned, was gusting between 40 and 50mph. Add the two together and we had air rushing over and around us at maybe as high as 90mph.

The wind was only one aspect of that pleasant little drive to Deming. Remember, we’re going through the desert. Deserts are made up of sand and dust, and a few cacti and other plants. When the wind blows at 30mph or more, it often picks up bits of the sand and dust and carries it along in huge clouds — what’s called a dust storm. In the worst of these, visibility goes to zero — you can’t see at all; similar to being in a “white-out” during a blizzard in the Midwest. It wasn’t nearly that bad on this day, but we did drive through dust and dirt for much of the way, although the visibility never got below a mile or so. So we pressed on.

Finally we were there — Deming, NM. We found our park, not more than a few blocks from I-10. There was a collective sigh as we put the jacks down and hunkered down for the rest of the night. A jigger or two of medicinal bourbon helped calm the nerves and keep us warm during that blustery night.

T

January 27, 2008 — Fort Davis, TX

I’ve always been fascinated by space and all the incomprehensible things about the universe in which we live. As I was going through my K-12 years in the late 50’s and the 60’s, the US Space Program was going all out to get a man on the moon before 1970. It was an amazing time in which most of the country was united behind this common goal and there was a “can-do” feeling that transcended the Space Program. There was a sense that we could do anything… that anything was possible. This was all very exciting for a kid, whose young mind was also influenced by TV shows like Star Trek or Lost in Space that added visual substance to a kid’s dreams of space exploration and the wonders of what’s out there.

We did reach the moon in 1969 and achieved the nation’s goal. For a short time during the next few years going to the moon became almost routine. We launched 6 missions that successfully landed on the moon — the last one in December of 1972. Think about this… if you’re under the age of 35 you’ve never witnessed a trip to the moon by astronauts. Considering that the median age in the USA is about 36, that’s almost half the country’s population. What’s become of our dreams and that sense of wonder about the universe?

At places like the McDonald Observatory near Fort Davis, TX. those dreams remain alive. It’s a place where the glowing embers of knowledge about the cosmos are tested and grow.

McDonald came to life after a posthumous donation to the University of Texas at Austin of a considerable amount of money from someone named McDonald in the 50’s. At the time, UTA didn’t even have an astronomy program. So, in conjunction with the University of Chicago, the first telescope was built on Mt. Locke and the place became known as the McDonald Observatory. That 82″ telescope was, at the time, the second largest telescope in the world. It’s still in use today.

The selection of Mt. Locke as the location for the observatory was made for a number of reasons. First, it’s remote and far from the lights of metropolitan areas. Dar and I can attest to the remoteness of West Texas. Second, it’s on a mountain top and higher than almost a third of the earth’s atmosphere. This means less air, haze, and pollution to view through to get a clear image. And thirdly, the area has good weather with almost 250 crystal clear nights each year on average.

During our visit we got into the dome and onto the floor with the second telescope built here at McDonald — the 107″ Harlan J. Smith telescope, finished in 1968. It’s a huge instrument and we had the opportunity to play with it some… moving it around, turning the dome structure, and opening the big door in the dome from which the telescope looks into space.

There’s a staff of about 70 people that are employed full-time to keep the facility operating. They’re the people that keep the equipment operating, the grounds and buildings in good shape, the visitor center open, and the tours staffed. They live in a village on the side off the hill and one off the “perks” of the job is the great view from up there at 6,800 feet.

I found it interesting that they have their own light pollution police. That’s right, someone who goes out and talks to some of those independent-minded West Texans who have bright outdoor lighting that can reduce the darkness needed for good space observation. It wasn’t clear how exactly how they enforce the darkness, but I got the feeling it’s more education and money rather than tickets and prison. Money — now that’s something a true West Texan can understand.

In 1997, they dedicated their third big telescope — the 433″ Hobby-Eberly telescope. Unique in design and limited in function, it’s one of the biggest 3 or 4 telescopes in the world today. Instead of one big mirror like other telescopes, this one is made up of 91 smaller individually controlled mirrors that work in unison to provide the best focus. It’s mission is primarily spectroscopy — the observation and measurement of light at different wave-lengths to learn more about what makes up these distant stellar bodies.

One of the programs we attended was the evening Star Party. Only held three nights per week, the staff breaks out 5 or 6 smaller telescopes to allow participants the opportunity to see and understand various stars, planets, and nebula (huge stellar gas clouds that glow). It had been a little cloudy earlier in the day but the sky cleared up right on time for the party.

We spent almost 8 hours at the Observatory that day and neither of us felt it was anything but a great experience.

T

January 26, 2008 — Leaving Marathon, TX

With the exception of El Paso, there are 8 large counties that make up the part of Texas that’s often referred to as West Texas. If you look at a map it’s that big point that sticks out to the west from the rest of the State. As we trek westward through this part of the country the thing that really gets my attention is the complete lack of people, or just about anything else for that matter.

Coming from the suburbs of a large metropolitan city, I’m used to living with thousands of people following me around and trying to get a parking place closer to the store. I learned to tolerate standing in lines and getting pushed and shoved while trying to buy a Christmas gift for my sweetie. At the intersection near my home I always had to wait for traffic before I could squeeze out onto the main road. And then there are all the rules and regulations that you must follow… building codes, zoning regulations, no left turn here, no parking there, do not enter over there, library book due in two weeks.

Well folks, this is West Texas, and in West Texas we pretty much do whatever we want to do. There’s little need for rules as there’s no one around who cares anyway. The little community of Marathon (pop. 455) is a case in point. Want to raise goats in your backyard in town? No problem! Don’t feel like throwing anything in the trash for the past 20 years? Just fine! Grown attached to the 50’s era house-trailer that you’re Grandma used to live in until she died in 1968? Just park it in your side yard — out by the chickens– and let it sag, rust, and deteriorate at it’s own pace. Grandma would have wanted it that way.

U-turn on the main street through town? OK. Park on the wrong side of the road? Great. Want to drive fast? The speed limits are set so high there’s no need for enforcement. 75mph on a two lane road is not uncommon. And I haven’t seen a traffic cop since we’ve been in West Texas anyway.

You see, this is West Texas. There’s so much space and so few people that there’s no need for all that rules, regulation, and enforcement stuff.

These 8 counties have an area of about 35,000 square miles — an area about half the size of Wisconsin. The population of these 8 counties is 55,000 people. Doing the math, that gives us a population density of less than 2 people per square mile. How does that compare with other places?

The average state in the USA is about 80 people per square mile. Wyoming comes in at 5.1/sq. mile. Montana at 6.2; both of the Dakotas at about 9.3; Wisconsin at 100/sq. mile; Chicago metro is a mind-boggling 27,000 per square mile. Only Alaska, at about 1.1/sq. mile, has a lower density than this part of Texas.

However, despite the lack of people, I’m sorry to report that it won’t be this way for long. The monied-artsy-fartsy set has found West Texas. Yes, it’s true. Real estate prices are surprisingly high and on the rise. Every little town has at least one art gallery. There are people who think they’re writers, sculptors, and painters, mostly from California, moving in and bringing their inflated home equities and sense of self-worth with them. There are quaint B&B’s, little coffee shops and bakeries popping up here and there. These may well be the seeds of this area’s destruction. It looks like the beginning of the end.

My advice? Get out here and see this before it’s gone.

Well, that’s today’s report from West Texas. I’ve suddenly got a hankerin’ for a Starbucks. Now if I can just find one.

T

January 25, 2007 — Marathon, TX

Hi everyone. I’m back at the PC and pecking away to catch up on the Sabbatical Blog. I’m learning to not like these big breaks in the blog… it’s been something like 5 days since my last post. It’s far easier to do 5 small daily post than to organize and write one that tries to span 5 days. But the past few days I’ve had little time to write and I’ll just get you all caught up with our goings-on.

This past Monday morning, after talking with some people at breakfast here at Marathon Motel and RV Park, we made the command decision to leave the camper here, right where it sits in Marathon, and “commute” down into the park for our visits. We had planned to move the camper down to the park but we heard places to camp are limited in the park and a couple other nearby options aren’t ideal for a number of reasons. So Marathon became our base of operations for the week.

Big Bend National Park, about 40 miles south from here, is a big park at 1,252 square miles. This makes it just a little bigger than Yosemite in California but less than half the size of Yellowstone. It stretches about 50 miles from north to south and about the same from east to west. At the center of the park is a ring of mountains, the Chisos Mountains, that peak at over 7,000 feet. In the center of that ring is a basin with a floor that’s at 5,400 feet. Most of these peaks are volcanic in origin and quite dramatic, with many high vertical faces.

Along the southern border of the park is the Rio Grande River. Once a might river with the power to cut through a thousand vertical feet of solid rock, it’s now a mere shell of it’s former self. According to some sources, it’s considered an over-appropriated river — which means there are more users for the water (irrigation, industrial, and drinking water) than there is water in the river. A Ranger told us it’s now carries only one-sixth or less the water it once did. This is not hyperbole… I’ve seen my little ol’ home-town Beaver Dam River carry more water than I observed flowing down the Rio Grande this past week. It was probably illegal, but I personally threw a good sized stone from the bank on the USA side and cleared the water by 20 feet or more. The Rio Grande is not very grand anymore.

In the spaces between all the mountain peaks and the river is desert. Miles and miles of desert containing all sorts of wildlife… javalinas, deer, coyotes, bobcats, all of which we actually saw. There are also active communities of black bear and mountain lion which we didn’t see. (Park poster advice: “If confronted by a Mountain Lion, act aggressive, wave your arms, yell… but do not run.” — got that?). The desert is also full of an abundance of plant life… grasses and cacti of all sorts.

Coming from the Midwest and having visited some of the great National Parks in the North, the one thing I missed at first was trees. There aren’t any — except on the sides of a few of the mountain peaks scattered throughout the Park. But I grew to like the open-ness of the Park and the ability to see for 20, 30, even 40 miles in every direction. The desert has a beauty of it’s own. It’s always changing.

We spent a day at Stillwell Ranch and the Rio Grande Village area, another day in the Chisos Mountain basin, and the third day on a long scenic drive to the Santa Elena Canyon, where we hiked a half-mile or so into the canyon where the nearly vertical walls are 1,500 feet high — and we were the only ones there at the time. I want to do an additional post or two, a little more in-depth than this one, on a couple experiences we had at the park. They’ll have to wait for another day however.

Besides our Park visits, we had to deal with some weather this week, not to mention a cold virus that both of us caught. But the rain eventually subsided and we’re on the road to full recovery from that bug.

Tomorrow, Saturday, we’re moving a little northwest to the Fort Davis area of Texas, a distance of about 60 miles. The McDonald Observatory is nearby and if we get settled early enough we plan to attend a “star party” they have every Saturday night. If I don’t post something tomorrow, I will Sunday for sure.

More later.

T