.. I spent two vacations in Big Bend in the early 80's. I spent a week each time, and in July and December so I caught two seasons..
You are correct in that getting there is FLAT and straight for the most part.... I am going to add this to my round the country tour I am planning, but I will come in from the west, trying like hell to stay off the Interstates.. do you think it'll be less flat coming from that direction?
I love the shot of the road up to the bowl... it just keeps going up and at stages it feels like you are on a level road but it is an optical illusion of the road and terrain.
I camped out in the bowl... had the lowest, most north, most eastern tent site in the campground... as I learned from the ranger the next day, rain inside the bowl is not a frequent event, and a thunderstorm inside the bowl is virtually unheard of... but when I was there, hooo-boy-howdy, did I win the lottery. As normal, from inside the bowl, clouds would come up from the south threatening to deluge, but the mountains would win and they would part and go around the western and eastern flanks. This time, a tendril managed to sneak into the bowl on the eastern flank, through the same gap in th ebowl that we infestations use. Standing around the campsite, waiting for the storm to go round, and not looking to the east, I was sucker punched by a wall of wind that nearly knocked me over. Turning to face this rude intruder, I was met with I can only describe as a roiling turmoil of very dark clouds, accompanied by very short and very loud and EEEEK, getting very close! I dashed into the tent for some silly reason, perhaps thinking there was some sort of protection to be afforded by having a few micros of cheap nylon tent between me and this WALL of mother natures best show. Within a few seconds of getting the tent zipped up it was hit by a blast that would have blow the tent over had I not been in it. I could see rain drops making temporary dents in the nylon... and the wind started to really gust.... I had to grab onto the inner frame of my cheapo cabin tent, to hold it up, and even then when it was all over, the entire fame was bent, and was no longer a rectangle but one of the titled rectangles... i was never great at math. Lightening was on TOP of me. Flashes that felt like giant flash bulbs that made you wince, but it was the simultaneous body punch of thunder that really brought home how deep the particular excrement, I was in, was! Then, it started to a hail. Those temporary dents in the tent were now turning into permanent puckers in the nylon! Of course the barrage or rain, lightening and thunder pegged the meter didn't abate. At some point I looked down. Ooo.. hard dry ground.. so hard, it took a very long time to POUND the tent stakes in , but in they went with the grace afforded the use a bigger hammer approach. All these thoughts raced through my head as I realized that my location at the low end of the campground and that hard ground meant that I was on the receiving end of a flood that was roaring directly under my tent.
So naturally, I want to go back.
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