There are Days…And There are Days...

We left Terlingua this morning about 10 am, local. No sense in getting an early start, right? After 5 nights in desert conditions, we were ready for something different. Driving east through part of Big Bend National Park and north on 385 took us to the "town" of Marathon, TX, population 425 or so, and the highest gas prices in four counties. Turning east on Hwy 90 got us to Del Rio, Texas, 270 miles later.

We're overnighting in Broke Mill RV Park, just north of Del Rio. This is a great park, with spacious sites, great wifi, excellent water pressure, and a great gentleman in the office who is the owner. I encourage you to google the park and read the section on their website about the history of the park…it's very "Texas". The owners family also runs cattle in the Hill Country and have a freezer full of grass fed beef for sale in the office for very, very reasonable prices. We enjoyed grass fed hamburgers this evening for dinner and they were delicious!

Site 14 is where we're located tonight.

The park is located near the Rio Grande river, which is somewhere over the bushes in the photo.














I should start the days chronicle by saying that while we were anticipating new vistas today, we were unprepared for West Texas.

The gravel frontage road on the left is for the use of the Border Patrol, which has a huge presence in this area.

We pulled off the road for lunch in front of a stone quarry. Thousands of pallets of stone were waiting to be delivered, and a truck was being loaded with large 6x6 foot slabs as we watched.

Just north of Del Rio lies Lake Amistad. A huge lake covering almost 65,000 acres, it is formed by a dam on the Rio Grande. Devils River also flows into the lake, which is managed by a joint commission of the United States and Mexico. Amistad means "friendship" in Spanish.

Oh, the part about "And there are days…."?

Just north of Bib Bend Park, on an exceedingly narrow section of road, we met a semi-truck going in the opposite direction at a high rate of speed. Unfortunately the buffeting of the wind as the truck passed tossed us about like a rag doll. A heavy doll, but a doll nevertheless, and the shock put the tow car into a terrible side to side movement, with the front wheels turning from lock to lock. After slowing the motorhome to almost a stop, the shaking stopped, and we continued on to the nearest turnout to check for damage.

The shaking had thrown one of the bicycles that we had mounted on the back of the tow car completely off the rack, and we dragged it down the road for a mile of so. Not a pretty picture.

If there is an upside, the only damage seems to be to the rear wheel, rack, tire, and tube. Something else to fix at our earliest opportunity. Like we need that! Hoping for a better day tomorrow, for sure.