Mexico 2012 – un viaje mas grande – Day 2 (December 28, 2011) Marfa, TX to Marathon, TX

When the alarm went off at 6:45 this morning neither of us wanted to climb out of bed. It was toasty warm under the covers and the outside temperature had dropped to 29 overnight! (57 in the RV) We drove back to Marfa to find a WIFI hotspot and were able to post Day 1. Marfa is a pretty little town with lots of churches and some interesting looking historic buildings. Tobey read that it has become an active arts community. We may have to return this way another time!
Today we traveled from Marfa to Marathon – normally a 55 mile journey. We, however, took the scenic route to scout out Big Bend National Park. Our route was 231 miles in the RV, plus 18 on the scooter.

“Crowned with a sky so wide that it threatens to define infinity, the Big Bend region of Texas is situated roughly west of San Antonio, east of El Paso, and north of the mythic Rio Grande river. It remains one of the last true frontiers in the Lower 48, a landscape unique in the world.”  Taken from Road Trip: The Borderlands of Texas From National Geographic's Drives of a Lifetime Series.  http://travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/road-trips/borderlands-texas-road-trip/
We headed south from Marfa on Hwy. 67 to Presidio. We passed through Shafter which has many abandoned buildings and ruins from the Presidio Mining Company heyday in the 1880s. Once we turned onto Hwy. 170 we followed the Rio Grande along the U.S./ Mexico border. We noticed lots of border patrol trucks and went through several check points. This is definitely a desolate part of our country!

Near Terlingua, we passed by the quicksilver mining area. Most of the mines in this region went bankrupt in the 1940s when cheaper sources of mercury were found in Spain.

We continued on to Big Bend National Park. The park is over 800,000 acres. We opted for the quick tour on the main road through the park – not really a good exploration, but enough for us today. When we got to the Panther Visitor Center, we unhooked the scooter and drove up the Chisos Basin Trail. It was a curvy 6 mile road, but fun.

Views on the Chisos Basin trail in Big Bend.

We arrived at our campground, the Marathon Motel and RV Park, and plan to relax tonight. We are hooked up to water and looking forward to hot showers and dinner.