The back roads started out pretty good, pavement gave way to broad, smooth gravel expanses. Our first heart stopping moment came with the cresting of a rise and trying to run over a small group of collard peccaries (wild pigs). A mule deer gave us another moment, and then we really got into back roads. It took us several hours to drive through the 35 mile back road of Pinto Canyon. It was wild and beautiful and there were birds. The driving though was slower than walking because a decision had to be made every inch of the way, turn left-miss that rock, turn right-miss that pothole. Learning to drive on the Menan Buttes in winter and spring was the best training I could have ever had for this road.
We came out back onto pavement at Ruidosa. From here we could see Mexico. We never did go into Mexico, but we sure saw a lot of its mountains to the South. We drove and drove along the Rio Grande, through desert and rock and over mountain. It was stunning and I wish I had more pictures. We stopped at an abandoned movie set (Controbando). Fort Leaton was interesting and had more birds and wonderful sun shades made of dried ocotillo. Ocotillo cactus looks like spiky rebar. At Terlingua ghost town we stopped at a diner for a late lunch. We still had miles to drive, but it was necessary. Terlingua is hot, dry, and dusty. When the wind kicked up the dust it was pretty miserable. The good and bad news at the diner was that the lady who owned it makes world class, blue ribbon winning pie, unfortunately she didn't have any available that day.
We made it into Big Bend national park and just drove on through. By now I was whining about never seeing a road runner. I really, REALLY wanted to see one. And then we turned a corner and I had to slam on the breaks again to prevent us from hitting one. Now that was an exciting way to see a bird. He was gorgeous and I am in love with the road runners.
We got back to Alpine, dusty, sunburned, allery ridden, and fell into bed.
Pictures of day 2: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jsemenza/sets/72157604142402353/
Birds of the day include:
- curve billed thrasher
- house sparrows
- brown headed cowbirds
- Eurasian collared doves
- common ravens
- white winged doves
- red tailed hawks
- northern harriers
- scaled quail
- cave swallows
- western meadowlark
- mourning doves
- eastern meadowlark
- loggerhead shrike
- American kestrel
- pronghorns (still not considered birds)
- vesper sparrows
- canyon towhees
- turkey vulture
- mule deer (not a bird)
- black throated sparrows
- pyrrholuxia
- roadrunners
- purple finches
- house finches
- yellow rumped warbler
- long billed dowitcher
- Mexican mallards
- northern shovelers
- green winged teal
- cinnamon teal
- great blue heron
- white crowned sparrows
- eared grebe
- cliff swallows
- say’s phoebe
- collared peccaries (truly not birds)
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