Episode: 3870
Title: HPR3870: Texas
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr3870/hpr3870.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-25 06:58:12

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 3,870 for Friday 2 June 2023.
Today's show is entitled, Texas.
It is part of the series Travel.
It is hosted by Ahu Kahn and is about 13 minutes long.
It carries a clean flag.
The summary is.
We wrap up our trip in Texas before heading back home to Michigan.
Hello.
This is Ahu Kahn for Hacker Public Radio.
Welcome you to another exciting episode in our RV Travels series.
And we are in Texas and approaching the end of our trip.
So Wednesday, March 16th, and we are in Presidio, Texas.
We got our day passes for the Big Bend Ranch State Park and headed for the closed canyon
trail.
Now this is what is called a slot canyon.
And what that basically means is you've got a high ridge of mountains and just this little
slot cut out of the middle and is usually caused by water erosion or something like that.
And there's photos if you want to see what this one looks like.
If you just go to the show notes, there's always links to all of the photos there.
I have them all on Flickr and it's a publicly accessible account.
So we got our day passes, remember it was $5 per person per day, so we gave the state
of Texas $10 for the privilege.
Got to the slot canyon.
Now it was not the longest hike we've ever done, but it was a pretty physical one.
And the reason is that once you get into it, you're going down the series of rock faces.
And then you know, when you go out, you've got to go up those same rock faces.
And you know, it's a physical thing and I'm 71 years old, so you know, you got to be
careful about stuff like that.
We reached one towards the end.
We didn't go all the way to the very end.
We got one towards the end that looked like about five feet of smooth rock.
Now I could easily see getting down.
Getting back is the part that looked kind of chancy to me.
Given the difficulty of the ones that we did go up as we returned, it was the right decision.
You know, it wasn't easy going up those things.
Well, then it was off to the store.
The RV park we were staying at is having a St. Patrick's Day potluck tomorrow.
We need to buy some fruit for a fruit bowl.
When we got back, the temperature kept rising and we had to turn on the air conditioning.
You know, that's such a nice thing to have happen in March.
Wouldn't be doing that in Michigan.
And so the next day, Thursday, March 17th, yeah, the park had the potluck brunch.
We made the fruit salad.
We joined everyone and after having as much to eat as we cared to have, we just went back
to the RV and had a day off.
Friday, March 18th, we had another trail to check out in Big Bend Ranch State Park.
This one is the Houdu Trail.
This took us down to the river side and then back up again.
The Okateos in particular were starting to bloom there.
Well, you know, it's spring in that area.
After hiking that trail, we stopped on the way back at a side road that looked interesting
and did a little more hiking.
We found some very interesting rocks where wind erosion had carved out holes and there
was an abandoned Adobe hut there.
Again, photos.
You can link two off of the website.
And finally, we had enough and came back to our RV.
Saturday, March 19th was our last day at Loma Paloma.
We did laundry, some chores, then went to our last Loma Paloma happy hour at the lizard
lounge.
That's what they call it.
It was basically just a little outdoor canopy with chairs and picnic tables set up under
it.
We had an unexpected guest at this, a dust devil.
It was another hot day and we tried to put on air conditioning and when we did, we lost
power altogether.
It turns out the breaker died on us.
This is the breaker at the pedestal outside.
So we contacted the park host couple and they came down and fixed it.
In the course of diagnosing all of this, they pointed out to us another stupid beginner
mistake that we've been saying all along everything we had was 30 amp and the guy said, no, it
says 50 amp right there.
You have 50 amp capability.
So that's one of those things we're going to have to figure out before our next trip.
Now, Sunday, March 20th, travel day.
We went to the Lost Alaskan RV Park in Alpine, Texas, which gets us a little closer to the
Big Ben National Park.
It will still be a drive, but less than it would have been from Loma Paloma and easier.
Now, part of the problem, we could have tried to do it from Loma Paloma, but it's a lot
of twisty, turny up and down mountain roads and as I've already said, we're not really
happy with doing a whole lot of that.
So the drive from Alpine is a lot flatter and straightforward.
So we're going to be at Lost Alaskan for five nights.
Let's say somewhat more upscale park and therefore across this more, but it's our last
real stay before we head back to Michigan.
So Monday, March 21st, another taking care of business day.
The RV repair place came by and installed a new domestic toilet and a shut off valve
which solved our toilet problem, which it wasn't that bad actually.
I mentioned previously, in our last episode, we kept the water supply line and just had
to use gallon jugs with water and manually fill the toilet.
We probably could have lived with it that way all the way back to Michigan, but the folks
at the RV repair place were friendly and made it easy for us, so no regrets.
Once that was done, we did our shopping and went back to the RV to stay.
Tuesday, March 22nd, we went to the RV repair place so we could pay the bill.
People are very friendly and trusting around here.
So they just came and did it and figured, you know, we would get around to pay them and
we did.
We wanted to do it right away and I always like to take care of things as soon as possible.
While there, we got some information about the Big Bend National Park, but you know,
running around doing errands, it was starting to get later in the day and it was a cold and
windy day and so we decided that we looked at the weather forecast and it looked like
tomorrow is going to be a nicer day.
So instead of trying to head to the National Park, we decided to go to the Museum of the
Big Bend, which is in Alpine.
And we had a very nice few hours there, it's a little museum but well arranged.
The exhibits are chronological around the outside of the room and you start with the dinosaurs.
Fossils have been dug in this area, including one of a terrace or called Quetzal Coatless,
one of the largest flying animals of all time.
When it moves to the native tribes, the early Spanish, the Americans, the Texas Revolution,
and the Indian Wars of the late 19th century, it finally ends up with Hollywood, which
used this area for filming, such as the movie Giant, which starred Elizabeth Taylor,
Rock Hudson and James Dean in his final role.
Wednesday, March 23rd.
Our final expersion of this trip, we drove down from Alpine to the Big Bend National Park.
We drove along the Ross Maxwell scenic drive, stopped along the way to see the abandoned
Samnail Ranch, and then at the end went to the Santa Elena Canyon.
There's a hiking trail here.
But to get on it, you first have to climb up the side of the mountain.
Now, it's not too bad because they've built concrete steps and ramps to get you up,
but you still have to be careful since there are no guardrails for much of the climb.
Once on top, you walk into the canyon and gradually work your way down to the river.
Which river?
The Rio Grande, of course.
You could literally do an illegal entry into Mexico just by waiting here, though what
you would do when you got there I couldn't imagine since there is no trail on the Mexican
side.
The canyon was carved out by the river, and no doubt it started with some kind of crack
in the mountain, like all slot canyons.
One thing that struck us all along, the Rio Grande is that for all the talk about invasions
and walls, the border looks like it is undefended.
Now, there are border patrol checkpoints along all of the major roads going north from
the border, so there is some enforcement activity.
Anyway, there was a long day with a lot of driving, so we were pretty tired when we got
back to the RV after all of that.
Thursday, March 24th.
After the long day yesterday at the National Park and knowing we had a five day truck back
to Michigan that was going to start tomorrow, that does take a day off.
Do some grocery shopping, filling the tank on the truck with the main activities.
Friday, March 25th.
We left Alpine in the morning and headed to Tai, Texas, which is just outside of Abilene.
The trip took seven hours towing the RV, which is a long, entire trip.
We should probably look to reduce the daily driving next time, but for now we have reservations
and plans.
The daily trips weren't so long on our way out in December, so I hope it will get shorter
from here.
This is just an overnight stop we are off again in the morning.
Saturday, March 26th.
From Tai, we went to the Oak Glen RV Park in Oklahoma.
This is the same park we stayed at on our trip out in December, and from here we are simply
retracing our steps and staying at the same places.
On day, March 27th, we left Oklahoma and headed for the Lamplight Lane RV Park.
This time it did not go as well.
The owner was not there, but he had someone working there.
We could not use the credit card machine, but fortunately we had enough cash to pay for
our overnight stay, which is like 30 bucks.
It's not a huge amount, but you know, and it was a very tight space, so we pretty much
crossed this off as a place that we would ever return to.
Monday, March 28th.
This time we got into the Terra Hote RV Park in a reasonable afternoon time, and it was
a much better experience than when we froze here in December.
Finally, Tuesday, March 29th, back home in Michigan.
It felt really good to get back home.
We're always excited when we start a trip, and we're always happy to get home again
when it's over.
So this is a hukka for Hacker Public Radio signing off and encouraging everyone to support
free software.
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