Hiking the Madera Canyon Trail

We were off today and the weather was great so we headed out to  Fort Davis to do a short hike. Madera Canyon Trail is part of the Nature Conservancy’s Davis Mountain Preserve. When we arrived it was clear skies and 68 degrees.

Trail Head…about 2.4 miles round trip.

Very green and scenic.

Madera creek had lots of water in it.

Wildflowers were still blooming

Butterflies were numerous

Grass covered parts of the trail and plenty of color too!!

We arrived at Chico tank which was covered in deep pink flowers with bees buzzing everywhere.

Closeup of the flowers with a bonus butterfly

Nice reflection in the water

More flowers below the spillway of the tank with water flowing beneath them

Some skippers taking a sun bath in the mud.

A huge grasshopper with a very colorful coat.

Butterflies were posing for photos in every direction

Another one…

There are called Apache Plumes

Great weather, and lots of photo subjects made for a wonderful day.

Big Bend Visit part 3

We really had a great day with the rain and cool temps. Enjoy some more photos of our day in the Big Bend National Park.

Great views to the South on our hike.

Heading to the Basin

Winding road

Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive

High Desert Country

Rain makes it green

Another Black-Throated Sparrow

I’m looking forward to going back asap. The summer rains has made everything green.

Big Bend Visit part 2

I took about 300+ photos on our visit yesterday so it’s taken a while to go through them. Here is a few more I wanted to share.

A view from our hike

It’s amazing where and how plants grow out here.

See what I mean…This looks to be solid rock, I suppose there is some soil in there somewhere.

Great views from our hike. This is Santa Elena Canyon

Same place, just zoomed in

Storm approaching

View from Sotol Vista overlook

View of the storm in the Basin from Sotol Vista Overlook

Empty Flower cups

More to come….

Big Bend National Park Visit

We planned on a few hikes down at the park today despite the threat of rain.

Low clouds were still over the tops of the mountains when we arrived this morning.

Beautiful scenery

We hiked around to a dry wash and down to the spring

Interesting rock walls

Santa Elena Canyon seen in the distance

Small pour-off from the dry wash

This area will hold water when it rains and fall down to the spring

A small cave on one side

Mule deer

As we were coming back I noticed some clouds towards the basin area.

Looked like it was raining just east of us

We finally got back to the trail head and wanted to check out the rain clouds

Stopped by Sotol Vista overlook and it was booming thunder and lightning at the basin

The Basin was getting hammered with rain

This is part of the old Homer Wilson Blue Creek Ranch. It was here long before the National Park was established.

Saw this swallowtail as we were leaving to go to the basin

A few miles down the road and lots of water was flowing across

This dry wash is no longer dry

Black-Throated Sparrow

We later found out the basin had received 1 inch rain in less than an hour. Water was flowing down the side of the mountains.

Texas Madrone Tree. These are odd looking trees

Another waterfall

And one more…

Not a lot of hiking but a great day, cool rain made it enjoyable. We headed back and run into more rain on the way to Marathon. Once we arrived back it had rained there as well.

Hiking in the Big Bend

I have been itching to go hiking for several weeks now. Went to bed last night with rain and woke up with more this morning. It started to move out around noon, so I grabbed my gear and was out the door at 12:50pm. Nice and cool…Temp-68

Arrived at Dog Canyon at 1:40…Temp-77

I’m headed to the canyon between the two peaks above

Trail is muddy from all the rain

I read where these rocks fell off sometime in the 1980’s

The trail leads you down a dry wash to the canyon, but because of all the rain I had to go up out of the canyon.

Going left

I think this is a Scott’s Oriole

Looking back to the trail head where I started.

The canyon walls are beautiful

Getting close

The closer I get, the better the view!!

There it is…I could have stayed up here for hours. The wind was howling through the canyon. So peaceful…just me, the wind and this view.

This is one side of the canyon wall

Another little hole in the wall

I’m hooked on the Big Bend. I can’t wait to go on another hike. Such a beautiful unspoiled wide open area.