The more we see of the wonders of this world the more we wonder. When we see a place through the stories, pictures and songs of others we gain their perspective. And when we see a place for ourselves it allows us to create our own experience. Anais Nin said, “We don’t see things as they are; we see them as we are.” The more we see the more we come to understand not only about our world but also about ourselves and how we are a part of it all.
As we traveled west along the I-10 corridor from Destin, Florida to Benson, Arizona there was much to see and much to wonder, and so much to learn. As we shared in our last post, at Henderson Beach in Destin we marveled at the beautiful green waters and squeaky white sands of the Emerald Coast.
In Waveland, Mississippi we were stunned by the impact of Hurricane Katrina that is still visible 16 years after it made landfall here. The few buildings near the coast are new and built up high on pillars. There are many older driveways that lead to empty lots. Visiting the Ground Zero museum we learned about the effect the storm had on the people of the area. A quarter of the population left and didn’t return. At Buccaneer State Park where we stayed Katrina brought ashore a 30′ storm surge that took out all the buildings and 8000 trees. As we camped along the bayou we also learned about the resilient beauty of nature. Despite all the trees that were lost it was still quite woodsy.
We did a one night Harvest Hosts stay at Bayou Tech Brewing in Arnaudville, Louisiana where we had a delightful evening at the brewery enjoying delicious food and beverages. Driving through the Louisiana countryside we saw farmers harvesting a crop we were not familiar with. It turns out it was sugar cane and we learned they burn the field before they harvest the cane.
Next up was Texas where we stayed at a couple Thousand Trails Encore parks in the Houston area, Lake Conroe to the north of the city and then 5 nights in a pecan grove at Colorado River to the west. Spending a little extra time there gave us a chance to regroup, fix a leaky tire and have mail delivered to us. To clarify, this is the Colorado River that flows through Texas, not the one in the Grand Canyon.
Continuing west through Texas we had a couple one-night stays at Stone Creek RV Park near San Antonio and then Fort Stockton Resort and RV Park. Fort Stockton provided a taste of West Texas history and it set us up for our next adventure, a drive down into the Big Bend which is far enough off I-10 to be too far for a day trip.
The next day it was an amazing drive through very open country down to Lajitas, Texas which is on the Mexican border and sits between Big Bend National Park and Big Bend Ranch State Park. The Big Bend region has the darkest night sky in the contiguous United States and the view of the stars from Maverick Ranch Resort was incredible.
We spent the first full day exploring Big Bend National Park taking in the massive expanse of beauty. It was eye-opening to us to see the Rio Grande as a little river wandering through the wilderness and not just a line of division on a map. We were also in wonder at the variety of mountains within the park. We learned that some were once at the bottom of the sea and were lifted up by the folding of the earth’s crust, others were formed by lava from volcanic eruptions and the white rocks were the ash from those volcanoes. The next day we hiked the state park which has a couple trails, Hoodoos and Closed Canyon, that allow dogs. Hiking the slot canyon was definitely a unique experience for us and Scout loved clambering over the rocks.
On the evening of our third and final night in Lajitas someone mentioned that the temperature would be down to 19° in a couple days. That’s when we learned of a winter storm headed south. We stuck with our plan the next day and returned to I-10 for a one-night stay in Van Horn, Texas. From there we had wanted to move up to the Las Cruces area in New Mexico to catch a couple more national parks but we needed to push further west. By daybreak the next morning we were on our way. In El Paso they were already salting the roads. We traveled 400 miles that day taking on mountain passes, dusty desert plains and a surprisingly tough tumbling tumbleweed before finally arriving in Benson, Arizona where we stayed at Valley Vista, a very nice Thousand Trails Encore park. When we pulled into the RV park a gentleman welcomed us and then proceeded to extricate the tumbleweed from our grill.
It was cool in Benson but we avoided the snow and ice. Now we are spending a month or so bouncing around Arizona and we will cover that chapter of our adventures in our next post.
So what is it that starts with see and has a why in it? It is CURIOSITY. Curiosity is what sparks our desire to see old places from new perspectives and to seek out new places we have never seen before. Curiosity opens our hearts and minds to marvel at the world’s wonders and see the why within the wonder.
the Why in the Road 