Beep beep!

Finally, a roadrunner!! Seminole Canyon State Park advertised roadrunners in their park, in fact, they even used the roadrunner as their logo on publications. We didn't see any there but this morning, in the Marathon RV park, there were two of them running down the road.

Frederick was outside getting ready to move when he saw them and came and told me. He took the camera and was able to "capture" one of them - see it on the far left? Someone told us that they actually make a sound something like "beep beep". Later, as we were driving to Big Bend we saw another one along side the road.

From Marathon we drove directly south, 40 miles to the north entrance of Big Bend National Park.

Along the way there was the now-familiar Border Patrol check-point. This time they were only checking vehicles traveling north. Since we were driving south we got a free pass.

We thought these hills were interesting. Looks like someone cut the ends off with a knife.

This is Santiago Peak, 6,552 feet high. It dominated the western horizon on our trip down to the park entrance.

Arriving at Persimmon Gap Visitor Center, the north entrance.

We went into the Visitor Center where David helped us plan some hiking for the next week. We also watched an orientation video about the park which really helped to get us excited about experiencing what Big Bend has to offer.

As we drove the 30 miles south to Panther Junction, just about in the center of the Park and where we turned west, the Chisos Mountains began to fill more and more of our front windshield. 

And there were hills, some with top-knots, to the west.

We stopped at the Fossil Bone Picnic Area for lunch.

There was an exhibit about the fossils that have been found in the Park. Once again we were told that where there is now desert, there once were swamps and meandering rivers, like the landscape in the above mural. That was Big Bend fifty million years ago during the Eocene epoch, the dawn of the Age of Mammals. 

We read that the painting is not guesswork; the prehistoric environment can be deduced from the fossil evidence. Many of the fossil jawbones and teeth discovered here could only have been used for chewing the large, pulpy leaves of swamp plants. We were then invited to take a walk along a path where we could view where the fossil were found.

The gray shales beside this path were once the mud of Eocene stream beds where bones sank and sediments accumulated. Here and in nearby outcrops, paleontologists have discovered the fossil remains of 29 species of forest-dwelling mammals. All are long extinct. 

The Chisos Mountains from the picnic area.

We made it to Terlingua and the Big Bend Resort & Adventures RV Park where we will be staying for the next week. We are about 30 miles from the center of the Park, close enough to take advantage of all there is to see and do.

After unhitching we set off on a walk into the mountains behind the RV park. We are about two and a half miles from the park boundary.

Nice scenery to view on our walk.