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| Mural on the side of a building in downtown Alpine |
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| Sunsets are beautiful here! |
Here it is, the first week in June and we have been in
Alpine for 6 weeks now. Most of the
boxes are unpacked and we are starting to feel settled. But until last week, we really had not
spent that much time in Alpine. Between
trips on the weekends to visit my parents and a weeklong excursion to San Antonio
for annual doctors’ visits, we hadn’t spent more than 4 nights in a row
here. This week, we broke a record and
can now claim 8 nights in a row!
Until a few days ago when this crazy 100-plus degree heat
wave set in, it had been so pleasant in Alpine.
The days were in the high 80s and low 90s, but many days there were afternoon rains and the evenings were
wonderful. We would walk out our front
door every night around 8:00 and take a long sunset stroll. The temperatures would have dropped into the
low 70s by then and the wind was cool and light. Most nights we were able to turn off the A/C
and sleep with cool breezes and the sound of far-off thunder and train whistles
as we drifted into dreamland. A couple
of mornings I woke with the blanket over my head. I had gotten chilled during the night!
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| Large petroglyphs in Seminole Canyon at the Fate Bell Shelter |
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| Close up of one of the petroglyphs |
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| Some of the smaller petroglyphs |
On our way back from San Antonio a couple of weeks ago, we
stopped at Seminole Canyon State Park & Historic Site for a little camping
trip. (We drove Silver to San Antonio
because we had a few plumbing issues and wanted to have her checked out while
our doctors were checking us out. I am
happy to report that we are all fine now.)
Anyway, back to Seminole Canyon… I
remember visiting the petroglyphs in the canyon over 25 years ago, long before
this remote and rugged area became a state park. Now there is a great campground and guided
tours of some of the petroglyphs. Much
of the park has archaeological sites from ancient native cultures that lived in
the area. The geology is interesting too,
not to mention all the unique desert plants.
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| View of Seminole Canyon from the Fate Bell Shelter |
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| Shaman art overlooking the canyon |
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Exposed fossils in the Devil's River Limestone at Fate Bell Shelter
The long skinny shell is a Turritella, an ancient sea snail.
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Unfortunately, that weekend was the beginning of the
unseasonably hot weather we are now experiencing. The sky turned hazy and our views of
picturesque Seminole Canyon and views into Mexico were not very clear. We took a guided tour of some of the
petroglyphs with a wonderful guide from the Witte Museum in San Antonio. The
Witte will be offering more hikes to other petroglyphs later this fall and we plan
to return. We loved the park and will be
going back to hike more when it isn’t so hot.
At only a 3-hour drive from Alpine, that shouldn’t be hard to do.
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There are many art galleries in Alpine,
far out in West Texas...
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We’ve been taking little excursions around the city and
have managed to locate most things we need.
Alpine has 3 grocery stores, one of which specializes in organic
foods. There is a farmer’s market open
on Saturdays, a recycling center, a couple of hardware stores, many restaurants
and food trucks, a brewery, a movie theatre and a yoga studio located upstairs
in the old Granada theatre. Alpine also
has an airport, a hospital and an Amtrak station. Ride the train and come see us!
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| Amtrak station in downtown Alpine |
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| Lots of trains besides Amtrak come through this small town |
We have been trying to find the historic homes and
buildings in the area and learn more about Alpine’s history. Even though David and I grew up in West Texas
and took many trips to the Big Bend when we lived in Odessa, we never spent
much time in Alpine. So, we never knew
that Alpine used to be called ‘Murphyville.’
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The historic Holland Hotel
The rooms are furnished with antiques and historic photographs are on display.
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One morning we had breakfast downtown (about a seven-block
walk from our house) and afterward took a self-guided walking tour of
Alpine. We learned that Murphyville was
a campsite for cattlemen until railroad workers and their families created a
tiny town of tents in the 1880s. For
five years the little settlement grew into a dozen houses, three saloons, a
hotel and rooming house, a stable, a butcher shop and even a drugstore which
housed the post office. After such a
dazzling spurt of growth, the townsfolk petitioned to change the name of their
little community to Alpine. Growth was
very slow for Alpine until Sul Ross Normal College (now Sul Ross State
University) was opened in 1920. When Big
Bend National Park was opened in the 1940s there was another spurt of
growth. Today the town has a population of about 7,600 people. It is by far the smallest place David and I
have ever lived.
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I made this photo standing on our front porch after a crazy thunderstorm.
We've had some serious little storms and this one scared us a bit with all
the runoff so close to our house. That's a trash dumpster being swept away!
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We are trying to ride out this heat until July when we hope to take off for a bit in Silver. Today it only got to 92
and that was a relief. But I am afraid
the break in the heat is only going to last a few days. Most likely we won’t do a lot of exploring of West Texas in this heat,
but perhaps I will review the area food trucks.
We will take little day trips to Ft. Davis, Marfa and Marathon and it is
still fun to eat even if it is hot.
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Dad and mom with her Mother's Day roses.
She felt well enough to go to church.
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If all goes well with my parents we will head out to New Mexico and Colorado for
4 – 6 weeks in July. Yay! There will be some ‘on the road’ this
summer. We sure do miss our Maya, but in our hearts we will always be “On the Road with Maya…”
