The parks service is resurfacing the road up into the mountains, so they’re closing it for a few hours each morning and afternoon. I didn’t get to Terlingua until almost 2am and had to be up again at 7 to drive up into the Chisos Basin before the closure. But I’d brought cans of cold brew and had two on the long winding road up. There’s something energizing about that drive, windows down, rising up into mountain air. The base elevation is 5,400 feet, which isn’t Rocky Mountain National Park altitude, but definitely knocks a few degrees off of the Texas heat.
I decided to revisit Emory Peak on the way out to the rim because it only added about 4 miles and I still think it’s the most spectacular viewpoint in the park.
After the scramble back down and the 2 miles or so back to the junction, it was a long walk through Boot Canyon out to the rim, but so entirely worth it. On a clear day, I bet you could see Argentina.
The trail returns to the basin through the Laguna Meadows, which traverses another pass and didn’t feel at all meadow-ey but a nice reminder that Big Bend has just about every type of forest in just this one area.
When I got back to the car, I collapsed onto the bedroll in the back, barely able to move, but victorious. I decided I would do slightly better than prepackaged dinner and trunkbed for the evening, so I booked a room back in Alpine on points and got back on the road.
