The ride to Seminole was an easy one, simply take RT377 south and join up with RT90. Straight, hardly any traffic and just one change in the route.
Our route from South Llano State Park to Seminole Canyon State Park
The countryside is just so vast it’s hard to stay focused on driving and I rely on Yvette to describe what’s other than right in front of me. She does a good job too. There are rolling hills and large expanses of land with ranches dotting the landscape along with cactus, bushes and the occasional Live Oak. Browned grass and rock fill in between. The air is clean, with almost no trace of humidity and for the last few days, there has always been a steady breeze.
Route 90 Heading to Seminole Canyon State Park
Cresting a hill, a large white windmill comes into view, then two, then four, then twelve, there are just too many to count and we estimate about thirty, maybe more. These are huge, biggest I’ve seen anyway with blades at least 100 feet long. I’ve seen windmill generators of this size before, but not 30 of them spread across the countryside. It’s impressive but it makes me wonder if making electricity like this, well, what’s the bottom line?
Windmill farm just outside Del Rio
Not too much further up the road is Del Rio and another possible chance to get cheaper fuel as well as a bathroom break. We find both opportunities in a Walmart parking lot. While at Walmart, we turn a bathroom break into an impromptu supply acquisition (shopping). But it’s not a really well thought out affair, more like a quick run down the isles because we have it on good authority that we will be able to stock up further down the road just before we head into Big Bend National Park. back out to the truck and I move into a fuel area on the edge of the parking lot and fill up. The price is less than before at Junction, but still not great. Off to Seminole. Other than Del Rio, this stretch of road is pretty routine. Plenty of rolling hills with some of the shrubbery and trees starting to change both in way of species and quantity. Also, we begin to see more and more border patrol vehicles. Mostly sitting on the south side of the road looking, waiting. after about 45 minutes, we arrive at the park.
The park is about a mile off the highway and normally that would be a red flag except this highway sees very little traffic. Other than our pass through Del Rio, we probably passed 6 vehicles heading in the opposite direction in 45 minutes. The park itself is on high ground with views all around. My navigator not only called ahead and booked us a spot, but she dug deep and found a review online about which spot was best. Sure enough, it was open. We backed in, hooked up and made camp. making camp is basically turning everything on that needs to be on (gas, electric etc.) leveling the vehicle, disconnecting the trailer if we think it will be to our advantage and pulling something from the freezer for dinner.
Nice long trail around Seminole Canyon State Park
Once we’re all set up, we grab our bikes and hit the trail. It’s late in the day so we ride to another trailhead and stow our bikes and take up another trail on foot. We find an amazing canyon view and decide it’s worth further investigation when we have more time. When we do, we walk this time because of a flat tire from the day before on Yvette’s bike. The whole hike takes a while and a few miles and it reveals some amazing views. Again, if you want to see the video footage, it’s well worth a peek HERE.
Click on photo above for YouTube Video
The first day was great. 89 degrees, dry, sunny with a light breeze. Then just after midnight, the winds kicked up. 20-35 knot gusts hit the side of coach that rocked us awake. At daybreak, the winds continued and the sun would not come up until later in the day. The second night the winds died down and a fog was in the forecast. Fog, on the day that we were to leave early for our final push to big bend. Sure enough, the one time the forecast had to be right…
And it was. Fog, drizzle and 50 degrees. No matter, we’re up early and after a quick breakfast we say goodbye to a great little park with so much history it deserves more than this little old blog to do it justice.