Big Bend National Park, TX

The first stop on our 2 month trip took us almost 2,000 miles and 20 hours away from Alabama to Big Bend National Park in Texas! First of all, if you’re looking for a place to view the Milky Way Galaxy clearly, this is one of the 10 places in the US you still can! Well, when there isn’t any cloud cover rolling in that is… sigh. We met an awesome family vacationing  from Tennessee at the RV park we stayed at (Stillwell Store RV Park & Hallie’s Hall of Fame) that invited us to ride with them down the road towards Mexico to stargaze and although we weren’t able to 100% clearly see the Milky Way, you could see the remnants of it and we were able to view more stars than I have ever seen in my life! It was absolutely gorgeous and the reason we chose Big Bend. We all laid in the middle of the road (which was basically abandoned since it dead ends right before the Mexico border) watching the sky and luckily I had my free SkyView app to show us all the constellations and planets, which they thoroughly enjoyed! While we we’re there we saw 5 javelin, 2 mule deer, tons of road runners & jack rabbits & got barked at by the cutest prairie dogs! I highly recommend Stillwell RV!

Now to the park!

If you love all things to do with deserts from plants to mammals, this is the place you need to visit! The park protects more than 1,200 species of plants, more than 450 species of birds, 56 species of reptiles, and 75 species of mammals which is incredible considering how hot and dry it is! I will give this one warning, ALWAYS check the weather and if you see rain in the forecast, BE PREPARED! Since Southern Texas rarely gets rain it will flash flood in a matter of minutes and you will be stranded wherever you are for however long it takes the rain to drain, which is a while since the ground is mostly flat and hard. We learned this the hard way, but luckily in town before we hit the basically deserted road to Big Bend. There are signs everywhere telling you to be aware and flash flood measuring posts, which lets you know how quickly things can turn.

The park is over 800,000 acres and includes sea fossils and dinosaur bones, which blew my mind! Some archeological sites in the park date back 10,000 years to more recent digs.

If you have time, I also recommend driving out to Terlingua and checking out the Ghost Town, especially since it’s free! There are partially remaining homes, a church, school and a few more buildings that you can go into. They have a gift shop on site and down the road is an amazing Mexican restaurant you must visit plus some teepees and an old cemetery.