2006/01 Southwest USA trip (MN-TX) - Marfa |
|||
We were headed for Marfa and planned to drive there on the Pinto Canyon road. This is a road that I’d read 
about in a Tony Hillerman novel, but it doesn’t appear on the map of Texas. We soon found out why. It begins as a reasonable gravel road, but midway into the Chinati Mountains we entered the Pinto Canyon Ranch. The scenery became awesome just as the road disintegrated into a narrow track of boulders. The ranch owners have put up signs making it very clear that this is private property and the public can only drive the road, and not venture off it to picnic, camp, or hunt. I would imagine that they have a problem keeping people out as it’s a gorgeous area with mountains, streams with flowing water, even trees and the occasional water dribble down the mountainside. Maybe that’s why they keep the road in such
poor shape!
As soon as we left the ranch, the road improved and the scenery changed totally to golden and yellow rolling grasslands and cattle range. We saw a herd of pronghorn in the distance, more evidence that we were into a grasslands ecosystem. We also found this pair of longhorns with outrageous horns.
We rolled into Marfa and found the campground, nothing special, just a row of hookups along the main road. Marfa seemed to have as many closed businesses as active ones. I guess there’s a lot of space in Texas, and it’s easier to build next door than clean up the failures.
Marfa’s famous for the “Marfa lights”. People have been seeing unexplained lights in the sky here for over a hundred years. There is even a special viewing area for them along highway 90. I’d heard of them, but can’t think why; maybe they were featured in an X-files episode. (They were. I looked it up.)
Our reason for coming to Marfa was to visit its agate fields about ten miles south of town. The roads there run through old volcanic rock which is full of agates and similar crystals, so the road cuts and shoulders are good sources. We found plenty of grey agates on a side road and not very much along the main road. There’s plenty there still in the rock but it requires hammer and chisel work to get it out and it’s too easy to break the crystals too.
We got back to the campground just in time to pay the ancient couple that own it. I guess they just show up at dusk and dawn to collect the money.