Sunday, February 11, 2018

ADVENTURES AWAIT US AT BIG BEND NATIONAL PARK

Monday, February 5 – We traveled Southwest on US-90 to Marathon, TX, where we stopped to fill up with diesel fuel at $3.45/gallon. We filled up in Del Rio yesterday at $2.65. Quite a difference! We then turned South on TX-385 to Big Bend National Park. The drive was a pleasure on US-90 which we recommend as an alternative to I-10 when crossing Texas. We arrived at Big Bend National Park after a nice uneventful drive.

drive to Big Bend

drive to Big Bend

This tunnel in the park is a lot higher than it looks.
tunnel in Big Bend

Big Bend

We used our America the Beautiful Senior Pass to waive the $25 admission price, but the campground did NOT give any discount on camping.

We are in the Rio Grande RV Campground with full hook-ups. It is just a blacktop parking lot and not very roomy at that. The area that is intended to be the road between the two rows of back-in camp sites is very narrow and made it difficult to back into our site. The sites are about 30 feet wide with parking for your vehicle next to your RV. That makes it nice that we are not right next to our neighbor's RV. The utilities are at the rear of each site with 50 AMP electric, water, and sewer. We had a clear shot at the Southern sky for our satellite TV.

Big Bend campground

Big Bend campground

Looking right.
Big Bend campground

Looking left.
Big Bend campground

There is WiFi at the nearby camp store. It isn’t the strongest WIFI we have ever used, but we can at least text with the kids. Since we are in Site #24, the second site from the camp store, we are able to pick it up from our RV. No one is in Site #25. We are hoping, if and when they arrive, they don't block our ability to get WiFi. There is a nice grassy area between the first campsite and the store. There is no cell phone service unless we go to Panther Junction Visitor Center, 20 miles away. We were able to make a phone call to Marsha’s 90-year-old father, who has had the flu for a week…and yes, he did get the flu shot. This is only the third time in nine years of RVing that we were unable to pick-up Verizon cell phone service.

After getting setup in our site, we went up to the camp store to do a couple loads of laundry. We sat out on the provided picnic tables, where many visitors were sitting to use the free WiFi, and chatted with several couples about the Big Bend area and other RV travels.

We have tons of things to do and places to see while in Big Bend so stop back and enjoy the visit with us.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!

11 comments:

  1. How nice to be able to get the WIFI at your site. We did without when we were there but we weren't as addicted then as we are now.

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  2. Wow! The full hook-up area is all but empty. We were full up when we went to BB two years ago. We checked out the boondocking sites when we were there, but it would have been a challenge to get level in most of them.

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  3. Looks like you got a really good site and with the closeness to the office, a good wifi set-up too. Looking forward to see some of the site you guys see through your blog. Enjoy your stay there.

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  4. When we were there the park was full. It was a real pain to park with the narror road. Back than you could not make reservations. We had to arrive eaarly and wait to see who left.

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  5. It's amazing how empty the campground is! Of course, we were there the week between Christmas and New Year's, and so was everyone else. :-)) Your weather looks perfect!

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  6. You know you're pretty close to the end of the earth at Big Bend.

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  7. Looking forward to your visit and pictures. We were there about seven years ago. Unfortunately, Anneke fell and broke her ankle on the first hike, so we did not get to see much.

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  8. Nice that you got a full hook up site and no neighbor! Looking forward to what you find in Big Bend:)

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  9. Hope you have great weather...enjoy! LuAnn

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  10. You are so smart for staying inside the park. I want to do the same when we go back. Completely worth the bit of inconvenience to be so close to everything. Enjoy!

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  11. That's the kind of RV park we like .... nearly empty. Looks like you finally made it.

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