Terlingua and the Red Buffalo Hunt

The town of Terlingua is a bit of a desert oddity. Once a bustling mining town in the 1930’s it was abandoned and fell to ruin when the mines went bust in the late 1940’s. Then in the 60’s the area was repopulated by “modern pioneers” (naturalists, river guides, musicians and artists).  They repurposed some of the ruined buildings and started up a community garden and co-op. The roof was gone from the old theater, so they turned it into an open-air venue for parties, concerts and theatrical productions (hence the name “Starlight Theater”). In the 1990's, the theater got a face lift and now it’s a $$$ restaurant.  The whole town has a fun, funky vibe and caters to both locals and tourists.

The Starlight Theater is a local favorite.

You can tell this is a town of artists. 

I wouldn't mind taking this one home. :)

Random car art.

The Saturday farmer’s market was small, but we managed to load up on local baked goods and foodstuffs including fresh eggs with the “born date” penciled on each one. Lol.  There are plenty of ruins still standing in the Terlingua ghost town and a cool old cemetery to explore. Of course free wifi and expresso was an even better draw. : )   

Lots of ruins scattered around town.

The old cemetery is still in use. 

We heard about a nearby trail leading to some old petroglyphs from some other campers. A few miles down a dirt road outside Terlingua brought us to a small parking area and a break in a fence marked as the National Park boundary. It was kinda fun sneaking in the back door. Lol.

Sneaking in the backdoor to Big Bend National Park. :)

The scenery here was different from what we’ve seen so far – sheer cliffs that shed ginormous boulders that have been carved by wind and rain, alkaline flats where nothing grows, black volcanic grit littered with flat crystals that looked like broken glass, and the occasional ancient graffiti. We ran into another couple and stood chatting for nearly an hour – we ended up having lots in common (early retirement, politics, travels), they’ve just been at it longer! It’s fun to find like-minded folks on the road.  Another couple we ran into were hunting for a pictograph of a red buffalo. They showed us a picture, and we hunted around for awhile, but without any specific information on its location none of us had any luck. We hadn’t planned for a long hike, so we opted to plan a return visit. 

Boulders fallen from the cliff face.

I did say ginormous boulders!

Alkaline flats.

Volcanic grit littered with crystal shards.

Petroglyph etched into the rock.

Great view of the Chisos Mountains too!

Sunday was rainy and we hung out at the RV, catching an afternoon break in the weather just long enough to get in our walkies. Monday was clean and sunny and mid-70’s. Perfect for buffalo hunting. Lol. We headed back to Terlingua and after a frustrating time trying to use the local wifi (I will be sooooo glad to get back to the land of Verizon LTE!) we headed for the back door of Big Bend National Park again.

This time we did a serious hunt for the red buffalo. We hiked further. We climbed higher. We searched longer. We looked on, under, and between hundreds of boulders. We actually found several petroglyphs and some 1902 graffiti. We also found quite a few boulders that had been used to grind grain, the perfectly round grinding holes were still filled with water from Sunday’s rain. But we never did find the red buffalo. Oh well, the hunt was great fun.

We searched high...

... and low.

We found more petroglphys... 

... and holes for grinding grain...

... but no Red Buffalo. And it felt like we checked every one of these boulders! Lol. 

We’ve decided it’s getting time to move on from our lovely spot in the state park. We will spend a few more days here - we still want to float the Rio Grande and Rog is going to do some more of the Epic mountain bike trail – but Thursday, 2/23, we heading out. We've been shut out twice trying to get a boondock spot in the national park, hopefully the third time will be the charm. If not, we’ll try our luck at one of the campgrounds. Fingers crossed!