Big Bend National Park: Rio Grande and Boquillas Canyon

On Saturday we were able to get another campsite in our same campground and then headed back down to Panther Junction. We were hoping to start the day by catching the park film, usually one of our favorite parts of the parks, but unfortunately the theater was broken and we were never able to see this one.

Instead we continued on with our day, heading down to the Rio Grande Village section of the park. After taking advantage of their laundry facilities we went on two relatively short hikes. The first one was a nature trail just off of the campground. This hike was only 3/4 of a mile, and it went out over  ponds and then up a small hill on a peninsula sticking out into the Rio Grande. It was a lovely.

We saw lots of wildlife, ranging from road runners to beautiful fish and turtles in the ponds. 

 

The hike did show us how surprisingly small the Rio Grande really is. 

So small in fact that Entrepreneurs from Mexico regularly ride their horses across the river, leaving crafts for tourists to buy by putting money in a jar, and then coming back later to collect their earnings. 

Sadly, the river was not always so small. First, due to diversions for farming irrigation and drinking water the river size was reduced to about 20% of its natural flow. Additionally in recent years the river has been suffering from reduced precipitation and increased evaporation due to climate change. 

There is a boarder crossing to the town of Boquillas where they will take you across the river in a row boat for $5. It sounded fun, and we were tempted by the prospect of some fresh tacos for lunch, but we ran out of time in the day. Maybe next time. 

Town of Boquillas, Mexico

We did find time for another fairly short hike into the Boquillas canyon. 

 

On the way back to Panther Junction we did one more easy hike at a location called dugout wells. This hike had signs along the way telling us about the different cactus and animals that live in the area and how they have adapted. All three hikes were nice because they were completely different ecosystems. 

We wrapped up the day with another ranger program, this time down at the Panther Junction Visitor Center. This one was about night sky and the history of astronomy. It was super interesting and ended with telescopes set up in the parking lot. Big Bend is a gold tier dark skies park, meaning there is little to no light pollution. We lucked out and were in the park with a new moon so the stars were extra spectacular. Unfortunately we don't have the right equipment for spectacular night sky pictures.