West Texas Adventure, Day 2
Well, today is the first real day of vacation, as yesterday was simply driving, and, all in all, was pretty much a butt-whip.
However, today is different. Today we got to Big Bend, got checked in at the lodge, and went on a short hike. The goal was to not do anything we had done at Big Bend before, and I am pretty sure we can reach that. I’m not sure that you could do everything in two weeks. I’m not even all that sure you could do all the marked, mainstream stuff in two weeks… and then there’s all that stuff that only the park rangers know about.
The hike for today was to Balanced Rock. I’d never heard of it, but it was a relatively quick little jaunt, and after we had driven in, checked in, made it to the Basin, dropped our gear, and left again, it was about all we had time for.
It also provided my first two â??critter shotsâ? which, hopefully, will become a theme.
These little guys were simply going about their own business, as most of the bugs in the area were either going crazy over the flowers (which were plentiful, as it had rained lately) or were simply looking for water, and they had far more important things to do that annoy us.
The hike back to Balanced Rock is pretty straight forward, little evevation change until the end, and is only about a mile to a mile and a half (maybe I’ll check my figures later, maybe I won’t). It’s right down the base of a canyon, so you are pretty much surrounded by rocks the whole time. I’ll spare you these photos, as I did â??Red Rocks Tour of the Southwestâ? last year. These looked a lot like those.
At the end of the trail is the Balanced Rock. It’s balanced. It’s a rock. It’s kinda cool, although after all the oddball stuff I saw in Utah last year (mostly in Arches National Park) it’s somewhat anticlimactic. The pictures don’t do it justice, however, as there is nothing to give it scale. It’s a big rock. The balanced part is probably 8-9 feet tall. You have to climb just a bit to get up to it, but it’s nothing hugely challenging.
And yes, I am perfectly aware that the rock on the right is, well, vaguely suggestive. Trust me, I had shots that made the resemblance far more… graphic.
the only real problem with climbing is looking where you put your hands and feet, as in-between any two rocks could be lurking…
Ouch.
We both escaped with our lives 
Although I did skin up my legs pretty good during a spill. But hey, it’s not vacation until I bleed, so I figured I would get it out of the way early.
Upon our arrival back at the basin, we had some company who didn’t really seem to care if we were there or not. Not one bit.
After this and dinner, we made our first ill-fated attempt to use my telescope. It was unbelievably windy, and it shook the scope so hard that it was difficult to keep anything in frame for more than a few seconds, and when it was there, it was awfully blurry. Strike one for the scope.