Everything has been a blur since Galveston. A blur that included a hurried evacuation and a blizzard in South Texas. If that's not a sign of the oncoming apocalypse, I don't know what is.
We had a lovely home in Galveston ...
Nathan was able to play in the sand and wade out on the crazy wide shelf of the Gulf of Mexico ... in his PJs.
We were fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of some roseate spoonbills.
And, we got to swing by the NOAA office in Galveston where a number of my clients work. Incidentally, when we went into relocation mode in late 2019, this is one of the offices that would have been a plausible option for us. Not the most inviting place, as you can see.
However, on Friday, we got word that there was some unusual weather making its way toward Texas, and, in fact, the better part of the country. There was a massive cold front coming that was bringing a bucket-load of ice, snow, and freezing rain to normally warm, dry areas, including a good chunk of Texas. The epicenter seemed to be around San Antonio, which was dead center in the route to our next location: the Big Bend region. We struggled, weighed options, and made phone calls, and finally, with much deliberation (and a healthy fear of freezing rain), we decided to leave Galveston a day early and make a quick stop in the old west border town of Del Rio. We figured that should keep us safe and sound, right? Well, after a day inching through the freezing rain, we ended up with this in Del Rio ...
Not what you'd expect in South Texas. We checked in with our hosts in Big Bend, and they warned us that we had rough seas ahead of us between there and Del Rio, including a couple of mountain passes that might not even be passable. Comforted by the fact that we could always stop short the following day and get a hotel if necessary, we decided to press on. We only had two days in Big Bend, and we didn't want any of that time to go to waste.
We woke up to a hotel that lost its electricity and a town that appeared to be about 100% shut down. No gas, no food, no nothing. So, we hit the trail and headed west.
No doubt, we were driving through border country, that day.
But, thankfully, the weather stayed reasonably calm, and we were rewarded with an amazing view of the Rio Grande region that only comes around once in a generation.
We drove into the town of Alpine looking for lunch, and pretty much everything in town was closed (including the McDonalds) due to frozen pipes.
Once we made it up and over the pass, we found clearer skies and drier ground. Eventually we made it all the way to Terlingua, a TINY town just outside of Big Bend National Park. When I say "remote," I mean truly, incredibly, unimaginably remote. Where we were staying, one would have to drive 45 minutes to the closest gas or grocery store (little more than a glorified convenience store) to get staples like bread and milk. If you wanted "real" groceries, you had to drive an hour and a half to Alpine. And, as our hosts explained to us, if you wanted to go to a Lowes or buy an appliance, etc., you made the 4-hour trek to Odessa. This is a place where everyone in town has their mailbox in one central location.
There was some snow on the ground ...
... but the roads were clear, and our hosts (and a family of mule deer) were there to greet us when we arrived at the "casita."
In reality, the casita was a large travel trailer sitting next to the owners' house. But, oh my, what a trailer it was! There are luxury hotel rooms that aren't this nice.
That said, we could have been staying in a shack, and we would have been grateful to have a roof over our heads ... and a driveway clear of snow.
Here's what things look like now, including the stop in Del Rio.
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