Big Bend Ranch State Park

[BroncoHauler]

Beautiful. Reminds me of the topography around Superior, AZ.


Herb

[Greg In Austin]

The road quality went down hill quickly when we left Guale Mesa Road for the Rancherias Loop.







As we worked our way down into the bottoms, the vegitation got taller and the road narrower. We did have quite a bit of Big Bend Ranch pinstripping before we were all done. It was not too far down this road that we ran into the first spot that had me worried.

[Greg In Austin]

Here was the worry....
I had to get out and scout out what I was really seeing and determine a route through it. There was a deep and steep dropoff on the driver side. The road was narrow to beging with, and as it exited the wash this was going down into, it got even narrower. OH... and the wash on the driver side got even deeper on the driver's side just off the road...

Michele decided that after she had white-knuckled an earlier descent that she would watch and photograph this little one.



BUT while I was worrying, she found a bug that was more interesting !










Yes, these next two photos show the front passenger tire off the ground.






BUT McBeast worked through this with no problems.

One worry we had at a number of places during this trip was whether the side steps would cause a ground clearance issue. I kept watching, and I don't think we ever got within 6 inches of hitting them.

[Greg In Austin]

Yes, this unmaintained road was narrow and overgrown.





At this spot (below) the road did not look bad, it was a little wider, with far less volvanic rock, and just some mild swells alternating down the road.
It was seconds after this photo was taken that McBeast was up on two wheels Front Passenger and Rear Driver), teetering back and forth. Although it would have been nice to have a photo, I did not want to leave it in that position long enough for either of us to jump out and get a shot.

[surfgeek33]

Wow Greg, awesome report and pics. Thanks for sharing your great adventure with us. Mcbeast looked like a champ on those trails! The fairing looks great as well.

Ray

[Greg In Austin]

This was an interesting area, with different terrain from the National Park, but one thing that is similar in some areas is that there are no trees unless there is water. So where do all those birds live with no trees for their nests?

The look for the tallest place they can find...


...or just about anywhere...


There are signs everywhere that water is the key. Lots of tanks have been built to allow water to accumulate and be held for stock to have water.

[Greg In Austin]

We did finally make it to the other end of the loop, and it had been slow going in some places...



...but that did mean the going was really that much easier...



Even after passing this sign on our way out of this area, there were still spots where I could not imagine going through in 2WD. There were a couple of soft sandy areas the Rangers had warned us about where they had been stuck. We went through with no problem, but in 4WD.

[Greg In Austin]

In the past BBRSP and the ranch that was made into this park was actually a number of different ranches. The owners in the last 100 years had beentrying to consolidate the smaller ranches into one large ranch.

Now the Texas Parks and Wildlife are trying to do the same thing. In the Austin paper the day that we left on our trip there was a story about an additional 7000 acreas being added to the park. At Saucedo I saw a map that shows the private holdings that are still within the park boundaries.

Here is one of the old homesteads; there are supposed to be a lot of these throughout the park.









Water was obviously an issue here. There was this pump still in place under the windmill, and there were two other discarded and spent pumps sitting not far off in the scrub brush.


This little shelter looked like it was in shape to still be used. In fact I wold probably use this shelter before I would use the house itself !
There are two camp sites close by, with one being an equestrian drop off spot.

[Greg In Austin]

...And then it was back on the road heading for Chorro Vista; we were probably a little over half way there from Guale #2.






And like we said, there were Hawks everywhere, even in some precarious looking spots.




And the State Park has not lost site of its Big Brother next door...literally...

With a campsite named for a view of the National Park's Chisos Mountains

[Skywagon]

Neat pictures!
Unfortunately, most of them I could only see about one quarter to one half. The other part was gray. Is that an issue with my computer or do others have the same problem?
Bill