Big Bend National Park and Terlingua Texas. Roadrunner Travelers RV Park | RV Lifestyle

Hey, we're Zephyrus Travels and welcome to Big Bend National Park. We're visiting there today and we've never been so this is exciting for us. Yeah, and I got my adventure hat on so we're ready to go. Let's go along. Okay, let's go. While we have a few minutes this morning, we thought we'd catch you up on some of our travels through Texas. We've been shooting a lot of video but we haven't had the opportunity really to talk part of it because it's really been windy in Texas. Oh my gosh, it's been extremely windy. Yeah, both Texas and New Mexico, which we'll get into later, have been very windy so it's been hard to do dialogue for some of our video. We left Hondo and our next destination was down into the southwest corner of Texas to Big Bend National Park and we went to Roadrunner Travelers RV Park. Right, and there we boondocked for four nights and yeah, it was a good location. It was not too far from the park so it was a short drive and the first day that we went into the park, we took the scenic drive, the Ross-Maxwell Scenic Drive, and that takes you to kind of the western end of the park. Hey, we're Zephyr's Travels and welcome to Big Bend National Park. We're visiting there today and we've never been so this is exciting for us. It's a bit chilly but it is sunny and usually, unless the wind picks up, it should not be too bad. Right, right. So, let's go along. Okay, let's go. I have no idea what that picture will be because I can't see. Because of the sun? I guess, yeah. Eh, turn out. What do you think? Oh, very neat. That's a very scenic shot. Yeah. Well, this is the store slash visitor's center. I don't think it's the largest visitor's center. I think the center one is bigger than this one. But, we're going to go wander around and check out things. Behind me is the floodplain of the Rio Grande. Now, down here is where they need one of those signs that kind of explains to you what this is. Yeah. This is the Rio Grande River, right here, and this is one of the access points to the river. Now, it does look like you could put a kayak in right here if you wanted to. We have ours, but I don't think we're going to go kayaking. It's still a little too chilly. Well, Diane just informed me that to use your kayak, you need to get a boating permit from the visitor's center. South of me, right here, is Mexico. This is the border from the U.S. to Mexico, the Rio Grande River, and that is nature's wall. Well, I can tell you one thing. If we put the kayaks in here, we'd be heading down that river in no time. I was going to say, you'd be going down fast. Yeah. Quite the car. I guess this is one of those rivers that you put in one place and go out in a different. Yeah. And some transportation. Just a few more feet and this could be an international video. Do you have your passport? Well then, don't cross the border. Right. We made a stop at the visitor's center, got our National Parks passport book stamp for this park, so we've got another one checked off on the list. Someday we'll get them all. We really wanted to spend our first day just kind of getting a lay of the land a little bit and seeing what we wanted to see. We also thought, after we did our hike, and we'll tell you about that, we decided we would drive down to the Rio Grande Village. And our thought was, being a village, it was shops and restaurants and whatever. We kind of pictured like a little western type town, maybe with some shops where you could buy some souvenirs or Native American or Mexican made items. It wasn't that. Well, no. What it turned out to be is, there are campgrounds within the park itself, and if you're staying in that particular campground, we're going to, can you cross the border from there? Yeah, that section of the campground you can cross into Mexico. It really is just like a little store. Yeah, it was a campground store. Maybe we missed it. Maybe it was someplace else and we totally missed it, but that's, I don't think so. No, I don't think so. So, you know, unless you're camping at that park right there, I would. Yeah. It was just a campground store. There wasn't any souvenirs or anything there. I would just, you know. Go to Panther Junction Visitor Center. There are other visitor centers throughout the park, and I'm not saying they're not worth visiting. You know, there was one on the western end of the park on our drive-thru that we pulled into. Unfortunately, it was closed. It was lunchtime. But, you know, they do have some scenic buildings and such that are, you know, historic that have been there for a while. Right. So, yeah. And then on to the second day when we went into the park, we decided to do a one hike. Yeah. So, we went to Grapevine Hill Road, and the hike area was seven miles down this road. It was a, it wasn't a dirt road, it was a gravel road, but it was rough. Yes. And when we say rough, we mean rough. Now, there was cars driving back there. I really was surprised, but you have to be very, very careful and watch where you're driving because you could easily take out a tire and a rim on some of the rocks. Or the bottom of your car. Yeah. They just say high clearance vehicles for a reason. And granted, it's rough too because our truck is set up for towing, and so the suspension is stiff. It's got airbags in it, and it rides very stiff. The tires had a lot of air pressure in them, and I probably could have adjusted all that and it would have been better. Well, we didn't know what to expect on this road. But there are parts where it gets very narrow, and you have to pull over to the side to let other vehicles by. And I know we scratched the side of the truck up. Well, not as bad as we thought. Well, it's going to have to... maybe you're a buff out. Yeah. But, you know. But anyways, the ride back there is a challenge. Keep that in mind if you're going. But the hike is worth it. Yes. We had seen it on a video of another YouTuber, so that's the hike we decided to do. Yeah. And the first part of the hike is pretty flat and just stern. Yeah. It's got a slight gradual uphill, but it's a flat trail. No climbing or anything. And that's about a mile. Right. And then about a quarter mile is all climbs. And it's all uphill and all rocks. Yeah. And so you keep that in mind. I think we saw a lot of people heading back there that weren't prepared for that. No. You want to make sure you have good hiking boots or, you know, something substantial. I certainly wouldn't wear sandals or even low sneakers. And if you have to carry your children because they're small, don't take that section of the hike because you're not going to be able to carry a child up that area. You need your hands. Right. At least we did. Yeah. And we actually had walking sticks, which helped. Uh huh. Helped give you something to get a balance on when you were climbing some of those. Right. But we did reach the top. Yeah. And we stood under the rock and it was pretty cool. We'll show you some video of that. Yeah. Daisy's blooming, sundress swaying in the breeze. I can't stop staring. You've put a spell on me. And I hope that you never decide to set me free. Man, we couldn't bring our dogs. I know. The way you're moving has got me moving my own feet. The greatest feeling that I could ever dare to dream is you forever moving next to me. Let's not waste time or take this slow. We've got miles behind us with miles to go. So let's just break this down to the simplest truth. You and I as one will always be better than two. Leaves ain't waiting. Their colors changing like the times. So how was the climb? Oh, tiring. Not in shape to do this. We'll get you in shape. Yeah? You know, if we do more hikes and such. I mean, we took a little bit more of an extreme, at least for the climbing part of this one. Yeah. But we've done this level before. You just need to get yourself back into used to moving more. We don't have this in the East Coast. I know. That's why we do it here. Let's not waste time or take this slow. We've got miles behind us with miles to go. So let's just break this down to the simplest truth. You and I as one will always be better than two. Yeah, you and I as one will always be better than two. Balanced Rock. Yep. And Big Back National Park. It was, what, two and a half mile hike to get up here? Mm-hmm. That's what it said, but I think it's more two and a half miles around trip. Because I only got 1.8 miles and I clicked this soon after we started. Oh, okay. Take a selfie? As you can tell, I'm tired. That's almost Randy. Randy says it's because I have short legs. And that could be an issue. But we made it down from to the top to see Balanced Rock. So the Balanced Rock is, like, way up there. So you have to climb up through. I don't know if you can see the people doing the trail. But it's a climb. You want to be prepared. Just take your time. And I would highly recommend walking sticks or hiking sticks. Yeah, hiking sticks. And, you know, we're wearing our high-top hiking shoes, which I think help, too. Right. They, you know, help with securing your ankles. Yeah. Yeah, but for us, we had to take it slow. For me. But it was all right. We reached the destination. And now we've gotten back down, so we're on the easier part of the trail. Yeah, so now we just got about a little over a mile walk. Yeah. And it's not bad. And it's going to be gradually downhill. So I liked that hike. I liked a little bit of the challenge at the end of it. I know you were struggling a little bit because you have a knee that bothers you sometimes. Right. But you did okay. Yeah. And I think you weren't too sore the next day. No. So I think, you know, you kind of pushed yourself a little bit, which was good. Yeah. But it was a fun hike. Long drive out again. Yeah, it takes, you know, quite a bit of time to get out. And there's a lot of other things to do at Big Ben. We only did the two days. I think they say three to four days is what you really want a lot to go to Big Ben. But, you know, we wanted to see some of the other things in the area. So we went to Teralinga, which is a ghost town. It's an old mining town? It's an old mining town, yeah. So the history of the town was that it actually mined quicksilver or what you would consider mercury. And it was very valuable and useful during World War I for making bombs. But after the war, the need for it kind of dried up. And so the mine just ended up being shut down about the end of World War II. Right. And so the town literally just dried up and disappeared. But we went there, and it's kind of coming back as a tourist destination. Right. And the first thing we went to check out was the cemetery, which was really cool. It has a really nice cemetery, you know, old cemetery, old graves, but it's current. The people are still being buried in it. Yes, yes. And that was neat. It kind of gives you an idea of the history. The cemetery is still being used, but there's a lot of older graves here that are essentially unmarked at this point. They've got just stones and maybe a cross or what's left of a cross laying on them. What better way to start your visit to a ghost town than stopping at the cemetery? These older cemeteries are extremely interesting. And it's, you know, it's very interesting to walk around, especially in a cemetery of a different culture. Yeah. Then we went into town, and there is a trading post, which is kind of a gift shop. They have quite a bit of different, it's not just all just little trinkets. They have a lot of different things there. Right. There's also a hotel, which you can stay in. Yep, it used to be the mine owner's home. And there's also the Starlight Restaurant, which we understand is pretty famous if you do go there. Yeah. It doesn't open until 5 p.m., so we were a little early. And I understand you do need reservations, and sometimes there's a long wait to get in. But it would be an interesting place. And there is also that other little, I think it's a little restaurant, too. Yeah, there was a barbecue place. Yeah. And then we found a pizza place outside of town that we made. This is Teralinga, Texas. It's actually the ghost town of Teralinga, Texas. And back in the turn of the century, the 1800s, this was a thriving mining town. They mined quicksilver here, and it was very high in demand during World War II because it was used to make bombs and such. And so the production of quicksilver in Europe was shut down, and this mining town supplied a lot of that for the war effort. Unfortunately, after the war, when the production of quicksilver picked back up again in other parts of the world, the need for quicksilver here started to die down. Now, there was hope that maybe after World War II, the demand would go up again, and it kind of kept the town going for a while. But about the end of World War II, the quicksilver mine went bankrupt, and the town kind of went down from there. But this has now come back as a tourist town, and there is a Starlight Theater here, which is now a restaurant, but that used to be the place you would go for entertainment. The miners would go for entertainment. And there's a trading post here where you can go in and pick souvenirs and such up. Kind of a neat little town. Now, we started our tour of the town with the cemetery and ended it here at the sign. While visiting Big Ben, the Zephyr Travels crew stays at Roadrunner Travelers RV Park. We're going to show you a little bit around the park this morning. Our campsite here at Roadrunner Travelers was a boondocking site. It cost us $35 per night, which is probably reasonable for this area being just outside of the national park. The other sites are all full hookup, and I think they're about double that price, so I think they're in the $60 to $70 range. We were here on a holiday weekend, and we weren't able to get into any of those other sites for more than one day, so we just elected to stay with the boondocking site, which worked out fine for us. We used our solar panels and our batteries, and we had plenty of power for the four days we were here. One point of advice, if you do go to the area, I would bring whatever you need as far as food or anything. There's, I think, one gas station, maybe a couple restaurants. Yeah, convenience store type shopping, and it's about all you're going to have. We made a point of really stocking up, made sure we had plenty of meals. We were boondocking. We chose boondocking. There are full hookups, but there wasn't anything available. We were there on a holiday weekend, so we weren't able to get a full hookup site, so we boondocked, which was no problem for us. And they do, I mean, it's a good boondocking area. Yeah, it's a nice campground. For boondocking in a campground, it was $35 a night. I think it was $50 to $60 a night for a full hookup site. Roadrunners Travelers RV Resort is a really nice campground. It's probably one of the better ones that we saw outside of the national park. A lot of them are really kind of trailer parks, but this one, it looks like the owners put a lot of work into it. It looks like they're still working on it, too, so they may expand it to have some more hookup sites. Yeah, they're probably going to expand it some more. The sites are all gravel because it's a desert, so there's no grass. So the sites are gravel. The whole place is pretty much gravel. But they do have some community areas. They have a dog park. They have a community area with games and a fire pit. On Sunday night, they did have a community campfire with music. It was right across from where we were staying, which was nice. So they do a lot. I think it's worth the $35 a boondock there and $50, $60, whatever it is, to get a full hookup site. I would definitely come back. I would recommend that probably over what I saw at some of the other campgrounds. Right, right. So that concludes our trip through Texas. From there, we leave and we head to New Mexico. And that will be our next video. So if you like this video, what should they do? Please give it a big thumbs up and subscribe to our channel, Zephyr Travels. Hit that bell for notifications. We post new videos on a weekly basis. And we'd love to have you follow along on our journeys, especially like this one. So until the next time, guys, we will see you down the road. See you down the road. Bye, guys. Let's not waste time or take this slow. We've got miles behind us and miles to go. So let's just break this down to the simplest truth. You and I as one will always be better than two.