Mountain Lion Print

We found this large print down by our watering hole after we filled it with water. My belief is that it is a mountain lion. We have heard them at different times of the year in heat. They sound very scary. The cat runs really really fast down screeching calling for a mate and she runs past the right side of our house, into the front yard and then away. They usually wait until we turn off our lights inside of our house.

The picture of the sunset was taken off of the web. It is very beautiful pic.:)

Still can't comment back on this computer and still need to get our other one fixed.

At the Porch

Dan and I went to the Starlight for 2 4 1 burger night on Monday. It was good as usual.

It's really funny because before we started socializing a bit more we didn't know what "See ya at the porch" was all about...I first heard it from MontelloOffGrid on a comment and then started hearing it more around town lol. Well, the porch is like a big chill spot connected to the Starlight which is a must go to place if you are visiting the Big Bend area. A lot of musicians will sit and play also on the porch. I think that someone should start a drum circle sometime. And, those are not my beers next to me in the pic. If they were I'd probably be throwing up later. We had a really good night and watched a band that came down from Austin.

Shady 80 Reptiles

Today at the Shady 80 Dan and I found a very large Spiny Crevice Lizard in our bathroom. It was a little skiddish, but after awhile he let us play with him. We've had a few before, but this lizard has been the largest one we've seen at our house to date. He was maybe 6-8 inches at least and had a real fat belly. We got some water to put into our watering hole again yesterday. Within a few hours the deer came down for a drink. The clouds were building all afternoon. Later that evening we got a few sprinkles and we got to see some cool lightning in the distance. This morning I went down to the watering hole and to my surprise this red racer was starring at me while it was having a drink. We watched it as it ate some of the bugs on the edge. It was very docile the whole time and it just hung out with us for awhile and let us get it on video and photograph it.

Terlingua dust storm .mpg

Yesterday was a strange day. We started the morning off with a huge power outage in our area. The power was not back on for hours. Like hmmm. 9 or 10 hrs. Glad to have it back and running. Dan brought some dinner up to me at work when we looked out the window and noticed a huge dust storm. We went outside and it actually barely sprinkled on us...then came the dust again. I grabbed the camera so that I can share just how crazy it is to be caught in a dust storm. It scared me a bit as the dirt was hitting my skin...it was blowing at about 45mph.

Thank you to the people who donated to the family---and Happy Father's Day to all the dad's out there.

Dinosaurs in the Big Bend

Big Bend is one of the best places for paleontological research in the world. Over 90 dinosaur species have been discovered here. The fossil record here continues uninterrupted from the Age of Reptiles to the Age of Mammals, giving one of the most complete pictures of a prehistoric ecosystem in the world. The second picture is the view from our place. I love to stare out and can definatly imagine dinosaurs roaming about.

Greenhouse and God's House

A few miles from our house is Church Road. We've seen it from a distance, but it was just a speck at the foothill of a mountain. The other day we decided to explore our own neighborhood and took a drive. We took a few pictures. The church offers a program for people in need of food. They have a food pantry inside and are always accepting donations of food. They even have a place to tie up your horses if you want to ride your horse to church.

This picture of our greenhouse was taken right after we put it up. There's a lot more detail to be done on the structure. We're going to wrap the greenhouse in ocitillo and yucca stalks. Dan built raised beds inside. Our watering system will be a gravity fed drip-system. We got the huge pieces of glass on Craigslist for free. We plan on planting things around the outside that will give it more shade. Despite all of the predators out here that would like to get a hold of our veggies, our big cat loves to munch on garden plants, so a door is a must before we begin planting for the fall.

Fine Feathered Friends

At my work we have some fine feathered roadrunners. We named the smaller one SpottyDottie. Dan hand fed one of them the other day. They love lunch meat. After the bigger roadrunner ate from Dan's hand the smaller one was begging for it to share the food. The temp. today is about 115. There is however a 40% chance of rain for Friday the 24th. Dan and I went to the Starlight yesterday for $1.00 tacos. I got to meet Jicky (the desert rose) for the first time. She just moved down here yesterday and was at the starlight with Frann. I hope these videos upload properly.

Bunnies, Snakes, and a Donate Button

Today I was at work when I saw something out of the corner of my eye jump behind a file cabinet. I peeked around the corner of it and found a cute baby bunny. We think the cat at my work brought it inside. I tried to get the bunny myself, but had no luck. Dan came up and rescued it. The other night Dan stepped outside and almost stepped on this huge snake going by. We went outside and watched it for a while. It's not poisonous that we know of. It got pretty funny because out of nowhere came this small bird and it started chasing the snake away and pecking at it's sides. And then it got even funnier because out of nowhere came a bunny and it started chasing after the snake and the bird. I guess the bunny was helping the bird chase the snake out of their territory.

Fire Update---

My previous post was about the fire that had happened. I found out that it was a rental unit that a family was living in. I finally figured out how to put a donate button on my blog. I'm going to take up a collection for the family. They really did lose everything in the fire. I'm also going to try and find out more information later this afternoon.

Computer--Sorry I can't comment back on this other computer that I am using. Don't know why. David--we might take you up on your offer for you to take a look at our computer, but we're going to try and do something with it first.

Fire in Terlingua

Today was my day off of work. Dan and I were having lunch at the Big Bend Forever Resort Cafe. Someone saw a big black cloud of smoke out the window. We drove over towards the fire to see what was happening. Someone's house went burnt to the ground. We were over there watching and seeing if there was anything we could do to help. The fire department was on the scene. After about 35 minutes of us watching we heard a dog desperatly crying. No one knew he was in there at all. He was completely scilent the whole time and then we think that the roof collapsed on top of him and he started crying. Some people ran over there and saw that he was chained up (I think) so they let him go and he escaped. His hair was a bit singed and his paws were bleeding a bit, but he was okay. I think they pretty much have the fire under control right now. I'm going to set up a donate button for the family in the next few days. I would do it today, but this isn't my computer since my computer is still a fried peice of crap.---signing off gypsyjess

Old Pics

I was looking at some old photos of mine today of our place and I thought I would post some. The picture with the rattlesnake in it was a crazy story. Dan went over to this dry waterfall after it rained and he had a shovel in his hand for some reason and leaned over this snake to look at something without even seeing that it was there. Well, as soon as he backed away his eyes focused and saw the snake curled up not ratteling or anything. I had to get a picture of it. Thank God he was o.k.. Still waiting for that rain to come. The lightning picture was taken last year during a huge far away storm. We wished we would have captured more of the lightning strikes, but I guess we were lucky to get that photo.

Water Babies

The other day Dan and I went for a swim in the Terlingua Ranch pool. It was perfect weather for it. If you visit down here in the Big Bend it is $5.00 a car load to enjoy the pool. After that we went back home to the shady 80 and filled up our watering hole for the deer to drink. We also splashed around in that for awhile. Any water in the desert will make it seem like a nice oasis. The watering hole already had what seemed like a small natural concreted part to it that held water for the animals in it, so earlier this year Dan had put some of our extra concrete next to it to help it hold more water. On our way to town we saw this dead javalina on the side of the road. Pretty gross, but still interesting to get that close to it without it being alive and ready to attack you.