Mark P Betts
Rain Comes to Big Bend National Park Opening Act
I was so lucky this year. The New Mexico Geological Society Fall Field Conference was early because it was located in the high mountains of Southwest Colorado. The planners wanted to time the conference with the height of the Aspen colors and they succeeded! The early date also meant that I might catch the last of the summer monsoon season further south in the Chihuahuan desert on my way back home.
The previous photograph showed that the clouds and monsoon were still active at Guadalupe Mountains National Park. The drive from the park to Van Horn was spectacular. The road travels straight down a graben named Salt Valley. Mountains parallel the road to the west and form a blockade to the south causing the road to swerve 15 miles to the east after streaking south for 50 miles straight as an arrow. There are only two or three big ranches on the west side of the road and Jeff Bezos of Amazon fame has bought all of them land along the east side of the road and has built the Blue Origin Space Port there.
This valley is dazzling at dusk especially if the heat of the day has fired up thunderstorms. Towering castles of white shot up into the deep blue of the west Texas dusk on the day I drove through this valley and I could see the tongues of rain licking the dusty soil of the valley. As the dusk deepened, the darkness was shattered by the lightning strokes probing the floor of the valley. What a delight for all of my senses. I turned off the air conditioning and rolled down the windows as I drove. The cool air refreshed me as it blew across my skin. The smell of rain was spread across the valley by the down drafts cascading out of the storms, crashing into the valley floor and fanning out in giant dust tsunamis undulating across the valley. I went to sleep that night hoping the monsoon would hold out until I drove to Big Bend the next day.
I was not disappointed!
As soon as I crested the rise at Tornillo Flat in Big Bend, I could see storms forming over Mariscal Mountain and drifting north-east over the Sierra del Carmens. They looked like they could sail past Ernst Tinaja on their course so I decided to head South and drive up the bumpy Old Ore road to Ernst Canyon to see if I could experience the canyon in a thunder shower.
The Old Ore road was rougher than I remembered. It has been a wet two years in the park and the water has washed many areas moving soil, sand, and rocks from one area and then depositing them in another., carving channels and adding bumps.
Many of the ruts contained a lot of water so I knew that some showers had already swept through the area. When I finally bounced into the trail head parking, I turned and was greeted by this wonderful sight.
One thunder shower was headed right for me and about to crest the two low hills that guard the trail head parking lot. To the north, another shower was washing across The Pine Canyon Caldera and the Chisos Mountains on the far right of the photograph.
D0A0925-3
Rain Comes to Big Bend National Park Opening Act
I was so lucky this year. The New Mexico Geological Society Fall Field Conference was early because it was located in the high mountains of Southwest Colorado. The planners wanted to time the conference with the height of the Aspen colors and they succeeded! The early date also meant that I might catch the last of the summer monsoon season further south in the Chihuahuan desert on my way back home.
The previous photograph showed that the clouds and monsoon were still active at Guadalupe Mountains National Park. The drive from the park to Van Horn was spectacular. The road travels straight down a graben named Salt Valley. Mountains parallel the road to the west and form a blockade to the south causing the road to swerve 15 miles to the east after streaking south for 50 miles straight as an arrow. There are only two or three big ranches on the west side of the road and Jeff Bezos of Amazon fame has bought all of them land along the east side of the road and has built the Blue Origin Space Port there.
This valley is dazzling at dusk especially if the heat of the day has fired up thunderstorms. Towering castles of white shot up into the deep blue of the west Texas dusk on the day I drove through this valley and I could see the tongues of rain licking the dusty soil of the valley. As the dusk deepened, the darkness was shattered by the lightning strokes probing the floor of the valley. What a delight for all of my senses. I turned off the air conditioning and rolled down the windows as I drove. The cool air refreshed me as it blew across my skin. The smell of rain was spread across the valley by the down drafts cascading out of the storms, crashing into the valley floor and fanning out in giant dust tsunamis undulating across the valley. I went to sleep that night hoping the monsoon would hold out until I drove to Big Bend the next day.
I was not disappointed!
As soon as I crested the rise at Tornillo Flat in Big Bend, I could see storms forming over Mariscal Mountain and drifting north-east over the Sierra del Carmens. They looked like they could sail past Ernst Tinaja on their course so I decided to head South and drive up the bumpy Old Ore road to Ernst Canyon to see if I could experience the canyon in a thunder shower.
The Old Ore road was rougher than I remembered. It has been a wet two years in the park and the water has washed many areas moving soil, sand, and rocks from one area and then depositing them in another., carving channels and adding bumps.
Many of the ruts contained a lot of water so I knew that some showers had already swept through the area. When I finally bounced into the trail head parking, I turned and was greeted by this wonderful sight.
One thunder shower was headed right for me and about to crest the two low hills that guard the trail head parking lot. To the north, another shower was washing across The Pine Canyon Caldera and the Chisos Mountains on the far right of the photograph.
D0A0925-3