Stalking the Roadrunner

I mentioned a week or so ago that during my time here in Texas I had not yet seen an armadillo or a roadrunner. The day after I said that, I found the armadillo, road kill, and refrained from taking pictures. But I have not yet seen a roadrunner and I am eager to do that. Perhaps today. Maybe if I keep a window open I will hear his familiar little, "beep, beep," to alert me of his presence.

We have a day of heavy clouds to drive in, pleasant, and yet I hope to see the sun later. A dam on the Rio Grande north of Del Rio forms the Amistad Reservoir, so as we headed north this morning we finally got to see the Rio Grande.





Down the road a short while, we came to the small town of Langtry, which we learned had been named for Lillie Langtry, the object of Judge Roy Bean's affections or infatuations, no one is quite sure which. Here at Langtry is Judge Roy Bean's actual Jersey Lilly Saloon, to compare with the replica we saw at the museum in Del Rio.



This one is actually nicer! Here is the room where Judge Bean died. I know you will find the ghostly light exiting through the window interesting.



The windmill above the saloon is a real, circa 1900, working windmill assembled from a kit by the McCormick Dearing company.





And a short way from the saloon is Judge Bean's home, which he called the Opera House, apparently hoping to entice Jersey Lilly, a famous singer, to come.


What probably didn't exist here in Judge Bean's time was a wonderful cactus garden on the grounds. There were many more varieties of cactus than these, which are a few of the outstanding. This was my first saguaro cactus and I learned that it is not native to this area but had been brought here from, probably, Arizona, many years ago, probably taking at least 75 years to reach this size.



Here is a purple prickly pear cactus.

This one was unlabeled.

And this is the aguave cactus that, with proper handling, becomes Mexican tequila.

Hmm, how dry has it been if the cactus needs watering?

Again, we encountered an inspection point. No illegal-alien-sniffing dog at this one, and we were very quickly moved on through.




As we travelled north, the flat barren land changed to rolling hills and the sun began to shine. We are probably now on the western edge of Texas Hill Country.




I can see on the altimeter feature of my GPS that we have gone from 500 feet above sea level at Del Rio to over 3000 feet as we near Fort Stockton.




Coming into Fort Stockton, where we will spend the night, here's what we saw on an overpass.



Are they making fun of me or what? Will I see the real thing tomorrow?


Tomorrow is a new day.