No cell phone, No Computer, No electricity, No noise, No people, it’s 100° in the shade and it’s March 22nd at 5 in the afternoon.  I really didn’t think I could get too much sunshine, but Ol’ Sole is to be respected and there’s very little shade here to be found, so I clothes-pinned my sheet to the front panel of the screen house that I couple to my tent.  There are few insects here in the Sonora Desert, so the screen part really isn’t needed, but I immensely appreciate the shadow cast by the roof and the sheet.
    I’m camped at Terlingua Abajo along Terlingua Creek in Big Bend National Park (www.nps.gov/bibe) at the southern tip of Texas that extends down into Mexico.  Sitting on a lawn chair in the creek is outstanding.  I did that last evening, but now the sun is too intense. My feet would love it, but the rest of me would be like being cooked in a crock pot minus the humidity - there’s none here. I walked to the head waters of the Creek, where it springs up from the desert this morning; yesterday I walked to the old mining town and on to what I call Desert Canyon and back.  Both walks ended up being considerably longer than I planned, so this afternoon I’m coolin’ it, R & R time.
    Yesterday I found a wheat penny dated 1919, lying in the dirt in the desert between the ruins of several stone dwellings in the old mining town. This is a true ghost town. There’s a cemetery on the hill overlooking the ruins of this deserted community so the spirits can keep watch. It’s littered with tin cans, pieces of tools and equipment, cooking utensils, pottery and other items that were used to eke a life out of this baked barren land. Just a few moments before the penny appeared I was thinking, wouldn’t it be neat to find an old coin. I was thinking more of a gold Spanish one, but a wheat penny will do!  Wow! If it could talk.  What has it seen while lying here for 80 or 90 years? The stories it could tell! I think I read somewhere that the mining done here was surface mining. The ore extracted was quicksilver which was used in the manufacture of tin, and the demand increased as WWI ensued.  By the 1940s the mine became unprofitable and the equipment was sold for scrap.
    I’ve been coming here in March or April since 2003 and I can’t imagine doing manual labor in the heat of the desert in those Spring months let alone in the extreme heat of summer.  Wow!  Where I camp is the former site of vegetable farms that fed the workers. There were many more cottonwood trees then and I’m sure under one is where I’d have wanted to be, then. More info can be found at:   http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/CC/dkc5.html.
    This morning I awoke to an absolutely gorgeous sunrise. The sky over the close-by bluffs, desert, and Chisos Mountains in the distance lit up with blends of yellows, gold, and orange. There was no time to heat water for coffee, just get the camera, tripod, and scurry up the butte behind my tent and start shooting.  Most times the color fades before I’m in position, but this morning I got several beautiful images. I bracketed the exposures (under, correct & over; tech info: Canon Digital Rebel xti, 22-55 zoom lens @ 46, ISO 100,1/6 sec, F13, shutter priority metering, & under exposed by 1 stop) to assure a good picture was captured and enjoyed the spectacle. What a way to start the day; then a walk up the creek to see the javelinas and what nature had to show me.
    Tomorrow I’ll pack a lunch with several ACBs, and paddle up into St. Elena Canyon to enjoy the shade of its depths, listen to the echo of canyon wrens, then relax sitting in the Creek with my feet in the trickling water. Terlingua Creek oozes up out of two rocky sandy places.  The creek bed is dry up stream from there for miles, but I think to the north there may be water or at least sometimes. Here it’s 30-50 feet wide in places and the water is 6” to several feet deep in some holes.  By the time it arrives at the Rio Grande at St. Elena Canyon about five miles from my tent, it’s barely a small stream, overlooked by the tourists, and very insignificant in comparison to those two huge people attractions, but the reflection in the calm water about a half mile from the Canyon is marvelous and no people (Reflection Photo Tech Info: no under/over metering, 1/250 @ F7.1 & 36mm- other info same as above). Near my camp site the creek was very significant because it supplied drinking water for the miners, moisture needed by the farmers, and now the source of the soaking, soothing and my rejuvenation from it’s trickling over my feet.
    There’s more pics of my camp, the canyon, and this site of relaxation at:  http://picasaweb.google.com/o.c.fotoguy2009.  
    Good to see so many locals supporting Kathy at Coins Restaurant last Sunday. Cancer is the Devil and doesn’t care who it inflicts, a Kennedy or one of us, it’s indiscriminant, and has no mercy.  We care for ours