Today we were back on the bike, heading to Marfa, one of the more unusual towns we would visit on this trip . . .

. . . oh and the road surface immediately changed from ‘pebbles’ to ‘boulders’!!

. . . it evidently is quite poor around Presidio and, on our ride north, there were LOTS of abandoned places ‘For Sale’. No need for a sign, just spray paint your offer on the side of the house!!!

I turned around after about an hour and could see Presidio back in the distance. It was a LONGGG 30 mile climb with a constant 2-3% grade. No coasting . . .

. . . but there was plenty of time to look around. Does this look familiar????

The answer is???

Oh yeah, there it is!!!

More green today as we climbed higher towards Marfa . . .

. . . a few ups and a few downs . . .

. . . here was a bobcat that had been hit by a car, probably the day before. Beautiful creature . . . reminded me of the one we saw on the Southern Tier three years ago.

Another natural roadside attraction . . .

Texans have a good imagination!!!

Nothing special about this flat, stretch of highway. No curves, no hills no siteline problems . . .

. . . not one, but . . . 

several perished in a car accident along this lonely stretch of road. Very sad . . .

We knew we were getting close to Marfa, and our home for the night, when we spotted this clean up sign . . . The Marfa Lights!!!

As we rode into town we passed this field with lots of concrete type bunkers. Many people seemed to be moving in and around the buildings . . .

. . . as you can see from this aerial there were many . . .

. . . when we got into camp several of were discussing what they were and came to the conclusion they were part a ‘paintball park’. Jacob, who had been camped here for about three weeks, and was camped right next to us, heard our conversation and came over to tell us they were ‘works of art’ created in the 1970s, by minimalist artist Donald Judd. Who knew!!!!

Judd moved to the sleepy town and help it ‘reinvent’ itself from its former WWII manufacturing history.

It was Sunday and the campground was hosting lots of young people who had come to town for a weekend music festival . . . most young enough to be our grandchildren!!!

As you can see from the aerial photo above the campground was sort of laid out in a circular patter. Lots of wild looking art and light displays at night. Sort of reminded me of a Marfa version of ‘Burning Man’!! Hammocks provided for napping . . .

. . . interesting trailer to rent . . .

. . . and unique ‘open air’ bath. shower facilities . . .

. . . where we think these ‘racks of rocks’ somehow helped heat the shower water . . .

. . . not much privacy . . .

. . . and David and Jane helped conserve water!!!!

We had climbed over 3,500 feet to get to Marfa and the weather was cool as we sat at 4.700 feet for our map meeting. Eating out tonight so we had the meeting first.

David treated the group to ‘Prickly Pear Taffy’ YUM!!

Soon we vanned downtown to the Jett’s Grill at Hotel Paisano . . .

. . . a ‘grande dame’ of an old hotel . . .

. . . nicely restored . . .

. . . with a great bar (I was still on the wagon, at this point) but you can see the G already ‘in place’ across the bar!

Good food all around . . .

. . . including jalapeno country fried steak . . .

. . . and the biggest portobella mushroom hamburger known to man!!!!

With full tummies, it was soon time to venture the nine miles out of town to see the Marfa Lights (if they would appear tonight, no one knew!!)

The lights have been appearing on the horizon, moving around, changing colors, combining and splitting since the late 1800’s. The community, of course, has capitalized on this phenomena and actually funded a viewing/visitor site just off the highway along  with pull through parking . . .

. . . as the sun set we waited . . . and sure enough there were several. ‘unexplainable lights’ on the horizon!!!

oh . . . and the crazy ‘crop circle’ markingson the ground are another whole thing to ponder . . .

Megan captured the whole thing and being the lightest, we were sure she would be the first one to be ‘transported up to the mother ship’!!!

Soon we were back in the van, where on the ride back to the campground, Jo-Ann, formerly a non-believer, couldn’t expound enough on her new found faith in the unknown!!! She led us on an acapella version of the Monkey’s, ‘I’m a Believer’!!!