We found out that something else in the van needed replacing, and the new plan is that it will be ready by eleven tomorrow morning.
We are all starting to love the roughed-up truck, and I'm not sure what it is about us and naming vehicles, but we named it Big Tex. Big Tex has just driven all over the area between Fort Davis, Marfa and Alpine. These towns make a little triangle and are about twenty minutes apart from one another.
I guess I've got a lot to cover about what we did to occupy ourselves for three days.
- We went to a "Star Party" at McDonald Observatory. This was so cool. We got to see Saturn and four of its five moons (my favorite thing), as well as the moon up close and a star that is actually two stars, which are actually double stars themselves. I'm not sure why they don't just say "This star is actually four stars". It would be a lot easier.
- We did a little swimming.
- We went to Alpine and ate at a cafe called the Reata.
- We learned about the area at the Museum of the Big Bend.
- Then we drove to Marfa, and to our surprise, there was a very nice restaurant called Cochineal. OK, I know it looks like we did nothing but eat back to back, but we really did do some other stuff in between: went into a bookshop, walked around in a couple historic hotel lobbies, and drove, drove, drove. Oh! We also found out that the 1950s' movie Giant was filmed in Marfa. I guess that's their only claim to fame besides the Marfa Mysetery Lights. They are supposed to be UFOs but...ya know....
- We also hiked a mountain.
- After finding a great little health food store in Fort Davis, we started talking with the cashier, and realized that everyone in the area is friendly.
When we found out that we had to stay yet another night, we decided to go back to one of the hotels we walked through in Alpine. And that's where we are now.
