Day 23; Caprock Canyons State Park, Quitaque, TX: I’ve got Buffalo 66 on DVD

Beam me up, count me in. Three, two one, let’s begin. Let’s get this out of the way. Caprock Canyon is a special place and we are fortunate to have the opportunity to spend time here. Even if we have to change sites 3 times. Worth it! You should visit it.

Let’s finish off last night before we get on with the show. There was little wind so the creaky, squeaky decorative windmill did not turn and keep us awake. Gerry, the only dude with horses did turn off his generator exactly at 2200. I guess that is when “America’s Top Horse Model” is over. Gerry gets no credit cause he was the only generator runner, but good that he followed the rules. The night sky was full of stars. There was no significant light sources in the horse campground (except Gerry’s outdoor light identifying his generator was on). So just stars. Twas beautiful. No pictures were taken. Oh, the coyotes. We heard a lot of coyote calls last night on our walk. They continued for some time, well, until Gerry made them harder to hear, We did not hear them again in the night.

It got a wee bit chilly in the night but our internal van temperature minimum was 13.8. Perfect for a comfortable sleep. We woke up to the distant sound of Gerry’s generator. He kindly waited until 0800 to turn it on. And off it went at 1000. Must have watched Live with Kelly and whoever is sitting beside Kelly now. That’s probably wrong. Likely Fox news.

For the morning hike I chose to take the Wild Horse Trail over to the Lower South Prong Trail. While on the first part I saw a bison galloping across the canyon floor (where I was headed). I failed to get a video. It was beautiful. At the junction of the two trails I could see the galloping bison and his friend.

The bison buddies were far enough away that I felt I could safely go past them. I lived to write about it. On the South Prong Trail. After a km or so on this trail I stopped to take a picture of this rock face.

Then, a few 10s of meters later, I looked and saw a solo bison. Now this fellow was closer and was really close to where the trail went. So we exchanged pictures and took the opportunity to turn around.

The trails are really nice. Cool diversity of stuff to see. I did not see any rattlesnakes. I’m OK with that.

We had a nice relax the rest of the morning. The sun was out, there was little wind and all we had to do was enjoy it. So we did. Around 1000, the bison started gathering at the gate to our camp area. We walked up and had a look.

It seems as though the bison were eating bison kibble. Cause, there was no vegetation in that spot and well, I think I saw the kibble truck come by. This is probably a common thing as a bunch more of the big bison arrived a bit later. They grunted a lot and the lesser bison gave up the kibble. In the picture below you can see one of the big fellas walking on the ridge.

Clearly we had had enough bison sightings. We broke camp and decided to check out all of the “scenic overlooks” marked on the trail map while we waited to check in to our new site. This was a good activity. We went to the farthest first down to the end of the road at a tent camping area.

It was so nice at the tent camping area, we think it would be cool to camp there. We would book a site and sleep in van. Don’t hate, tents are on “RV” spots all the time.

Next stop was a park and hike. The lookout was up a trail. Dang, more beautiful sights. None of the pictures have been enhanced. The sky was amazingly blue.

Near the end of the trail we played a game of “Rock or Bison?”. The dark thing in the middle of the image, is it a rock or a bison? Hint, guess bison.

You would think we had had enough. Wrong. As we drove to the last overlook on the way to the office we were stopped by a bunch of bison. Aha, I had my 360 camera out. We will get some good 360 video. Boo, I failed to hit record, but here are some pictures. It was kind of like when DenDog and I rode our bikes through the bison herd in 2013 (youtube).

OK, done, we promise. We headed to the office to do the paperwork. Saw some bison by the side of the road and in the lake (I know, I said we were done). Stopped by the dump station, still faeces free and parked in our site. What is the site like? Pretty close to the bison super highway.

We had identified this site last year as desirable despite being near the main road.

We hung out, literally, for some relaxation post all the bison watching and scenic vista overload. The wind had really picked up and some clouds appeared. Plenty more bison went by.

Post dinner, we went for a walk along the Canyon Ridge Trail. The trailhead is just behind our campsite.

Seriously, that’s it. Off to the showers. Acceptable. 5/10. We could compare that with my rating last year (I did not re-read). On the plus side there was plenty of hot water and good water pressure. Nothing was dropped.

Hey, I said that was it.

Tomorrow we change sites again. It won’t be as good as this one. I intend to do the Eagle Trail again. It’s about 8km there and back with a fair amount of elevation change. Really nice trail though.

Thank you, nature!