Davis Mountains – Texas
On January 12, 2016 by Jay McCormickAfter leaving the Big Bend NP and SP area we headed north about 125 miles to Davis Mountain State Park. If we had to choose a single word to describe what we were seeing as we approached the Fort Davis area it would be WOW!
Image from the Davis Mountain SP web site
It really felt as if we had been transported hundreds of miles north to the foothills of the Rockies.
We drove through the cool(I can’t say cute because I’m a dude) town of Fort Davis (population 1201). It was mid-afternoon on New Years Eve and the place was hopping…for a small town with a population of 1201. The state park is 4 miles outside of Fort Davis. We checked in and got our site assigned (#12). It was a pull-though with trees on both side. It was perfect for an RV that’s no wider than a few feet with no slides. So, we drove back to the entrance of the park and tried again. The park staff was awesome and found us a much larger pull-through site (#24). After some minor leveling we completed our setup. It was cold with some light rain. Perfect football weather.
And guess what…they had cable TV in the park. I know I should be experiencing the great outdoors and I would. Just as soon as I thawed out and got my college football fix. I found the game on TV, turned up the volume and to my dismay I couldn’t understand anything the broadcasters were saying since they were speaking Spanish. The only way I could get the early game is ESPN2 with the ESPN Deportes audio feed. Oh well. Better than no football at all!
The next morning I did go for a nice run at 5,000+ ft (altitude in Texas!). Some of it was on the park roads and some of it on the trails. One of my “walk breaks” during my run was around the Indian Lodge, which is a 39-room full service hotel with a restaurant and gift shop. What makes the Indian Lodge such a remarkable structure is that it was built by unskilled CCC workers in the 1930’s. A state park with a hotel, restaurant and cable TV…I must be kidding. Nope!