Sunrise Mountain Scramble in the Neighborhood

It has been a very social week, with guests visiting and camping here on my land. We took turns improvising some gourmet home cooked meals and sharing ideas about living off grid. My favorite event of the week was a pre-dawn hike up the mountain behind my house.

We woke up at 5:30 in the morning to catch this view of the sun rising over Mexico.
This is from the mountain right behind my land

Exploring the Big Bend

Having a friend visit is always a good reason to go exploring Big Bend. This last Summer, I traveled through a half dozen National parks, including Yellowstone, The Grand Canyon, and Glacier National Park, and I must say that Big Bend holds its own when compared to these more well known parks. Big Bend is the least visited National Park in the country, but has the highest percentage of return visitors. Those who make it all the way here, come back for more. The last few days, I did a lot of hiking, including 14 miles in the Chisos within 24 hours. The 14 miles included my first venture up Emory Peak, the highest summit in the Big Bend. Here are some photos:

a glimpse into the window

UPDATE - 2008 Summary

I am traveling and performing music around Texas. Here is a link to some December 2008 photos of the Big Bend area. 

I have also been posting some articles on TreeHugger.com and PlanetGreen.com. Here is a link to one that got alot of Diggs:

The Bad News of 2008 is also the Good News

vamanos veggie

Sometimes the best work parties are the ones that happen unexpectedly. I met Jori and Betsy at the Terlingua Ranch Lodge when I played a show there a couple of nights ago. We got to talking. They told me about their travels across the country on waste veggie oil. They have traveled over 5000 miles by using the grease that restaurants throw out. They spent the last couple of nights camping out at Earth Language and today they helped us finish the foundation of the dome. Their help turned a full work day into half that. We spent the rest of the day hiking and playing an old Yiddish card game called Klabberjass that my grandparents taught me.

To finish the foundation, we filled in the gaps between the bricks with the same materials as the bricks themselves ( 5 parts gravel, 5 parts sand, and two parts cement ).

Here is a link to Jori and Betsy's blog about their travels using grease.

The Adventures of Remington and the Prickly Pears

Friends Lindsey, Preston, and Remington paid a visit from Austin ( and Denton ) this last weekend. They win for being the first of my friends to make the treck out here. I'll let the photos tell the story. These are our combined photos from the trip ( still waiting for more to roll in ). See the sidebar for more pictures and albums.

The entrance to Big Bend National Park is just a few miles from town. Ojinaga ( in Mexico ) is about 50 miles.