I had the privilege of guiding a party of seven last weekend in the beautiful Colorado Bend wilderness in late May. Five of the seven were boys ranging from 6 to 9 years old. I’d taken these boys out before, and it was time to up their game. They rose to the challenge.
The troops gather on a dusty street in Hico, Texas….
From Dallas, we drove ninety minutes to Siloville Rock Climbing Gym, a gem in Hico. Dave and Kathy have converted four historic grain silos into rock climbing walls, both inside and outside. Unfortunately, coronavirus regulation restricted us to climbing only the outside walls, but that was plenty. As one of the adults said, “I’ve been to indoor climbing gyms before, but to climb high, feel the wind and hear it in your ears, and look down to see how high you are is a different experience. After I looked down once, I decided not to look down again.” The view from the top, however, is spectacularly scenic and surprisingly relaxing.
From there, we drove to Colorado Bend State Park, where we hiked the three-mile round trip to Gorman Falls, the tallest, continuously flowing waterfall in Texas. The tufa, coral-like sheets of calcium as fine as lace depositing out of the water as the water turns to spray, was much in evidence. We could see rainbows in the waterfall too, although they were hard to capture on camera.
The next day we canoed down the Colorado. Here the river alternates between rapids and consecutively deeper pools, flowing northeast until it slams into a cliff wall and then turns southeast in a dramatic curve that gives the area of Colorado Bend its name. During the trip, we noticed fins sticking out of the rapids. Closer inspection showed massive white bass, two to three feet long and between five and ten pounds hovering in the rapids in their annual mating run up the Colorado, analogous to the salmon of the Northwest. The depth of the water was insufficient to cover their entire bodies. The spectacle was moving for the shear number and size of the fish. One of the youngsters almost succeeded in clubbing one of them. Also amazing was the sight on one of the high banks of the river of a quintessential cowboy, replete with cowboy hat and firearm on his side, riding a unicycle. This latter vision prompted me to say, “I’ve seen it all.” Unfortunately, I have no photographic evidence but only the eyewitness of one of the other adults in the group who also saw the cowboy on his unusual steed.
The last day was a recovery one in which we went fishing and enjoyed burgers at the (only) store in Bend. A full weekend with a good crew.
A raptor soars lazily above the cliffs of the Colorado Bend.