This post has been updated as we have now seen bears!

We leave Big Bend Monday morning so a quick summary of our time here and a few more photos seem appropriate.

• 1200 volunteer hours between the two of us this season
• 35 degrees – lowest temperature in The Basin
•  89 degrees – highest temperature in The Basin
• 104 degrees – highest temperature in The Park (at Rio Grande Village)
• .26 inches – total rainfall in The Basin (Yes, that’s 26/100ths of an inch.)
• 50 mph – highest windspeed in The Basin
• 10 tents rescued before they blew away
• 21 fuel canisters left behind
• $8.07 + 2 pesos – found money
• 2 hours, 45 minutes – increase in day length since we arrived
• 4 full moons
• 2 blue moons
• 1 super blue blood moon
• 1 total lunar eclipse
• 2 bears seen (mama and her cub on our very last hike)
• 0 mountain lions seen (even though a mama and her kitten were in our campground for several days in a row)
• 1 dozen aoudads seen (Aoudad = Barbary sheep)
• 1 elk seen (Like aoudads, elk were introduced for hunting but jumped fences and came to Big Bend.)
• 142 miles hiked (Alan’s total. Mine should be similar, but I didn’t keep a separate log.)
• 12.9 miles – longest hike (South Rim loop)
• 1,156,000 steps on my fitbit since we left home
• 30,373 steps – most ever on my fitbit in one day
• 17 trips to Cottonwood General Store for groceries
• 6 meals eaten out
• 10 friends came to visit
• 2 HAMs stopped by to talk radios with Alan
• 108 days since we left home (and 8 more before we return)
• 15 months until we return to Big Bend (Yes, we’re coming back August – October 2019. Alan will be in The Basin campground, and I’ll be in The Basin Visitors Center.)

Lately we’ve wandered a bit further off the beaten track:

A snail shell seems an odd thing to find in the desert. The clam shell is a fossil.

Artifacts found near the ruins of a house

We returned to Santa Elena Canyon:

 

And we’ve looked around our campground one last time before we leave:

Casa Grande framed by cholla in bloom

Pyrrhuloxia or desert cardinal

We’ve had a pair of these in the Chisos Oak in front of our trailer for the past two weeks. They like to sing to each other and eat grass seeds but are, unfortunately for us, rather camera-shy.