Q & A with Mary S. Black about Her Book "From the Frio to Del Rio"

Just posted over on my main every-Monday blog, Madam Mayo:

One of my very favorite places not just in Texas but in the galaxy is the Lower Pecos Canyonlands, so I was delighted to see that Texas A & M Press has published Mary S. Black's splendid and much-needed guidebook, From the Frio to Del Rio: Travel Guide to the Western Hill Country and Lower Pecos Canyonlands. 

From the catalog:

"Each year, more than two million visitors enjoy the attractions of the Western Hill Country, with Uvalde as its portal, and the lower Pecos River canyonlands, which stretch roughly along US 90 from Brackettville, through Del Rio, and on to the west. Amistad National Recreation Area, the Judge Roy Bean Visitors’ Center and Botanical Garden, Seminole Canyon State Park, and the Briscoe-Garner Museum in Uvalde, along with ghost towns, ancient rock art, sweeping vistas, and unique flora and fauna, are just a few of the features that make this distinctive section of the Lone Star State an enticing destination.

Mary S. Black
Author of Peyote Fire
and
From the Frio to Del Rio

"Now, veteran writer, blogger, and educator Mary S. Black serves up the best of this region’s special adventures and secret treasures. From the Frio to Del Rio is chock-full of helpful maps, colorful photography, and tips on where to stay, what to do, and how to get there. In addition there are details for 10 scenic routes, 3 historic forts and 7 state parks and other recreation areas."

Herewith an interview with the author:

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write this book? 

MARY S. BLACK: I think what inspired me was the land itself, and the history. The Lower Pecos Canyonlands are not well known by most people, but the landscape is incredibly majestic and unexpected. You can be driving 70 miles per hour down the highway through the desert, when, wham, a huge canyon veers off to the left like a sudden tear in the earth.  ... CONTINUE READING 

> Your comments are always welcome. Write to me here.

P.S. For the second half of this month I am artist-in-residence at the Guadalupe Mountains National Park in Texas. I'll be giving a free travel and nature writing workshop, probably over Memorial Day weekend. Details to be announced shortly. And yes, the Marfa Mondays podcasts will resume ASAP. Twenty have been posted to date, four more are in-process for a total of 24. Listen in anytime here.

Curly Tail Panther and White Shaman, 

Two Stunning Rock Art Sites in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands

Gifts of the Ancient Ones: Greg Williams on 

the Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands

Blood Over Salt: Q & A with Paul Cool about "Salt Warriors"

"Over Burro Mesa and into Apache Canyon" in CENIZO JOURNAL

I am in deepest Mexico for the moment and so haven't yet put my paws on the new issue of the Far West Texas' always-lovely Cenizo Journal, but my on-the-spot informers tell me it is out and it does contain my essay, "Over Burro Mesa." Herewith:

OVER BURRO MESA 

AND INTO 

APACHE CANYON

By C.M. Mayo

I had ghosts on my mind—not in a spooky way, just stray thoughts about long-gone people on a bright, hot morning in the Big Bend National Park. In the foothills of the Chisos, I parked on the road-side. My aim was to hike over Burro Mesa west into Apache Canyon, to a corral where Apaches stashed stolen horses, and to explore an arrow quarry. 

The week before in this canyon, two Italian women fended off a mountain lion. Apparently it was a young lion and their screams caused it to scramble off—but that wasn't the kind of adventure I was looking for. I figured my guide, Charlie Angell, could handle any critters better than I could. 

Sun blasted down. The only clouds were wisps, as if from a paintbrush dipped in milk. Thorns snagged my jeans. The trail became so faint, I surely would have lost it on my own. Just when the hill dipped, then came another trudge up another rise through whips of ocotillo, lechugilla, biznaga, beargrass, stunted soap trees... Many had been incinerated, probably from lightning strikes. 

No sign of burros on Burro Mesa. In two hours in this merciless landscape, we had seen no animal tracks, no scat; one lizard; one butterfly; two ravens.

It began to seem we were hiking not so much to a place but into the past, for this was a soundscape deeply strange to me. I live in Mexico City, one of the biggest in the world, where the thrum of traffic surges and fades, but never ceases. On myriad saint days, firecrackers pop like popcorn; weekends, the thump-a-thump-a of parties. Helicopters roar; dogs bark. 

Less than two centuries ago, Burro Mesa and Apache Canyon, indeed, the whole of the Big Bend, were Mexican territory—Mexico City the capital. But notionally. Maps of the period tell the truer story, a blank space with a name that was a shrug of ignorance or, for those who had heard the stories of kidnappings and scalpings, a drum-beat of horror: LA APACHERIA.

Finally, not that there was anyplace to sit, we sat down. 

"Drink up," Charlie insisted, handing me another bottle of water.

And this was when, suddenly as that mountain lion must have appeared, a lone figure carrying a pole taller than he was, loomed above us. A Texan in expensive-looking drab olive gear. He'd been hiking for several days, he said brightly—yesterday, the Mesa de Anguila. Mighty surprised to see us. We were the first hikers he'd encountered in the past three days.

And the pole?

For scaring mountain lions. But it didn't weigh much; it was bamboo. After twenty years, its bottom was starting to split-he lifted it to reveal a mass of duct tape. From his flask, he drank water, but he did not sit down. In a moment, he and his fabulous pole had disappeared down the hill.

We found the dry stone corral tucked against the mountain, blanketed in shade. It was filled with rubble and brush. Beyond a waist-high forest of creosote, the arrow quarry would have been easy to miss. It was not a hole in the ground, but a cliff of flaky-looking dark rock. Broken arrowheads lay all about: bone white, pink, orange, some tinged lavender. Before I put it back, I held one in my hand. Who knew how old it was, a hundred, five hundred years? 

I tried to conjure an image of the hands that had chipped, so expertly, until this triangle, a form at once unfathomably ancient, life-giving, and deadly, emerged. It was probably a man, probably older than most in his tribe— let's say he had an arthritic knee. A claw strung onto his necklace.

# # #

Listen in to "Over Burro Mesa" (plus "The Kickapoo Ambassadors") in Marfa Mondays #14

Watch my mini-clip video of Apache Canyon:




Big Bend National Park: This Video Could Save Your Life!

Listen in to (or read the transcript of) my interview with founding editor of Cenizo Journal, Dallas Baxter: "This Precious Place." 

Listen in to (or read the transcript of) my interview with the immensely talented and daredevil photographer Paul V. Chaplo, author of Marfa Flights, "On Finding Composition in the Landscape"

Listen in to the whole enchilada! Nineteen podcasts so far.

(Links go to my main blog, Madam Mayo)

12 Tips for Summer Hiking in the Desert

(How to Stay Cool, Avoid Actinic Keratosis, Blood, and Killer Bees)

La Chora Interminable Goes to Marfa

Top 10 Books Read in 2014

Podcast #2 Charles Angell in the Big Bend

Now live: The Marfa Mondays podcast, this month, an interview with Big Bend expert Charles Angell, which took place at the Hoodoos in Big Bend State Park, right on the Rio Grande, and in Fort Leaton, near Presidio, Texas. Listen in at www.cmmayo.com/marfa or directly atpodomatic.com.

The Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project is a monthly podcast about Marfa, Texas and environs. It began last month (listen to the introduction here), and will run through the end of 2013.

Here's a mini-clip (a brief, edited video) about the Hoodoos:



>More mini-clips about Marfa and the Big Bend.

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