West Texas Road Trip!

Welcome to the West Texas Road Trip blog post! This is one I have been working on for a while and I have so much to say about the incredible things we got to see and do! The best part about this kind of vacation is that it wasn’t so much of a relax-and-do-nothing type trip, it was more of an active and introspective type of trip… which can be much more rewarding at times.

The places I will cover in this post are Del Rio (briefly), Marfa, Terlingua, and BIG BEND.

4th of July morning Sean and I left bright and early to make it to Del Rio by noon. We had plans to spend the holiday with Sean’s aunt and uncle (Tito Jose!)

Side note: He’s going to be our officiant at the wedding! Yay!

We got to go to the oldest Winery in Texas and see Lake Amistad which was so fun! I genuinely love Sean’s family so much. They have been so good to me since day one and I honestly don’t know where or who I’d be without them.

Unfortunately, we only had one day to spend with the family so we ended the night with a nice dinner and some fireworks at a local community event. The next day we were back on the road to Marfa!

Oh! I almost forgot! We saw this little target on the side of the highway in the middle of absolute nowhere on the way to Marfa! haha

It was seriously the cutest thing! We had too much fun with this.

The first thing we did when we got to Marfa was eat of course. There was no question about where we would go because… if Beyonce went to Food Shark, then it must be good, right?!

Sean and I shared the Marfalafel and then were quickly on our way to El Cosmico!

I don’t even know where to begin with how much I loved El Cosmico/Marfa. We had originally booked a tepee but since there was a storm that blew it over, we were upgraded to a trailer… and man am I grateful for that! It was honestly magical. The inside was so cute and quaint. Our trailer was called “Golden.” I was so excited to wear my new JORD watch for this trip. I felt like it fit in so well with the vibe and style. It is a gorgeous wooden watch and I am OBSESSED with the quality. The concave dial and domed crystal allow light to play across the face of the watch as you move your wrist throughout the day and it’s so beautiful! To enter the JORD GIVEAWAY click here.

El Cosmico is the kind of place you go to find yourself. It’s a peaceful and humbling place. I absolutely loved it. The shower was outside next to the trailer so you can shower under the stars… and there were a lot of them out there.

There are a lot of cute shops in the city that we walked around to before dinner. We ate a fancy meal at the St. George Hotel which was delicious. Then it was off to see the Marfa Lights!

I will say, we are pretty certain we saw one which was actually very close to us! It was an amazing experience and the stars out there are so beautiful they will make you cry. I know that might not make any sense, but if you see them in person, you’d understand.

We also got to stop at the Prada Marfa. This place was surreal. As a famous art installation, people come from far and wide to see this and it is definitely worth it. I love that we finally got to see this insanely cool place.

Off to Terlingua!

We got to Terlingua around 5 PM from Marfa and were super excited about staying in our tiny terlingua that we found on Airbnb 🙂 It was seriously the cutest little tiny house! It’s cool cause it’s modern and cute, but in the middle of a ghost town haha we enjoyed it so much. For more of tiny terlingua watch my vlog! You can skip to the terlingua part by clicking the time by “Terlingua” in the description.

With what little daylight we had, we saw the cemetery and grabbed some chips and queso at High Sierra Bar & Grill. I don’t know if it was all the traveling but it was phenomenal! haha best chips and queso I ever had.

Then for dinner we ate at the famous Starlight Theatre which was fantastic as well. We were supposed to go to La Kiva after dinner but we wended up just making a fire and watching the stars as the night fell. Again, the stars were breathtaking.

Last but certainly not least, Big Bend. We woke up super early from tiny terlingua to get some drone footage and get on the road to the park because we wanted to get a good campsite. We set up camp in the Chisos Basin and then did the Window Trail which was about a 3 hour long hike. The end of that trail was magnificent. I hadn’t seen something that beautiful in a very, very long time. As you can see from the pictures, you could just see for miles and miles, like it never ended! I am in love with the pictures we got, I know I will cherish them forever.

After our hike, we headed back to beat nightfall and cooked some good campin’ food on our fancy GSI Outdoors cookware that Sean got for the trip. It was darn good! I was so tired that I passed out right after eating haha

The next morning we woke up early to do the Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive before our evening hike. We saw some really cool historical spots as well as Santa Elena Canyon. It’s so crazy to think that it was all under water at one point, the whole desert was.

We had packed some sandwiches for the road and ate on the drive. Then, we headed back to do the Lost Mine trail. This was the trail Sean most looked forward to and it was definitely very rewarding. It seemed like you could see all of Big Bend from there! During our hike to the top it actually poured down rain and I was so worried about my camera… luckily my camelbak was water resistant for the most part. Eventually, it stopped raining but by the time we made it to the top, we were still a little wet and there was a lot of wind up there so it was FREEZING! But it’s okay, because we weren’t there to complain about the weather lol.

It took us about 4 hours to complete the hike and it was about 5 miles I believe. We were gonna cook dinner after our hike, but we felt like we had just been through so much that we ended up just going to the one and only restaurant they had in the park. It was so nice to have a home cooked meal after being rained on haha

I made sure to stay awake this night so that I could enjoy the stars. From the Basin we could actually see the milky way and it was incredible. It was a once in a lifetime view and I know I will never forget it.

I highly recommend this kind of trip for anyone who is doing any kind of soul-searching. It will really help you find yourself and it will remind you what matters in the world and in your life.

Personally, I received confirmation that I am right where I need to be in life and I really lucked out with more happiness than I could have ever imagined.