2,073 miles later...

...we're back from Big Bend National Park. The weather was ideal, and we had a terrific time. Each morning we left in the dark to be on the hiking trails at first light.

We calculated our total hikes and came up with 21.5 miles in 4 days of hiking plus 2 hours on horseback.

Crossing the Pecos river on day 2.

Santa Elena canyon on the Rio Grande. Our first hike of the trip at BBNP. There were tons of people on this trail that afternoon. It seemed like they too had just gotten to the park since many of the kids seemed to be in traveling clothes and flip flops. It got us a little worried but every day after that we were on the trail at dawn and were the first ones on many trails.

Caroline's first trip to Mexico. This is not what you expect for the mighty Texas Mexico border. We followed the law and never touched land on the other side, but we did do a lot of rock chunking from the center of the river.

Caroline and Amy in the last mile of the trip. Caroline was the " scout, speedboat or cheetah" most of the week to encourage her to keep going. Amy was the " anchor or grandma" for most of the trip. At some point along this trail Caroline took off her jacket and tied it on my backpack telling me, " Mom, now you have a cheetah skin on your back. You can go faster. Easy for her to say when we are carrying all her stuff!