1. Suggested sights to/from Big Bend National Park
Castroville
A historic district founded in 1844 by Henri Castro, who brought Alsatian settlers
from the Rhineland. The Landmark Inn (an 1840’s inn on the Old San Antonio
Road) has been restored as a state historic site. A walking tour of over 50
historic sites can be downloaded from the internet.
Alamo Village at Brackettville
The centerpiece of this Old West entertainment complex is a replica of the
Alamo, built in 1959 for the John Wayne movie The Alamo. The original Spanish
plans for the mission & adobe artisans from Mexico were used in its
construction. The set, said to be the largest ever built outside Hollywood, has
been since used in countless feature films and hundreds of television shows and
commercials.
Seminole Canyon State Historic Site (pictures)
2, 173 acre park known for Fate Bell Shelter and its 4000 year old pictographs,
considered by many to be some of the oldest and most important examples of
rock art in the New World.
Judge Roy Bean, Law West of the Pecos- Langtry (pictures)
Judge Roy Bean Visitor Center has exhibit depicting facts and legends
surrounding the life of Judge Roy Bean, controversial justice of the peace.
Adjacent to the visitor center is the Jersey Lily, the famous saloon and billiards
hall where the judge held court.
Marathon- Gateway to Big Bend National Park
Gage Hotel – (pictures)
Built in 1927 Cattleman Alfred Gage, the historic hotel has been
restored and furnished with ranching artifacts
Places of Interest after leaving Big Bend
Terlinqua Ghost Town
With the discovery of cinnabar ore in the area in the mid-1880s, the Marfa and
Mariposa mining camp became known as Terlingua. Terlingua was a segregated
village. Mexican families lived east of the company store while Anglos lived on
the village's west side, a section dominated by mine owner Howard E. Perry's
mansion, erected sometime prior to 1910.
Liquid mercury ( or quicksilver) is obtained by heating crushed cinnabar and
production peaked during World War I. By 1922 40 percent of the quicksilver
mined in the United States came from Terlingua, but production began to
decline steadily during the 1930s. On October 1, 1942, the Chisos Mining
Company filed for bankruptcy. A successor firm ceased operations at the end of
World War II when most of the population dispersed. Terlingua became a ghost
town.
During the late 1960s and early 1970s tourism brought new life to the village.
Terlingua became famous for its annual chili cook-off and in 1967 was deemed
the "Chili Capitol of the World" by the Chili Appreciation Society. The former
company store reopened as a gift and art shop, river float trips are scheduled in
the former cantina, and a dinner theater occupies the former motion picture
theater. In 1994 Terlingua had thirteen businesses and a population of twenty-
five. The population was 267 in 2000 with forty-four businesses.

2. Marfa
The Marfa lights are lights which are visible from a viewing area about 10 miles
east of the town of Marfa, Texas. They are the main tourist attraction in the
area. The lights are said to appear to bounce around in the sky, vanish and re-
appear, and thus are considered a mystery by some. To others, the lights are
not a mystery. They are ghosts or swamp gas or radioactive bursts or ball
lightning or navigational lights for space aliens.
The lights were the subject of a segment on the TV series Unsolved Mysteries.
In May 2004, a group from The Society of Physics Students at the University of
Texas at Dallas spent four days investigating and recording lights observed
southwest of the view park using traffic volume monitoring equipment, video
cameras, binoculars, and chase cars. They came to the conclusion that all of the
lights observed over a four night period southwest of the view park could be
reliably attributed to automobile headlights traveling along U.S. 67 between
Marfa and Presidio, TX.
Davis Mountains – Points of Interest (with some pix)
Fort Davis National Historic Site
Located within the Davis Mountains of West Texas, the historic site was
established in 1961 in order to protect one of the best remaining
examples of a United States Army fort in the southwestern United
States. From 1854 to 1891, Fort Davis was strategically located to
protect emigrants, mail coaches, and freight wagons on the Trans-Pecos
portion of the San Antonio-El Paso Road and the Chihuahua Trail, and to
control activities on the southern stem of the Great Comanche War Trail
and Mescalero Apache war trails
Fort Davis is important in understanding the presence of African
Americans in the West and in the frontier military because the 24th and
25th U.S. Infantry and the 9th and 10th U.S. Cavalry, all-black regiments
(known as the Buffalo Soldiers), which were established after the
American Civil War, were stationed at the post.
Today, twenty-four restored historic buildings and over 100 ruins and
foundations are part of Fort Davis National Historic Site. Five of the
historic buildings have been refurnished to the 1880s, making it easy for
visitors to envision themselves being at the fort at the height of its
development. A self-guided tour of the fort begins at the site's visitor
center. Living history demonstrations are common during the summer
months.
Davis Mts State Park and Indian Lodge
Davis Mountains State Park, 2708.9 acres in size, is located in Jeff Davis
County, four miles northwest of Fort Davis, approximately halfway between
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Carlsbad Caverns, and Big Bend
National Park.
The Davis Mountains, the most extensive mountain range in Texas, were
formed by volcanic activity during the Tertiary geologic period, which began
around 65 million years ago. These mountains were named after Jefferson
Davis, U.S. Secretary of War and later President of the Confederacy, who
ordered the construction of the Fort Davis army post.
Indian Lodge is a unique inn located in Jeff Davis County northwest of Fort
Davis within the bounds of Davis Mountains State Park. The historic
section of the lodge was constructed in the 1930s by the Civilian

3. Conservation Corps (CCC) and features the original interiors and
furnishings. It resembles a Southwestern Native-American-style, multilevel
pueblo village. Indian Lodge was voted the #1 accommodation in Texas by
readers of Texas Highways magazine in 1992.
McDonald Observatory
Operated by the University of Texas at Austin, the McDonald
Observatory is an astronomical observatory located on Mount Fowlkes
and Mount Locke in the Davis Mountains of West Texas (19 miles
northwest of Fort Davis). The high and dry peaks of the Davis Mountains
make for some of the darkest and clearest night skies in the region and
provide excellent conditions for astronomical research. The observatory
has a 107-inch telescope, the world’s largest telescope available for
public viewing.
Overland Trail Museum in Fort Davis
Local history exhibits are housed in 1883 home of a Texas Ranger.
Neill Museum in Fort Davis
Museum, located in the historic 1898 Trueheart House, has five rooms
of antique toys, dolls and collectibles.
Balmorhea State Park
features 3.5 million gallon San Solomon Springs-fed pool. Great for
scuba diving.
Chihuahuan Desert Visitor Center
Located 4 miles south of Ft. Davis, this 500 acre research facility
includes a greenhouse, arboretum, and botanical garden featuring
Chihuahuan Desert species.