Pecos, Texas

Pecos, Texas

Weather: low 24 degrees in Alpine, high 48 degrees in Pecos, clear skies

Brrrr, it was cold this morning! The faucet froze because I forgot to cover it up last night. Using a hair dryer, it only took a couple of minutes to thaw it out.

I wrote in an earlier post that we had a tire on the RV that had a slow leak. Well, while we were parked in Alpine, the leak got worse. I made it down to a tire store, where the tire was removed, checked out, and repaired. It seems we had picked up a nail in our travels. I was more than happy to pay what was charged for the repair.

Leaving the tire store, we took Texas 67 north to I-10, where we picked up an FM road north to US 285, which took us into Pecos. We're staying in the Escapees RV park while we're here. We were parked and set up by 1230 hours.

After I rested a few minutes, I went into Pecos to check out the town. This is a town of about 9,500 people, located in west Texas on the high desert. The terrain is flat and rocky here, with scattered mesquite and creosote bushes. Dry, dry, dry.

Now, don't get me wrong. Even though it is dry here, the area produces some of the best cantaloupes in the world, the famous Pecos cantaloupes. We can say from personal experience that they are good. In addition, the area grows onions and cotton.

This is a picture of the Reeves County Courthouse. The architecture is a combination of Classical Revival and Mediterranean. This is the second courthouse, and was completed in 1937. Unfortunately, this is the best picture I could get because of the trees. That's kind of funny, since there are not that many trees here.

Continuing on with my tour of the town, the next stop was at a replica of Judge Roy Bean's Saloon and courtroom. Judge Bean was considered to be the law west of the Pecos River, including Pecos. Apparently, it didn't matter that he had no law training. He didn't allow hung juries in his court, and during recesses, the spectators had to buy rounds of drinks in his saloon.

Normally, I don't put pictures of graves and headstones in the blog. In this case, I couldn't resist. This is the grave and headstone of Clay Allison, a famous gunfighter of the old West. His headstone had the following on it:
ROBERT C ALLISON
CSA
CO F
9th TENN CAV
SEP 2 1840
JUL 3 1887
GENTLEMAN
GUN FIGHTER

In addition, a separate stone had the legend "He never killed a man that didn't deserve it." I think the actual truth may be a little murkier than that. Supposedly, he killed about 20 men, and was considered a real bad man, in every sense of the word.

Well, I'm a little tired after all the excitement. I'm going to relax a little before bedtime.

More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Pecos, Texas: Home Of The World’s First Rodeo

Not all who wander are lost.