Still Gravity

We reached Palo Duro through the small city of Claude, Texas. At The Burro, we stopped for a coffee. This part of town smells to old history with the 1912 building of the courthouse across the coffee shop.  45 miles later, we stood looking the multicolored rocks of Palo Duro Canyon from the visitor center. Palo Duro Canyon, the "Grand Canyon" of Texas, seen from the rim - License our images  here .  Layers of orange, red, brown, yellow, grey, and the shining white veins of gypsum competing for space on the face of the tall cliffs. Color lines that show the age of Palo Duro canyon. 240 million years. What an elder.  Around the canyon rim, the flat expanses of the Llano Estacado - Staked Plains - nurture endless winds. This treeless world of grass of the Texas Panhandle inspires a sad mood. The canyon is an oasis.  Palo Duro means hard or strong wood in Spanish. The name is for the Rocky Mountain junipers that grow in the canyon. This wood is very rot resistant.  Apache Indians

Looks like another trend is gone and that's normal. Trends come and go. And we are familiar because the same happens to fashions and labels - "caravans" became "vans" in 1829, or so it's said.  Also, the expectations around the van life were unrealistic. Simple economics. Too many wanting a "job" doing tourism in a never-ending vacation. Social media saturation made van life boring. The system crashed and confronted with reality many folks jumped out. But van life didn't start like this. In 2011, before the hashtag evolved into a social media frenzy,  Foster Huntington  used his van only to support his creative life as photographer.  I think is good that the van life trend is fading off. The invasion brought crowded places, noisy campers, wildlife disturbances, and mountains of trash to the American wilderness. Also brought price increases for campgrounds and outdoor activities - a matter of supply and demand.  Yep, living in a van is not easy.

This plant has many names: pond apple, swamp apple, monkey apple, alligator apple - because American alligators eat their fruits. For science, it's  Annona glabra . Alligator apple in the Everglades - License our images  here . The ripe fruit is edible, but the seeds are poisonous. The pips are dark brown when ripe. At that point, the pulp will be from yellow to orange.  Some say that alligator apple tastes like ripe Honeydew melon , others say that it's bitter. Native Americans made jelly or jam from it. Alligators, turtles, squirrels, birds, and other animals eat the fruits. We haven't tried it - scared of the poisonous seeds.