If You Take Your Pants Off… They will Come… And other Stories from the Caprock Canyon Trail

“You two are going alone?!”

“The whole rest of the way?”

Albert looked at us like we had rocks where our brains were supposed to be.

And maybe we did…

Because over the next 13 hours we would cry…

Pray to the rain gods…

Question our sanity…

Swear…

Question our life choices…

And wonder why the hell we signed up for this??

This by the way…. is a story of three idiots

I hope you’re wondering by now…

How we got to an obscure hike in North East Texas called Caprock Canyon in the first place.

Some of your questions might include:

• 64.5 miles in 47 hours… are you guys nuts??
• Why not go tubing for Memorial Day?
• Was that even a trail?
• Who hikes in North Texas?
• Is there even anything to see out there???
• Why didn’t you guys ride bikes?

I know because these are the questions that went through my mind during the hours of 9pm and 1 am, hiking blindly through a sandstorm with only the light of our headlamps inches in front of us to keep us going.

Here’s a little blurb to really put you in the mood of how our hike started

Waiting in the car for the rain to pass

It started over Torchy’s Tacos

It was May 11th and it was the first open patio day I’d had since Quarona as call it began in March.

My friend’s Emily and Tucker invited me out for some tacos and bonding.

Tucker was talking about a state park up North.

The canyons sounded gorgeous.

And the pictures he showed were equally breathtaking.

Beautiful red rock canyons… herds of buffalo roaming freely.

Being from Alaska, I was intrigued. And it was old Indian territory.

This was my chance to see the Wild West for real.

“If you do the whole thing, it’s 64.5 miles start to finish. I’ve been wanting to do it for a long time.”

“Just can’t find anyone to go with.”

I heard some idiot chime in…

“I’d do that.”

I’m looking at Emily

Her lips aren’t moving.

Dianaaaaaa…

Dont you do it. DONT YOU DO IT!

Diana!!! He said SIXTY FIVE. Not 6 point 5!

This, I’ll have you know, is the secret to most of my accomplishments.

Complete lack of understanding and utter delusion for what I’ve signed up for.

I figured, hey, if Tucker can do the whole hike, I can.

Oh the IRONY…

That is not at all how this story turns out… as you will soon see.

Tucker texted me the next day asking what dates I could do the hike and I thought to myself

Really….

How bad could it be?

I decided to asks the experts…

So I went straight to Google and started reading reviews:

• “My husband and I (both in our 60s) prepared for what we thought would be a really fun experience… you know what they say, the best laid plans.”
• “Lots of mosquitos… SO MANY mosquitos.. OH GOD THE MOSQUITOS”
• “Lower leg protection…. is a MUST”

UMMMM…

My mind is running wild imagining Texas bugs…

snakes…

ants…

Imagine sleeping on a pile of frisky fire ants

While a scorpion makes a nest in your pillow and a group of black windows shelters under your tent.

That’s where my brain is going.

Then of course there’s the mosquitos.

Oh GAWD what have I signed up for?

That’s when I read this little gem

“BRING YOUR OWN WATER”

Right now my brain is thinking things like

“How can I get the water into Tucker’s pack without him knowing about it?”

“Is there a donkey I can hire for all my stuff?”

“Maybe I can just be support crew and not do any of this…”

Problem #2…

I’m looking at the map…

If we are walking 64.5 miles one way

How the eff are we getting back?

I’ve told Ana about the hike and she is as equally delusional as I am.

She has agreed to go.

Murphy? Who is Murphy? And What is this law??

Tucker drove ahead and dropped two gallons of water every 10 to 17 miles.

We were suppoed to drive 5 hours to the start of Caprock Canyon, pick up Tucker (he left his truck there) and drive an hour to the end of the trail and start the hike. We’d do at least 10 miles the first night and then two 10 mile sections each day.

We each had to carry all our food and water as well as a sleeping pad and anything else we wanted.

Tucker would bring the tent.

By this point, I felt prepared… and even a little excited.

We were ready for this!

HORSESH*T

It’s mid afternoon Day 2.

And miserable hardly describes it.

Here’s a picture of us about 15 minutes before I lost my mind.

Now you have to understand, the night before, we didn’t even start hiking until 9 pm.

That’s because Ana and I may have been a WEEEEEE bit late leaving Dallas (shhhh we had to stop for snacks and we’re girls so we got sidetracked driving out there).

The first night we made it 12 miles.

This was through a sandstorm so blinding, we could see just inches in front of our feet with headlamps.

The winds got up to 40 miles an hour.

We could hear tree branches breaking near by.

But since we couldn’t see anything, we had no idea just how bad it was. Or how close those branches were to landing on us.

That being said, night hiking this last section of the Caprock Trail at night was awesome (remember, we hiked the trail in reverse, leaving all the pretty stuff for the very end…)

Because you can’t see all the farmland you are hiking through.

The next morning, we woke up to a beautiful sunrise…

And Tucker’s Sun Salutations.

Rather than sleep on the side of the railway path (um SPIDERS), we found a bridge and set up there.

We looked out ahead in the morning and saw…

FARMLAND

Miles and miles of farmland.

Thank the maker the Canyons were coming up in the next leg of the trip.

Back to my story of dying…

I have no idea what the temperature was.

Somewhere around 95 degrees.

No wind. No Breeze. No shelter.

Just Heat.

AND BUGS.

So I took my pants off

In fact, for a little there…

I took everything off.

Boots… shirt… pants…

It was just me, the mosquitos, my flip flops and my thong, wandering around looking for a breeze.

I felt like we were sitting Indian style in the middle of a volcano.

All I could think was…

NO WONDER THE GOVERNMENT GAVE THIS LAND AWAY FREE!!!

After wandering aimlessly in my thong for a bit

I found the most beautiful thing I’d seen all day

Shelter!!

A real life outhouse with an awning and cement base.

I went back for Tucker and Ana and we settled down to nap through the hottest part of the day.

And then the eeriest thing happened

Ana and I woke up and turned to each other at the exact same time.

That’s when we looked down.

He was thick…

And multicolored.

His neon legs seemed to move a million miles an hour.

Like a demon possessed he disappeared into Ana’s bag.

We screamed, rolled away and looked blankly at each other.

This huge freaking centipede just crawled his way into Ana’s bag!!

What would you do in this situation?

I thought of a few things given the circumstances:

• We could burn the bag… it was Ana’s afterall.

• We could trick Tucker into opening it… another solid strategy.

• Or we could throw it in Tucker’s direction, scream, and see what he does.

All good options.

We did what any sensible person would do…

KICKED everything we owned into the woods

Luckily (for Tucker)

The centipede slithered out immediately.

That’s when we decided to eff sleeping during the day and just get to the halfway mark as fast as possible.

Because if you’re going to be hot and miserable, you might as well be moving.

The next 10 miles really were beautiful…

And besides the heat, it was actually pretty cool.

We were having fun!

Except Tucker…

Tucker’s feet look like flesh eating Amoebas had babies… and those babies had babies

We guess it’s a combination of his heavy pack, cotton socks, and his boots.

ORRRR

His body’s absolute resistance to hiking in 100 degree weather

And that brings us back to the hottest part of the day…

THE LAST 10 miles BEFORE THE TURKEY HOTEL

Tucker is limping at this point.

His blisters are so bad, I’m afraid if we stop, we will never get started again.

By the time we hit the last few meters to the Turkey Hotel, it’s after 6 pm and we can see a nasty storm coming right behind us.

Where the eff was this cool weather 10 hours ago??

We’ve Officially Arrived at the Halfway Point

It hailed all night so we got a room and hot showers at the Turkey Hotel.

Tucker got pork slider’s, the only food available at the hotel. I got the usual gluten free option — gas station snacks.

Tucker is done for.

He lost too much skin to walk anymore. So he became our support crew.

And Ana and I are now faced with finishing this hike on our own.

That’s when Ana and I had our most delusional idea yet:

HOW FAST DO YOU THINK WE CAN DO THE LAST HALF?!

This was Tucker’s idea after all…

And if he couldn’t be with us to finish it…

We decided we’d speed through the last 32.5 miles.

“You need anything… anything at all you can call us anytime while you are out there,” Albert, the manager of the Turkey Hotel said.

“Oh wait, except it’s memorial day…”

“And no one’s going to be here.”

“I’m kidding… I’m kidding.”

Ana and I looked at each other with the kind of eyes you make when you are hangry…

And someone just bit into a Cuban sandwich in front of you even though they know you are gluten-free and are an hour’s drive away from food you can eat.

(The sandwich thing is a true story btw. Andy Roof you know who you are.)

We’ll be fine…

It’s gonna be fineeeeeeeee.

Here’s a quick summary of how that went

First 6 miles…

Wow that went by so fast! And it’s so pretty out here…

This is going to be easy!!

Second leg of 9 miles…

Okay so this is just three hours. No big deal. Three easy hours!

3 miles into second section … Okay, only six more to go stay focused. Keep moving.

Wow… the Indians took white women settlers captive out here by hiding in the bushes and ambushing travelers???

At this point, both Ana and I had gone silent.

She was probably looping the song “Feeling good, like I should” in her head, trying to trick herself into believing it.

I was now playing full movies in my mind to get me through mile after mile.

I was half way through Dumb and Dumber when we saw it.

The start of the

LAST 17.5!!!

That’s when it really hits us!

OH GOD

OH GOD WHAT WERE WE THINKING

PLEASE LORD let this be FINISHED

I THINK A RASH HAS FORMED BETWEEN MY BUTTCHEEKS…

YES, it has DEFINITELY formed AND ITS RUBBING TOGETHER

WHO INVENTED THIS GOD FORSAKEN HIKE

By this point we’ve broken the last 17 miles into 2 phases

The first 8 – This is where the Batcave (or poop cave if you want to call it by it’s most predominant feature) is and where it really gets beautiful.

And the last 9

Ana and I were both carrying between 20 and 35lb packs.

Hiking as fast as we could we were moving about 3 miles an hour.

So we’d already been hiking more than eleven hours practically straight.

We stopped for just minutes to drink water or take a five minute break.

I hated stopping because we had blisters and rashes everywhere now. It took me hours to forget about them and everytime we stopped, we had to go through the pain of getting started again.

And then it happened…

I didn’t think we were quite done yet.

But all that was left after leaving the canyons was farmland taking you back to a lot where you could leave your car.

I turned to Ana and said,

“It won’t hurt your pride if we skip the last mile of farmland right?!”

“NOPE”

We raced toward the truck.

My legs are so stiff at the point I’m not even sure my knees are bending anymore.

That’s when Tucker gets all excited and yells

“LAST TWO MILES!!! KEEP GOING”

Ana and I once again mind meld in this moment…

So eerie how we do that

And with a single nod to each other agree to kill Tucker after the hike (and dinner of course).

We can’t quit now. He’s just too excited to see us finish.

We race by him as he holds out Pedialyte to us.

Under our breath, we mutter something about that Pedialyte bottle better be full of Reeces or we are going to throw it in his face.

Hey, we were a little cranky alright!

All I’m thinking about right now (besides Reeces Peanut Butter Cups) is how wonderful a hot plate of fajitas is going to taste.

All the rice… all the beans…

As we pick up the pace we hear Tucker shout behind us…

“SORRY FOR THE FALSE HOPE”

Who parks their truck two miles from the trail’s end anyway???

At this point Ana and I are moving on pure Adrenaline

Last 2 miles… last 2 miles… last 2 miles…

With one mile left to go…

We just start running…

FASTER FASTER FASTER

Anything to not feel the stiffness of walking

I forgot to mention…

On this endless hike through mostly farmland and one great section of Canyon…

We got this warning:

I just want y’all to know, the only time in 65 miles we saw a single soul was during the two hour stretch I took my pants off.

That’s right, if you take your pants off…

I digress…

Two miles went by so fast…

They were so beautiful

JUST KIDDING.

These last two miles the rain finally caught up with us.

There was something magical that happened though.

We started at 9 pm less than 48 hours ago on a double rainbow..

And we ended at 8 pm… on the very same thing.

And then Tucker redeemed himself

Oh yeah…

About that Mexican food

It was CLOSED

In fact, because we were in the middle of nowhere, by the time we picked up Ana’s car and drove to a town with food…

Everything was CLOSED.

You’d be surprised just how good Taco Bell tastes after two days of beef jerky, protein bars, and gas station popcorn.

We got home near 2 am that night.

With these little beauties…

And spent the next day doing this…

And this…

Tucker wants to go back and finish the full thing.

Any takers?? Drop a comment on this blog and I’ll send him your info.

Cause Ana and I will be sleeping at the Turkey Hotel, waiting for y’all to arrive.

Even better, we will be eating at the Mexican Restaurant so we can tell you how it was in case it’s closed by the time you get there.

Until the next Adventure…

Stay salty my friends.

P.S. Caprock Canyons has many day hikes through the actual Canyons. You can ride horses through it, take ATVS, bike, or just hoof it around.

And if you’re really crazy, you can try the whole 64.5 mile Caprock Canyon trailway.

P.P.S. There was supposed to be a river. It must have dried up.