Tonight made camp on the Rio Frio River just south of the town of Rio Frio. Some really great small south Texas towns along Route 83 between Abilene and Rio Frio. The river runs through a soft valley with lots of oak and mesquite. Wild flowers and lots of elk and exotic animal ranches. The water is clean and cold and Henry learned to swim the rapids. Now he’s a Rapid Dog! Finding more and more time to make photographs. Tomorrow perhaps the beach.
Padre Island South Texas
Arrived at the beach on June 7th.!! Padre Island, Texas. 68 miles of beach you can drive on and camp anywhere. It’s almost empty as well. I am sharing it with toxic waste, lots of trash, birds, seaweed and nesting Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtles. Got to see one come up and lay her eggs yesterday. The trash is really apparent, coming in from boats, Mexico and Texas. I guess Louisiana contributes its share as well. Lots of plastic and weird stuff you don’t want to touch. But the water is warm and the light is quite nice. Mostly overcast but with some good clouds to photograph. Working a good deal with time exposures. Seems movement is the message. Everything seems to be timeless right now and it seems that to capture this landscape I need a rather large slice of time to record it on film. Figures I’ve spend so much energy putting together a 4×5 system that I can hand hold, then decide to latch it down to a tripod for long exposures. On to Galveston and the beginning of the trek up the Gulf Coast.
on the beach
Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle
Eggs in Nest
Transferring eggs for incubation off site
Galveston was a bust -spent all of an hour there and continued east to Turtle Bayou, west of Beaumont Texas, arrived the evening of June 9th. I camped on the edge of the bayou, compete with four resident gators. Thursday morning I packed up to continue west and stopped for gas at Gator Junction, just down the road and pulled in next to an old Texas truck with a cattle hauler attached with two Long Horn Bulls in it. Great photograph waiting to happen. Turned out that V.R. Hylton of The Achor Valley Ranch Trust and Barry Bay of the Bar 9 were sitting in the truck. Well, I went up and asked if they would mind hanging out for a few minutes so I could photograph the truck next to the airsream and got me an invite to their ranch to photograph their herd of Longhorns.
I spent the remainder of the day trailing behind them down long forgotten country roads searching for Long Horns among the bayous, cypress stands, lakes, and huge live oak trees. Needless to say I found some amazing cattle and saw some of South Texas only the locals see. Spent some time at Our Lady of Light Mission, built in 1756 but only lasted a few years. Saw the grave site where 4 of the Priests were buried and found old birds-eye pepper plants brought here by the Priests and still growing. Small but hot! V.R. is quite the historian and told me about the history of the area, the mission, Priests and the Karankawa Indians who roamed this area who, according to local folk lore, were cannibals.
Quite a day and as night fell I found myself back at the camp on Turtle Bayou. Six a.m. this morning V.R. came a knocking with a copy of his video for me. He was the videographer for the Texas Longhorn Quincentennial Cattle Drive. Quite a man. I was very impressed he knows of Leonard Peltier and his fight for justice and freedom and says prayers for Leonard each Sunday. When he found out I had photographed Leonard he asked for a copy of the photograph for his prayer book. I have found a great deal here and will be staying a few more days.
V.R.’s truck and Airstream
camp at Turtle Bayou
DMK and VR
DMK shooting Long Horns with Barry and VR
DMK shooting in the Cypress Trees
Henry in Back of Truck
Final Portrait of V.R. and Barry
Final Portrait of VR and Barry
Woke up this morning to Henry barking….at nothing. An hour later in the car
heading toward Houston I glanced over my shoulder and thought “Henry’s maken’ faces again! (Something he does now and then in the back seat to amuse himself and me.)
The funny face turned out to be a huge swollen left lip with two small puncture marks centered in the swell. Frantic calls to 411 and a local vet (should we call 911?) found us at Baytown Animal Hospital and a confirmation of my fears. “Yep, David your dogs been snake bit. Might have been a copperhead or water moccasin, not many rattlers round these parts…. “ Two shots, a bottle of antibiotics and $65.00 later we were on our way again. By the next morning the swelling was gone and Henry was looking like his old self again.
All week, really since a day or two after I arrived on June 9th it’s been raining. The last five days, it’s really been raining! The last few days I’ve been watching the bayou as it has slowly crawled toward my camp. Obviously the creatures are crawling too as witnessed by Henry’s recent visit from the snake. Mr. Don, the camp manager, keeps assuring us the water never gets that high. But his warnings seem to always come with implied exceptions, and a twinkle in his deep blue eyes.
I have decided that the Airstream floating down the bayou, along with the various other object we have so far sighted; 55 gallon drums, logs, 1 and 5 gallon jugs, an icebox, some abandon boats and vast amounts of unknown objects washed away by the recent rise in water, would make a stunning photograph. Standing by the edge of the rising water with my fellow campers, many of them long term leasers here at Turtle Bayou, I hear stories about the last flood and the dead body they got to fish out as it floated by.
The rise in water seemed to excite everyone and even Bill Ellis got a ride down to the fishing pier via Don’s golf cart and caught hisself two catfish for dinner. I photographed Bill last week and got to know him a bit. He was a heavy equipment operator until a few years ago, when two strokes ended that and now he spends his days sitting outside his 1977 Airstream watching the goings on at Turtle Bayou. He’s been living here ‘bout 4 years.
Last night the water had covered the fishing pier and I made the decision to move in the morning…….
During the night I woke a few times and the water was rising slowly and about 4 AM I fell into a sound sleep. 6 AM brought a loud knocking on our door and there stood Don, rubber boots, jeans, bright yellow rain slicker, blue oversized umbrella and huge blue eyes. Standing there in torrential rain with the same twinkle in his eyes. “It’s risen kinda fast… you all might wanna move up a bit.” I stepped out of the Airstream into 5 inches of water, looked over at the bike and saw the bottom of the engine beginning to disappear under the chocolate brown water and decided it might be a good idea. I spent the next hour stowing gear, hooking up and hauling ass to higher ground.
After the flood
just to remind you here is before
Mr. Bill Ellis
Don the Manager
Spent the afternoon fishing on V.R.’s lake. Great Day good bass fishing
Henry’s first boat ride
Henry Kissen Fish
I’ve spent the last three weeks working with V.R.’s herd. Here are some of the fun shots and a few of the 4×5’s. This page may be a bit slow to load…….. Good time to go get some coffee…..
one of the final 4×5 images
V.R. feeding
V.R. and DMK
one of V.R.’s cows
DMK Running scared
Old Barn and Long Horn
Through the truck window
V.R. and His friends
28 days at Turtle Bayou! Amazing how a one night stay can expand into a 28 day adventure. I’ve met so many great people here and made some good new friends. The fellowship with V.R. and Jean, his wife, was unquestionably the high point of the trip. Spending time with them in their home, in the field with the Longhorns, and at their Church where V.R. is the Pastor, has given me memories that will last a life time.
While staying at Turtle Bay I made one of the multi media images of Bruce Springsteen, The Nebraska Session, for my gallery in New York. (The Gallery at the Katonah General Store). The images were printed in the airstream, the plastic was poured in the dinning room/kitchen of V.R. and Jeans’ Church, The Day Spring Church, in Liberty, Texas and the steel frame was made by V.R.’s son, David Hylton, who owns The Lone Star Fab Inc. company in Mount Belvieu, Texas. David is a true artist with metal and if you are looking for any metal work in the South Texas area, from fabrication to fine art be sure to look him up. His email is HYLTONDAVID@cs.com.
Now I come to the matting and framing of the work. This really is more of an installation piece than a straight framing job and we were truly blessed to find Dakota Framing, owned and run by Joan Bueling. Joan runs the framing show and is also a private dealer of fine art, primarily photography, but has a very eclectic group of artists ranging from potters to very fine rug weavers. Meeting her and her significant other, Jerry Herring, who is a photographer and owner of a graphic design firm made the numerous 80 mile round trip drives to Houston something I could almost look forward to. So while in Houston the best frame shop and dealer has got to be Joan! And special kudos to Frank, my friend and the owner of Frontier Frames in Santa Fe (just the best little frame shop in the Southwest) for recommending Joan to us!
Now I’m not gonna try and tell you that doing a multi media piece while on the road is something I’d do often…. But with the support people we found here it turned what was beginning to look like a complete disaster into a finished image I am quite proud of.
The time I have spent here has been what I’d hoped the trip would be about. To head off into the unknown with little or no direction, allowing The Great Mystery to unfold, trusting in it to guide us down a path of discovery of the American landscape. Not only the hills and valleys but of the People who reside here. Learning that there are no wrong turns, no missed exits because it is unfolding as it should and perhaps that’s better than the way we think it should be. Each wrong turn only deepens the Mystery and allows so many new possibilities to come into our lives. If only we can learn to trust enough and believe.
V.R. and Jean in front of their Church
Singers at Church
Food
Shooting on the road to Liberty Texas
The Turtle Bay Camp
Speaking of wrong turns….
I left Turtle Bayou around noon and crossed the Texas Border into Louisiana heading toward O’Brian’s Flying Service. In the town of Iowa, Louisiana a wrong turn down HWY 383 brought me to Boogah Red’s Vegetable Stand and family farm,in Buller La. After purchasing watermelon, tomatoes, green chile, squash and other goodies I made photographs of the Newman Family and friends. As the sun set on us, in the swamps and farm country of Louisiana, I was invited to park the airstream next to The Newman’s barn for the night. Tonight, the whole family would be working late into the night sheering sheep for a livestock competition that their daughter, Jayde is attending tomorrow. Hours later as the sheep quiet down and the night slips away I had the feeling that I really did make the right turn after all.
The Newman Family and Friends
Dakota, and The Newmans: Jayde, T Jon and Angie worken the sheep
T Jon and Jayde Newman
DMK and his new Friends
Jayde worken a sheep
Up at 6 am to find Angie and Jayde loading sheep into their air conditioned trailer while T Jon and the guys unloaded the watermelons they picked yesterday. The days start early and end late at The Newman’s. Right now the watermelon business is hot being July 4th. Because of this years heavy rains most of the watermelon crop was lost. The fact that T Jon planted his watermelons on a hillside while most others growers planted in lower fields means the Newman’s melons are in high demand, but T Jon’s prices remain the same.
I’ve been invited to go to the watermelon fields this morning. They have a six acre field behind Mrs. Harper’s House about 30 minutes away. So far they figure they have picked about 5,000 melons since early June and maybe have another 3,000 sitten on the ground. I have heard some stories about Mrs. Harper, her 16 gauge shotgun and her prolific use of this particular weapon from her back door. Watermelon picken and a 91 year old woman with a shotgun, sounds like a good time to us and off we go.
By 9 am; T Jon, his nephew Jake, the other Jake, and Dakota are out in the field. There is an orderly plan to watermelon picken- T Jon walks the field checking the melons, cutting the vines on the ripe ones and points to them. The two Jakes pick ‘em up and load the trailer behind the tractor driven by Dakota. It’s hard work in the hot humid sun and not many breaks. Once in a while a melon accidentally breaks open and out come the knives … They will load over 400 melons today.
Under a large open sided metal roof sits two flatbeds full of past picked melons resting on beds of straw. As the day progresses, peddlers come to buy melons and the activity in the field slows down as the melons are sold and loaded onto pickups.
It is under this roof we first meet Sister Reiddie Harper, Grandma to the folks around the Newman Household……
The Boogah Camp
Boogah Signs
Dakota on Tractor
DMK and the Watermelon Men
Watermelon Toss
Jake
The other Jake
