Day 8 & 9. Grapevine Hills Rd & trail to Balanced Rock. Drive to Castalon & Cottonwood CG

Day 8 & 9.  Grapevine Hills Rd & trail to Balanced Rock.  Drive to Castalon & Cottonwood CG

We left Pine Canyon and moved to Grapevine Hills Rd and campsite GH#3.  Campsites GH#2 & #3 share the same cleared off area. This is one of the few backcountry campsites which share the same area.  Most are separated by ¼ mile or more. 

We had a neighbor this night, a very nice German couple camping in a very small VW van.  Their van is not sold in the US, they brought it over from Germany.  So far they have spent 6 months touring the eastern US and Texas.  They are planning on going to Alaska this summer and then down into Mexico later in 2014 & 2015.  They are considering touring South America after that. 

This is the shared camping area.  You can see the wildlife resistant food boxes for each campsite.  GH#2 on the right and GH#3 on the left. 

In the afternoon, Misty took a nap on the dashboard in the warm sunshine.

More sunset pictures.

In the morning I took a nice hike on Grapevine Hills Trail to Balanced Rock. 

The first ¾ miles of the trail is level with some sandy areas.   Looking down at the trail

 and has pretty views of the rocks.

The last ¼ mile of the trail to Balanced Rock required climbing some rocks.  The trail heads up on the left side of the photo. 

and goes up these rocks. 

A little perspective on the steepness.

More of the trail.  That's a 4' high steel trail marker at the top center of the photo.

And Balanced Rock at the end of the trail.
To give you a perspective on the size of the rock. 

The back side looks like a duck’s head or perhaps ET (from the movie)

The view through Balanced Rock

After my hike we drove the paved Ross Maxwell Scenic Highway to Castolon and Cottonwood CG at the eastern side of BBNP, near Santa Elena Canyon. 

We stopped for lunch at Sotol Vista Overlook.

This is the view from Sotol Vista Overlook.  The crack in the cliff in the distance is Santa Elena Canyon.

From Sotol Vista there is a 2 mile 6% grade with a couple of switchback.  The road is good, just no guard rails.  Sorry about the grainy pictures.  I forgot I had my camera on ISO-1600

Here is a photo of Cottonwood CG.  Nice cottonwood trees and grass between sites.    

Drinking water is available near the entrance, but the spigot is not threaded.  No dump and no generator operation is allowed.  

We only spent one night here.  It was going to be in the mid 80's tomorrow and in the low 90's the next day.  Time to get back up in the mountains where it will be cooler.  Very nice weather for mid February though.