Monday morning I took my camera and went for a walk along a trail that led out of our campsite. 

I thought this cottonwood tree was beautiful! I used it to orient myself... I could see camp from the cottonwood tree and I could see the tree from as far as I went along the trail. 

I saw a lot of birds on my walk... this quail was backlit, but I think it makes a nice silhouette. 

This bird was so tiny... I think maybe it's a kind of hummingbird?

I used ProCapture on my Olympus to capture this mockingbird taking off.

I THINK this is a little sparrow. It had been perched on the cactus plant. 

Another sparrow in a dive.

This cliff remined me of Pride Rock in the Lion King. 

I had to get a close up of the plants growing at the base of Pride Rock. 

Another bird silhouette.

Flying through the cactus.

A wasp of some sort. 

Heading back to camp, the tiny white speck in the middle of the valley is our truck!

After my walk, Gary and I went for a drive along the main park road. 

This purple cactus was everywhere. I don't know if it is a variety of the green cactus or if the green cactus turns purple at a certain stage, but it is beautiful.

Here is the green variety.

There are so many varieties of cacti... it's incredible.

May is a perfect time to go to Big Bend... the desert was blooming!

I have always struggled with getting nice landscape photos, but it's pretty easy at Big Bend. 

We drove all the way to Los Alamos Private Residence and saw these longhorns across the fence. 

Not sure exactly what this is...

These are as big as the trees there.

On the way back to camp we saw this little bird.

It was collecting bugs and taking them to this post.

Nice hairdo! LOL

We finally figured out it had a nest in the backside of the post and was feeding the bugs to it's babies. 

This cactus grew in whole fields, it reminded me of a set from Star Trek. 

An old cistern in the desert. 

Gary said this mountain looks like a volcano with the clouds on it like they are. 

Back at camp I had to get a photo of this skull someone had placed on the fire pit.