Travels with Twinkles: Alpine Texas and the Lone Star Cowboy Poetry Gathering

February 16 -17, 2024:

The Cowboy Poetry Gathering is held on the campus of the Sul Ross State University of Texas on the outskirts of Alpine, Texas.

Alpine Texas has an interesting attractive downtown, many good murals, although nightlife, shopping and dining is limited. There is the beautiful old Trost designed Hotel Holland on the Main Street (Holland Ave), which is also route 90l. The train station is across from the hotel which is serviced by Amtrak. As it's a college town it seems to have an artistic, liberal vibe to it, not expected in Texas. Heading east out of the downtown area, is the university campus and is the main motel, hotel, gas station and small business district.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpine,_Texas

One of my all time favorite murals

Also quite nice

Now you know; Who put the pine in Alpine

Texas Rangers

The Cowboy Poetry Gathering was very well organized except for one thing, a lack of signs for the multiple rooms where performances were held around the campus. This was not a problem for the locals who have been going to this for years.

I had signed up for the Friday morning Chuckwagon Breakfast held from 7:30 - 8:30 in Kokernot park adjacent to the University, but it took me a while to find it, no signs were posted ! It had a real cowboy attitude, hot coffee over a burning fire, scrambled eggs, bacon, biscuits and gravy.

Cowboy Breakfast

The fire felt good on a chilly morning

I then found my way to the festival mercantile center inside the University Center building where you check in to get your name badge, program schedule and goodie bag. I initially was at a loss of where to go from there, but eventually found that there was a venue map and that the program schedule did show who was playing when and where.

Beautiful Monument on the campus

The Marshall Auditorium where the main performances were held

The unwritten policy at the festival seemed to be no iphone or camera videos or flash photos allowed. This was disappointing to me as it's one of my favorite things to do, but I understand how annoying it is when everyone is doing it. Anyhow as a result I took very few photos and only one short video of Ramblin’ Jack Elliott.

My first show was performed by Hal Cannon titled, “Making the ordinary heroic: The story of John Lomax” which was very good. John Lomax had searched for, recorded and saved the music of many early musicians who continue to inspire us to this day. I never thought someone giving a talk on this subject in Texas would say that the early anglo cowboys didn’t really invent cowboy singing, but instead learned it from the hispanic and black cowboys.

From the balcony at the Marshall Auditorium

I then attended the “A taste of the gathering” show at 10:45 - 1:45 AM in the Marshall Auditorium which helped to introduce me to several performers I was not aware of. After lunch I attended the “A Pair To Draw To” show at the Marshall Auditorium with Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and Andy Hedges which was great. Ramblin" Jack was sort of the celebrity performer at the show and was treated with considerable reverence.

I then found my way to the “Museum of the Big Bend” to look around the excellent museum and attended a “Diamond Hitches” show. There were several performances in rooms adjacent to the museum and art gallery. I also sat in on a show; Stampede for a few minutes.

Lots of Spanish history in this area

Poncho Villa and the general seems to be having a good time here

There was a room filled with old maps

A nice story with a bad ending

A show titled; Stampede, noted cowboy poet Wade Mitchell on left

At about 5 PM, travel to the Alpine Civic Center for the Cowboy Supper, Guinness pot roast with vegetables, cheddar mashed potatoes, green goddess salad, roasted asparagus, roux biscuits, apple crisp desert, water and iced tea. It was yummy ! I sat with a man who told me his father had attended Sil Ross University who was on the football team with Dan Blocker who played Hoss in the classic TV show, Bonanza.

I didn’t see as many Cowboy performers as I felt I should have, mainly because of how spread out the venues where on campus. Also the size of the rooms made it awkward once seated to leave in the middle to go to another show. Also I did not really know who I wanted to see, most of the performers were new to me.

I had a motel room reserved for Friday night to get a break from the cramped van interior and to enjoy a big bed and a hot shower.

Saturday, day 2 of the Gathering started cold and cloudy with a wet rain drizzle and as a result I skipped the outside Cowboy Breakfast at the park. The temperature stayed about the same all day, 40-50 degrees and about 5 PM the sun broke through just before sunset.

I attended an excellent show at 10 AM at the Museum of the Big Bend” - Songs and Poems worth remembering” that was especially good, one of my favorites ! I was quite impressed by Rod Taylor

Next was a show at 11AM in the Fine Arts Center called “Wrecks” that was also very good. In cowboys talk a "wreck" is a horse accident usually a bad rodeo ride that result in injury.

During the day I went to several shows with the highlight being the Ian Tyson tribute show “Fifty Years Ago: Songs of Ian Tyson” at the Marshall Auditorium performed by Corb Lund and Brent Hill. These are two of the upcoming stars on the cowboy poetry circuit.

The grand finale of the event was at 7:30 PM with a special concert orchestrated by Andy Hedges based on his latest album, “Roll On Cowboys” that included many of the people taking part in the poetry gathering. Andy Hedges is definitely the new rising star on this Cowboy Poetry circuit. There is definitely a changing of the guard taking place which is badly needed for this genre to attract the younger crowd. This show is amazingly going to New York City soon to be performed at Carnegie Hall.

Saturday night was a really cold night in the van (That was the night I should have had the motel room) with the temperature dropping into the mid 20’s. I was really hunkered into the sleeping bag with every blanket on me.

Sunday was full sun and warming temperatures, that felt really good. I was sort of wondering why this Cowboy Poetry Festival didn’t continue on Sunday, but I had heard one person say on Saturday that he had a prayer meeting on Sunday. That may be it, Sunday is a go to church day in this part of the country. I went fro a good breakfast on Sunday morning at Judy's Bread and Breakfast Cafe and then roamed around town taking more photos.

A Texas music inspired mural

Alpine is a railroad town and entry corridor to Big Bend National Park

Great murals all over Alpine

Another favorite

The Holland Hotel in downtown Alpine

Very cool car mural in downtown

Another great one

Across the railroad tracks is the interesting Bottle House

I contacted my daughter Miranda in the morning to learn her work schedule, as she is now working as a conductor on Amtrak and is working a two days on, two days off schedule. My plan was to extend this Alpine trip to visit her in San Antonio, Texas which is another 300 miles to the southeast. I learned that she will be leaving on Monday for two days, returning on Wednesday evening. As a result, I decided to stretch out my travel accordingly to get to San Antonio on Wednesday afternoon.

On Sunday afternoon I take a ride back on Rt 118 north through Fort Davis to the Davis Mountains State Park for a short hike on the Montezuma Quail Trail to the the Indian Lodge Trail. It was a very steep, rocky trail that was treacherous in the beginning but then slacked off. The views were great from the trail. There are several large campgrounds here, a lodge and a skyline drive that takes you to a peak top scenic view.