Post by puppie96 on Nov 15, 2008 16:06:22 GMT -5
Yesterday I had a meeting in Houston and had the afternoon free, so when I found the Brazos River at the I-10 crossing in the guidebook, I figured I'd run out there & see what I could find.
The pictures below are of stuff I thought was interesting or different, that I hope people might have some thoughts about identification. This isn't the prettiest stuff, really, since after I got home I filled a 6 lb barrel with jaspers and wood and stuff and got it going.
First, there was a bunch of this stuff that looks like some kind of fossils. That one that's sort of pinkish looked to me like a coral, maybe, or perhaps they are all corals?
These two have an interesting surface texture. The larger one originally looked like some kind of conglomerate rock cemented together with sandy stuff. However, once I washed it well and brushed out the crevices, it looks more like some kind of solid thing, again, maybe some kind of fossil?
I'm really fascinated by these, especially the large one, which as you see sure looks like a bone as far as its shape goes. Then there are the two smaller ones that also have a distinctive shape to them & I could imagine they might be either bones or twigs. The one is such a perfect cylinder -- I've hardly ever found anything so perfectly round. All of these have a very sandy, grainy surface. Of course, since I don't think I should mess with them until I satisfy some curiosity, I don't know what is inside them.
Last, just so you don't think I only picked up oddities, here's some pretty obvious wood. Naturally I was especially interested in any possibility of finding palm. I thought the large, light colored one that I think ended up at the bottom of the photo I decided to use here, had palm possibilities.
If you are interested, here comes trip report information. I had no problem finding the site from the westbound side of I-10. Once there, getting down to the river at any areas with gravel was challenging! From the top, I couldn't find any clear path, it was very overgrown and hard to tell what was underfoot, then the bank down was steep with ravines from erosion and the ground was sandy and crumbly. At the bottom at the base of the bridge abutments, the mud started and it was nasty, sticky, slimy stuff. I walked VERY carefully -- you could slip on it easily and land in the river or with mud all over yourself. The first place I found the river was under the interstate bridge and you couldn't get to any gravel -- the bridge abutment was surrounded by water. I found my way over to the RR bridge that parallels it and had better luck there, but still the rocks were really in the mud and sometimes the actual look of them was sort of a mystery. It was a spooky place and believe me, I had my ears open. I sure didn't want to get frightened by somebody showing up & it wouldn't have been easy to run away from there! On the way down the slope the first time, there was debris of various sorts and I wondered whether this was a homeless people shelter or something. Also, I started to notice a really terrible smell that I couldn't tell where it was coming from but eventually I got away from it. Sometimes I go to these places and think of Law & Order and how people find the bodies in odd or remote spots like this.
After 45 minutes or an hour or so I climbed back out. On the way back to Houston to the airport, I stopped at a truck stop looking for outside water someplace and luckily found a pump. The shoes I was wearing were water shoes with good soles, luckily, and I must have been carrying around about 5 pounds of mud on each one. (Nice to have a rental car and not my own!!) It took a while to wash and scrape all the mud off myself and I still had some interesting spots of it on my jeans when I got on the plane.
I thought briefly of trying the other access point to the other side of the river, but I was too nervous about getting to Houston Hobby in time for my flight, so I gave it up. Besides, while I am always game for picking up more rocks, I'd had about enough mud for one day.
The pictures below are of stuff I thought was interesting or different, that I hope people might have some thoughts about identification. This isn't the prettiest stuff, really, since after I got home I filled a 6 lb barrel with jaspers and wood and stuff and got it going.
First, there was a bunch of this stuff that looks like some kind of fossils. That one that's sort of pinkish looked to me like a coral, maybe, or perhaps they are all corals?
These two have an interesting surface texture. The larger one originally looked like some kind of conglomerate rock cemented together with sandy stuff. However, once I washed it well and brushed out the crevices, it looks more like some kind of solid thing, again, maybe some kind of fossil?
I'm really fascinated by these, especially the large one, which as you see sure looks like a bone as far as its shape goes. Then there are the two smaller ones that also have a distinctive shape to them & I could imagine they might be either bones or twigs. The one is such a perfect cylinder -- I've hardly ever found anything so perfectly round. All of these have a very sandy, grainy surface. Of course, since I don't think I should mess with them until I satisfy some curiosity, I don't know what is inside them.
Last, just so you don't think I only picked up oddities, here's some pretty obvious wood. Naturally I was especially interested in any possibility of finding palm. I thought the large, light colored one that I think ended up at the bottom of the photo I decided to use here, had palm possibilities.
If you are interested, here comes trip report information. I had no problem finding the site from the westbound side of I-10. Once there, getting down to the river at any areas with gravel was challenging! From the top, I couldn't find any clear path, it was very overgrown and hard to tell what was underfoot, then the bank down was steep with ravines from erosion and the ground was sandy and crumbly. At the bottom at the base of the bridge abutments, the mud started and it was nasty, sticky, slimy stuff. I walked VERY carefully -- you could slip on it easily and land in the river or with mud all over yourself. The first place I found the river was under the interstate bridge and you couldn't get to any gravel -- the bridge abutment was surrounded by water. I found my way over to the RR bridge that parallels it and had better luck there, but still the rocks were really in the mud and sometimes the actual look of them was sort of a mystery. It was a spooky place and believe me, I had my ears open. I sure didn't want to get frightened by somebody showing up & it wouldn't have been easy to run away from there! On the way down the slope the first time, there was debris of various sorts and I wondered whether this was a homeless people shelter or something. Also, I started to notice a really terrible smell that I couldn't tell where it was coming from but eventually I got away from it. Sometimes I go to these places and think of Law & Order and how people find the bodies in odd or remote spots like this.
After 45 minutes or an hour or so I climbed back out. On the way back to Houston to the airport, I stopped at a truck stop looking for outside water someplace and luckily found a pump. The shoes I was wearing were water shoes with good soles, luckily, and I must have been carrying around about 5 pounds of mud on each one. (Nice to have a rental car and not my own!!) It took a while to wash and scrape all the mud off myself and I still had some interesting spots of it on my jeans when I got on the plane.
I thought briefly of trying the other access point to the other side of the river, but I was too nervous about getting to Houston Hobby in time for my flight, so I gave it up. Besides, while I am always game for picking up more rocks, I'd had about enough mud for one day.