The Chihuahuan Desert Education Coalition has been meeting with people on the border in hopes of forming an international committee to help put this project back on the US-Mexico conservation radar screen. Above – Boquillas Canyon, Big Bend National Park in the US on the left, Maderas del Carmen Protected Area in Mexico on the right.
by Rick LoBello
“I do not believe that this undertaking in the Big Bend (referring to the establishment of Big Bend National Park) will be complete until the entire park area in this region on both sides of the Rio Grande forms one great international park.” President Franklin D. Roosevelt in a letter General Manual Avila Camacho, President of Mexico, October 24, 1944
Living and working in Big Bend National Park gave me a unique opportunity to get to know and study one of the crown jewels of our National Parks.
Nearly every day I gazed towards the northern frontier of Coahuila, Mexico, in line sight from my home at Panther Junction. Less than twelve airline miles away the towering cliffs of the Sierra del Carmen created the perfect wilderness backdrop for daily life in the park. Huge layers of limestone overshadowed the vista as the Mexican mountains rose more than 5000 feet above the banks of the Rio Grande. I could not escape the view. The ever changing light created wonderful sunrises and sunsets. Photographers try to capture the mood, but it’s too glorious to confine within the lens of a camera.
I always think of these mountains as part of the Big Bend, but in reality they are part of another country. Mexico is divided from the United States by not only the Rio Grande, but also by a culture where life is often much slower and where the economy is rarely supported by ecotourism.
An old man living in the tiny village of Boquillas in Coahuila, just across the river from the park’s Rio Grande Village Campground, once said that the Rio Grande is a very special river, for as it divides it also joins. This reflection perfectly characterizes the Big Bend we see today, for if it were not for political boundary lines drawn across the map, most visitors would be hard pressed to know just where the United States ends and Mexico begins.
The entire Big Bend National Park area combined with the adjacent mountains in Mexico plays an important role in maintaining the balance of nature on both sides of the border. For example, the Sierra del Carmen is home to a significant population of black bears that is important to maintaining a sustainable population of bears in the park’s Chisos Mountains. Other animals cross the border back and forth and find both habitats important to their survival. To mountain lions and rare bird species like the Zone-tailed Hawk, Gray Hawk and Peregrine Falcon, international boundaries are meaningless.
When President Franklin D. Roosevelt called the proposed International Peace Park a “meeting ground for the people of both countries” he helped to define a now 74-year-old dream. If realized, the dream of a vast international protected area will help to ensure the survival of a significant intermountain desert wilderness and will enhance the tourism economies on both sides of the Rio Grande.
On October 14, 1988 I joined a small group of Big Bend staff on a trip into the Maderas del Carmen section of the Sierra del Carmens as guests of the Governor of Coahuila, Lic. Eliseo Mendoza Berrueto. Governor Mendoza had been in contact with Big Bend officials on several occasions during the year and was very enthusiastic in his desire to rekindle the dream of an international park. Meetings between Mendoza and Big Bend National Park Superintendent Jim Carrico had paved the way for a visit to one of the most spectacular wilderness areas left in northern Mexico. Little did we know at the time, six years later Mexico would designate the area the Maderas del Carmen Flora and Fauna Protection Area on November 7, 1994.
After driving about 40 miles along rough roads we gathered at an airstrip south of Rio Grande Village and Boquillas. There we joined the Governor and his staff plus other officials and businessman from throughout Coahuila. The road up into the Maderas del Carmen demands 4-wheel drive vehicles. It rapidly ascends the steep southern edge of the range where some peaks reach to nearly 9,000 feet. Our caravan of ten jeeps and pick-ups slowly made its way to the top where we abruptly entered a forest more typical of a forest you would see in Colorado.
To our delight the Governor was accompanied by his private chef who prepared a classic Mexican barbecue complete with fresh corn and flower tortillas, beans and salad. After dinner everyone gathered around the campfire to become better acquainted as a cassette player filled the air with Mexican tunes. Sitting by a propane lantern, the Governor enjoyed a game of dominos with Jim Carrico.
The next day more than 40 people gathered among the tall Arizona cypress, yellow pine, and Douglas fir trees. It was an occasion with a telling parallel: the Governor was visiting the area for the first time and the scene was reminiscent of the 1870 meeting near the mouth of Wyoming’s Madison River where the idea of creating Yellowstone National Park, the world’s first national park, was seriously considered. As topographical maps were unfolded onto a long wooden table, the group gathered around to answer the Governor’s questions about the best black bear habitat and to discuss ideas about the most logical boundaries for a protected area.
In Northern Mexico the Maderas del Carmen mountain range is one of the most remote and unexplored areas in Coahuila. Now that protected status for the area was declared in 1994 and renewed efforts to create an international park with Big Bend are underway, the region may soon receive long overdue international recognition as one of the last great wilderness areas in North America.
From 1975-1992 and almost every year since I have enjoyed thousands of sunrises and sunsets over the magnificent Sierra del Carmens. I am continually inspired by the shifting hues of red, pink, purple, crimson and blue on the massive limestone cliffs and have admired countless thunderstorms building above its heights.
I used to wonder about the high mountain forests and have always looked at the magnificent Sierra del Carmen vista as if it were actually a part of Big Bend. Now that I have been to the area several times I realize that Big Bend National Park is actually a smaller part of something much bigger, a mountain range that President Roosevelt referred to as the “missing piece” needed to make the Big Bend park idea complete.
The dream lives and those of us who have discovered the wonders of this special corner of the earth will continue to look to the day when the dream of a US Mexico International Park finally becomes a reality. To join a network of people working to support the designation of the international park, contact Rick LoBello in El Paso, Texas at 915-474-1456 (text first) or write ricklobello@gmail.com or fill out an online form and write in how you want to help.
To see a historical timeline and for more information here.