Desert Aura: Southwest Adobe & Detached Guesthouse

Summary:
Desert Aura: Classic adobe with detached guest house.

The Space:
Desert Aura is a classic adobe home with a detached guesthouse. Breathtaking Views of the Chisos Mountains and Terlingua Ranch.

Desert Aura offers unique character and charm that can’t be duplicated with modern construction. Lovingly built by hand, over many years, by the family that still proudly calls it home. Thick adobe walls, stone floors, and surrounded by stone patios with unparalleled views of the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend National Park, Desert Aura lives up to its name by emanating the very character of Terlingua Ranch and the Big Bend. You will feel like you are part of the desert as you live like a true local here on Terlingua Ranch.

Not many vacation rentals come with their own guest house. The main house will sleep up to four, with two queen beds. The detached guesthouse, with a queen bed, private bathroom, and kitchenette, is automatically included in all rentals for extra space and added privacy.

The two homes are separated by a shaded breezeway that is an ideal place to relax outside or even share a meal. Views from the breezeway and the other patio areas are simply breathtaking. Wildlife is abundant and water and birdseed is provided for the birds. Please don’t straighten out the bent “shepherd’s hook” bird feeder holder. The home’s matriarch cherishes that bent hook as a reminder of the time that a Mexican Black Bear dropped by to sample the bird seed and bent the hook. Don’t worry though, the bears are extremely uncommon here. They are very timid and have never threatened anyone in the area. Mexican Black Bears are among the smallest of the bear species in North America, rarely exceeding five feet in length or three feet in height at the shoulder.

The main house has an open floorplan with a living room, dining room, and kitchen all open to each other. Perfect for spending time together. There is also a semi-private den with a queen bed. The master bedroom has a comfortable queen bed and antique armoire. Neither bedroom in the main house has an entry door. The main bedroom is open to a hallway that extends to the room with the second bed. The bathroom with a large tiled shower and ample counter space is located between the bedroom and den and opens to both. There is even a utility room with a washer and dryer for use during your stay.

The guesthouse has a studio layout with a single room housing a queen bed, dining area, and kitchenette. There is also a private bathroom with a combination shower and tub. Stone floors and southwestern styling create a welcoming retreat. Thick adobe walls and separation from the main house provide guests with plenty of privacy during their stay.

Desert Aura is located just two miles from Terlingua Ranch Lodge. The lodge also offers a great little restaurant, The Bad Rabbit Cafe, with frequent live entertainment. Guests can register at the lodge for access to the Christmas Mountain conservation area, a 9,270 acre reserve owned by the Texas State University System. Vehicle access along a narrow jeep trail is permitted for only one vehicle at a time. Hikers can park at the trailhead.

Big Bend National Park, Terlingua, and the Terlingua Ghost Town are just a 40 minute drive away. Lajitas and Big Bend Ranch State Park are about an hour away. Adventure outfitters in Terlingua offer river trips in canoes or rafts, jeep tours, guided hikes, horseback tours, ATV tours, Jeep rentals, and mountain bike rentals. Terlingua, the Ghost Town, and Lajitas offer a variety of dining, drinking, and live music venues, plus shopping and art galleries.

While here, live like a local. There are ample adventures to keep you busy and leave you exhausted, or just relax around Desert Aura to escape the stresses of “civilized” life.

The Neighborhood:
TERLINGUA RANCH: Located between Big Bend National Park and Big Bend Ranch State Park and including much of the town of Terlingua, Terlingua Ranch is a private subdivision of over 190,000 acres, divided into 9,500 tracts owned by about 5,000 individuals and crisscrossed by 1,100 miles of dirt and rock roads. Tracts range from five acres to several hundred acres. It is some of the most rugged and scenic land in Texas.

Back in the 1960’s, the Ghost Town and much of what later became “Terlingua Ranch” was owned by racing legend and car designer extraordinaire, Carol Shelby and some of his friends. The decided to promote the area by holding a chili cook-off in the then abandoned Ghost Town. That little stunt of a cook-off grew into CASI (Chili Appreciation Society International) which now hosts nearly 500 chili cook-offs around the nation and internationally, all leading up the championship cook-off every year in Terlingua. Shelby and friends later subdivided the Ranch and started selling it off to hunters and rugged naturalists. Over the decades, the area was reborn and an eclectic community of nature lovers, artists, musicians, adventurers, and folks just wanting to escape from “civilization” has grown and started to resettle this rough country.

People have come and gone. New buildings have risen while others have fallen, Dreams have been realized and others crushed. Through it all, the land remains. The harsh desert and vast openness encourages positive development and slowly swallows up and recovers from past abuses. The old cinnabar mine sites and ranching outposts persist as relics and ghost towns, some redeveloped, some carefully preserved, and others dissolving back into the desert. Abandoned dreams eventually become points of interests for those of us that stumble upon them decades later. Terlingua Ranch is a bizarre mix of old and new, good and bad, growth and decline, all completely unregulated. Modern homes with high values and stunning designs stand beside dilapidated do-it-yourself mistakes and abandoned ruins of the 1800’s and early 1900’s.

The landscape is even more varied than the people and the structures. Rugged mountains, deep canyons, wild arroyos, dry and wet creeks, peaceful valleys, breathtaking badlands, moonscape like mud flats, the remains of ancient volcanoes, and fossilized ancient seabeds. All of it nurturing a vast array of plant life and wildlife. Around every corner and over every hill lies new and unexpected surprises.

The Ranch is now home to a few hundred hardy souls. It is also dotted with a diverse array of vacation rental lodging options and campsites. Like the diverse land, they range in quality, style, value, and price. A few are amazing dream destinations. Some are good places to sleep. Others are the stuff of nightmares. (We don’t manage any in the nightmare category.)

Big Bend Vacation Rentals started out in 2007 and initially managed three of the first four vacation rentals in the Terlingua and Terlingua Ranch area. We now manage dozens out of a couple of hundred options. We represent dozens of property owners and have hosted tens of thousands of guests. You can trust us as managers, and you can rely on the properties that we manage. We have become very selective about the properties and the property owners that we add to our portfolio.