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This past December, I headed to Big Bend National Park with friends. We were thrilled to have scored a rare last-minute reservation for a night in one of the park’s six historic stone cottages, all built by hand by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the early 1940s. These typically book up about six months in advance, but we got lucky when someone canceled. The cottages, along with 67 motel-style rooms, make up the accommodations at the Chisos Mountains Lodge, the park’s only alternative to camping.We sipped coffee and ate pancakes, courtesy of our camp stove, on the porch in the morning as a bright blue Mexican jay flitted in the branches above our heads, begging for crumbs. Inside, a framed black and white photo on the…

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