The Rio Grande looked more like a brown puddle than a river, but my buddy Dave didn't care. He was too busy trying to pull a cactus spine out of his left butt cheek after sitting down without looking.

“This is what I flew from Chicago for?” he yelled. A guy in a kayak floated by, laughed, and shouted back, “Wait for the hot springs.”

We were at Big Bend National Park in West Texas. The least visited national park in the lower 48. Five hundred thousand people come here each year. Yosemite gets four million. The difference is not having to smell someone else’s sunscreen while staring at a rock.

No entrance gate line. We pulled right up, paid $30 for a seven-day pass, and the ranger asked if we needed a map. “Most people skip the east side,” she said. “Don’t be like most people.”

The drive from Midland-Odessa Airport took three hours on roads with no traffic and no shoulders. Rental cars cost us $45 a day. Gas from the airport to the park and back: $65 total. The nearest “city” with a grocery store is Alpine, population 6,000. We stocked up there. Loaf of bread, peanut butter, a bag of oranges, and instant coffee. $17 fed us for three days.

Inside the park, the Boquillas Canyon Trail is a flat two-miler to the river where Mexico sits across the water. No passport check. No fence. Just a guy on a mule on the other side selling handmade walking sticks by shouting prices across the current. Dave yelled, “How much?” The guy yelled back, “Twenty dollars!” Dave yelled, “Too much!” The guy shrugged and rode away.

We sat on a rock and ate our peanut butter sandwiches. A roadrunner ran past us carrying a lizard. Dave said, “That’s the most Looney Tunes thing I’ve ever seen.”

The hot springs are the real secret. Not the resort kind. A stone tub built in 1909, right next to the river, filled with 105-degree water that trickles out of the ground. No fee. No lifeguard. We soaked at 8 AM and had the place alone for an hour. The water smelled like sulfur. Dave’s cactus wound healed faster. Coincidence? Probably.

Downstream from the hot springs, a trail leads to a spot called the “closed canyon.” No sign. Just a worn path through reeds. We followed it for twenty minutes until the walls closed in, and the river turned into a narrow slot. A group of javelinas (wild pigs that look like grumpy footballs) crossed the trail ten feet ahead of us. Dave froze. I froze. The javelinas ignored us. We turned around and speed-walked back.

For sunset, most tourists drive to the Chisos Basin. We drove to the Grapevine Hills Road instead – six miles of unpainted hell that shook our car so bad the glove compartment popped open. The trail to Balanced Rock is a mile of sand and boulders. We climbed to the rock formation and sat on a ledge overlooking nothing but desert and mountains. Two other people showed up, took three photos, and left. We stayed until the stars came out.

Big Bend is a Dark Sky Park. The milky way at midnight looks fake, like someone painted it with a roller. We walked back to our campsite in the dark without headlamps because the starlight was bright enough to see shadows. The Rio Grande Village Campground costs $16 per night. No hookups. A raccoon stole Dave’s bag of oranges on night two. He chased it for fifty feet. The raccoon won.

The Boquillas Crossing Port of Entry is open Wednesday through Sunday. A rowboat takes you across the river for a $5 round trip. On the Mexican side, a donkey cart rides you to the village for another $5. We ate two tacos and a bottle of Coke for $4. A local kid named Juan gave Dave a high-five and asked for his hat. Dave gave it to him. Best five dollars he’s ever lost.

Season warning: Summer hits 110 degrees. We went in late October. Days were 85, nights were 50. Perfect for hiking. The mosquitoes were gone, but the flies near the river were aggressive. Wear pants unless you want to donate blood to a bug the size of a raisin.

The most overlooked place is the Fossil Bone Exhibit. A half-mile walk from the main road, no shade, no benches. A glass case holds a 70-million-year-old duck-billed dinosaur leg bone. The sign says “please do not lick the exhibit.” Dave licked it. I asked why. He said, “The sign didn’t say please.” Some people should not travel with friends.

Three days, two guys, one stolen orange sack, and zero cell service. Total cost including flights (Chicago to Midland), rental car, gas, camping, food, the rowboat to Mexico, and Dave’s mystery butt treatment: $285 per person. You cannot spend your way into a better view here, and that’s the entire point. The javelinas don’t care about your Instagram. Neither should you.