Lot 26

Ten acres won't feel flat here. Tract 26 leans about 29 ft from its high part to its low, which sounds like nothing until you're standing on the upper swell and watching the low chaparral step away in slow waves toward the bottom end. That tilt is the thing to know about this 10.42 acre piece, and it's what sets it apart from the other ranch land for sale at 44 Ranch South in Duval County, Texas.

A draw takes up the southern portion, roughly 310 ft of shallow channel that carries water when a rain pushes it off the higher part and lies dry the rest of the time. Nobody ought to call that a water source. Call it what it is: the lowest line on the tract, the seam where moisture lingers longest and the growth follows greener and tighter than what stands on either hand. Animals use a line like that. If you're choosing where to set a blind, sit somewhere you can watch that draw at last light.

About 1,430 ft of dirt ranch road already exists here, entering at the north edge and bending out at the east end. That matters more than it reads, because opening a road in scrub this dense costs real money and real days of a dozer's time. Yours is cut. Senderos run the tract as well, pale lines sliced in the canopy at right angles, wide enough for a pickup and narrow enough that anything stepping out in one stands in the open for a moment. A road on the dirt and the legal picture aren't the same thing, so when you visit we'll set the recorded survey and the plat in front of you and point out where the lines actually sit.

August midday out here is white light and heat. The caliche glares like bone, the silver-leaved shrubs go pale as smoke against the dark motts, and by afternoon the clouds stack up tall over a horizon that lies flat and far off. Thorns everywhere. Wear boots you don't mind ruining, long sleeves, and bring more water than you think you'll need.

44 Ranch South totals 584 acres in a stretch of Texas that lies between Laredo and Corpus Christi, and Tract 26 is one surveyed slice of it. That's old working land. The narrow gauge rail reached this county in 1879, hauling freight and stock up from the coast and pressing on toward Laredo, and the towns here grew off that line. Ranches in this part of Texas were making a living off cattle and game long before anyone platted a 10 acre tract out of one.

The boundaries are surveyed, access is deeded rather than promised, and the restrictions stay light enough to keep commercial outfits out without telling you where to park a camper or put up a cabin. Ask us about the agricultural valuation and how it stands on this tract; we'd rather show you the paperwork than describe it. We carry the financing ourselves, as little as 5% down on the $62,000. Best time to see it is a cool morning before the sun climbs, and if you call we'll meet you at the ranch road, take you up the high swell, then follow the dirt road out to where the draw bottoms out so you can judge the shape of the place yourself.