2022-06-18 TRR Abilene Rally Part 1

 I wasn't in any hurry to leave Hords Creek in the morning because it was only an hour to Abilene and check-in wasn't until afternoon. My GPS sent me on back roads, really back roads instead of routing me back through Coleman. Except for one short gravel section, the roads were good but had no shoulders at all and almost no traffic which gets you thinking about what you would do if you had a blowout. Stay on the road with flashers on I guess because there was no place to pull off. I won't do that route again if we rally in Abilene again next year. 

The rally was at the Whistle stop RV Resort where we also had a rally last year. It's a newer park which means very few trees but it's nice and they take very good care of us when we rally there. since the rally didn't start until Thursday, those of us that were there on Wednesday went to Heff's Burgers fo. r dinner. The burgers are great and the portions are so large that you really want to order off the kids/seniors menu. I remembered that from last year. They had a huge staffing snafu with only one woman working there. We told her we weren't in any hurry so she took our orders and then she cooked them too. By the time she was done with us, a second person arrived to rescue her.

On Thursday we had brunch at Cracker Barrel and then we went to see the new Topgun movie. It's nice and cool in the theater and the movie was good. If I was Tom Cruise, I would have been very unhappy with the dye job they did on his hair, lol.

 

I spent the afternoon visiting with my sister-in-law and got back just after the Meet and Greet started.

Friday morning was set aside for siteseeing on your own. Some of the group went to the National WASP Museum in Sweetwater. It is well worth your time to visit.

Since I went to the WASP Museum, I talked my sister-in-law Elaine into going to the Frontier Texas Museum with me. She has lived in Abilene for 30 years and has never been there. Seems like you often see more when you visit someplace than when you live there as you keep thinking you will go another time.

The Frontier Texas Museum was great. We both really enjoyed it.

The lobby had some really great sculptures and scenery typical of Texas.

The first thing you do is see a movie telling you about the old days. It was narrated by a character acter that many would recognize if they watched old westerns. Next we walked around and listened to various "actors" giving us their version of what the old west days were like. They were holograms set in natural settings for the particular well-known person. They werre all good but some were amazing lifelike.

the killing off of the huge herds of bisons was featured in many different ways.

Many of the props had ben featured in well known movies.

There were many settings where you pushed a button to learn all about that particular area.

The Butterfield Overland Stage was a very prominent means of travel.

This particular character, an actual person, told us her whole life story. she was married 4 times and lost every husband through some terrible mishap from Indians to accidents. Her husband, daughters, and a son were killed by Indians during a raid. One horrible thing after another happened to her but she just kept persevering. It was an amazing story of fortitude and courage.

The final part of the museum was a theater where sate on stools that turned around. The whole story happened all around you with storms and stampedes and stories being told. It was really amazing. I definitely recommend a visit to this museum.

Visit with a Sister and a Visit to Sisterdale, TX

Wednesday, Birdie and I headed cross-country to meet up with our friend Sharon.  Sharon has had a rough year healthwise but she is now on the road to recovery.  We left about 9:30 AM for Kerrville.  Sharon is a full-timer but she stayed with a another RVing friend while she was undergoing treatment.  She just moved back into her RV so there was lots to celebrate.  Birdie and Sharon were laughing at TedE, Sharon's little dog.

After visiting for a while, we headed to the Kerrville Cracker Barrel where Sharon and I had breakfast for brunch while Birdie had vegetables.  I didn't manage to get photos of all the great food but Sharon had some huge blueberry pancakes with blueberry syrup along with eggs and sausage, juice, and coffee.  I only mention this because it is so wonderful to see her appetite has returned and she is gaining back a little of the weight she lost.   She is looking good and enjoying a new lease on life.  She's still doing physical therapy and it is definitely paying off.

After brunch, we returned to Sharon's RV park where we visited and Birdie and I put together a new barbeque grill Sharon had gotten.  She took a picture of that and shared on FB so we don't need to reshare that butt shot here.  lol.

Soon it was time for us to head back to Canyon Lake and our own RV's but......we got a little distracted when we drove through Sisterdale.  Now I have driven through there before and even stopped at the winery but it seems that they have spruced things up and have more going on in this small stop on the road. It's located on FM473 (north of Boerne and east of Comfort).  The farm and ranch community was established in 1847 and had 25 residents in 2010.

They have a dancehall built in the late 1800's.

There is also a Dancehall Bed and Breakfast next door.

The Trading Center and Saloon was busy.

This is also the location of the Sister Creek Winery.

The winery is housed in the old Cotton Gin which was built in 1885.

You are invited to wander through the winery using the self-guided tour sheet.

This is the first room with a few barrels.

We were lucky enough to arrive when wine was being bottled.  It's a down home operation with friendly staff that are happy to answer your questions.

Sorry for the blurry picture but this gentleman was fast as he loaded newly filled bottles into cartons.

The man in the green shirt is filling several bottles at a time from different spigots.  The gray machine puts in the cork.  The fancy gold covers over the corks will be added another day.

In addition to wine tasting, selling, and producing, there are also some handcrafted items for sale.

After a tour of the winery, next up was some wine tasting....I bet you already guessed that.

The man up front was very friendly and engaging so we enjoyed the experience.  I guess I should have added convincing since we each purchased a bottle.

Our next stop was the Sisterdale Market right across the street.

It's an eclectic little market with several rooms to wander through.

We each bought some homegrown tomatoes and she threw in some peaches as a bonus.  They were a couple of days old but she didn't want to have to make another batch of cobbler that night after work.  She said they were delicious and she was absolutely right as we sliced them up with a dab of ice cream for dinner.  Mmmmmm.

All in all, it was a wonderful day.  The best part, of course, was visiting with Sharon and getting to see how well she is progressing.  Birdie (earlier in the year) and Karen (through the final treatment process) were both the kind of friends everyone should be lucky enough to be blessed with during rough times.  And Sharon is a tough lady who will be traveling again.  The trip to Sisterdale was just icing on the cake.

Whooping Cranes and Granger Lake COE Parks-Texas

Yesterday was a really great day.  I headed up to San Marcos to meet my friend Birdie.  After a fairly quick breakfast at Cracker Barrel, we headed towards Austin and caught the Tollway Bypass on our way to Granger Lake.  As her nickname indicates, Birdie is very "into" birding and she had heard about whooping crane sitings at Granger Lake.  Coastal Texas is the winter headquarters for the endangered whooping cranes who were down to a population of about 20 a number of years ago but now number somewhere around 300 which is still pretty small for the whole country.  Here is Birdie setting up her telescope.  We were thrilled to see SIX whooping cranes.  One group of three looked like a family with a cinnamon looking youngster and two adults.  The other three were unmated males according to my expert.

Although we could see them very clearly with Birdie's big telescope and binoculars, you are just going to have to take my word that they are on the shore in this picture as my camera just couldn't get a clear shot that far away.  You may see some white specs on the sandbar on the right side of the photo.  There were six pelicans there.

During our visit around the lake, we also saw 3 Great Blue Herons, 1 Great Egret, and 4 Double Crested Cormorants in addition to American Wigeons, several Gull species, and Coots, Malards, and another type of ducks.  Birdwise, it was a pretty good day!

The entire shoreline of Granger Lake is either a wildlife area (4 different ones) or a Corp of Engineer park (3 different ones).  We saw the whooping cranes while we were right next to the south end of the dam so they were on the shore of the Sore Finger or San Gabriel Wildlife areas.  First we visited the COE Hdqtrs and checked out the historical marker in front of it.

The largest of the COE parks, Wilson H. Fox Park is currently closed for renovation work and is scheduled to reopen in April.  We got to check out Taylor Park and Willis Creek Park.

The sites are nice with paved surfaces, a great picnic table cover, water and 30 Amp electric.

The only downside was that the water views were obstructed by a lot of underbrush but there was a good hiking trail down below.

 We took a little path down from this site to get to the hiking path and found....

these great views with lots of birds on the water.

Due to the droughts in Texas, the lake levels are low and many boat launches are unusable but the one at Taylor is open.  There is also a dump station in the park, restrooms, and a playground.  Rates are $18-22 (1/2 for National Park pass Golden Age/Seniors).

We also drove around to visit Willis Creek Park.  We liked the layout of Taylor Park a little better but found a hidden, not advertised benefit at Willis Creek--4 of the sites have sewer connections!  ($22 for these or half off that for seniors with the park pass).

After 1 Oct, you can stay 14 days at the COE parks and then get extensions so staying all winter is definitely possible.

All in all, we couldn't have asked for a better day.  Hope you enjoyed riding along!

Sunday-The Road Trip to Florida Begins

Some time ago, Steve asked me if I wanted to come to Florida for a good part of the summer while he has the kids.  His idea was to travel down with the RV and then spend time camping for part of each week while there.  He will have quite a bit of time off from work so it should be fun.  He loves to RV as much as I do and wanted to share the experience with the kids.  We picked the RV up from storage on Saturday and he was busy checking the tires, etc. that evening.  I started doing a bit of reorganizing.  Toting things out to the RV goes much faster when you have some big strong help to move it.

Sunday morning, the last of the clothes and extras went out.  We had already decided to hold off on a Walmart run until this morning and just load the food directly into the RV. 

Let's hit the road! 

I forgot to mention that Steve and his Dad did some trading which resulted in Steve having a motorcycle that needed transport to Florida.  Of course, the men in the family decided that this was the perfect time to get it there as there would be plenty of travel breaks.

Everybody ready to roll?

Suited up at Walmart and headed out!

We pulled out of the Walmart parking lot at 11:30AM and headed down the back roads to I-10.  Two hours later, we pulled into a rest area and made ham sandwiches for lunch.  Potty breaks for all plus a walk  around with the dogs to stretch the kids legs and we were on the road again.  We had an easy trip through Houston since it was Sunday afternoon and traffic was light.  Just as we were coming into Beaumont, TX, about 6:15PM, we pulled into Hidden Lakes RV Park.  The office was already closed but there were two envelopes with info for #30 and #31 pull-through spots taped to the door.  One of the other campers came up to see if we needed any help (and to ask if the motorcyclist was with me, hilarious as he certainly didn't look like a Hell's Angel).  We got set up in our site.  The propane turned up empty earlier in the day and we were hoping to fill up at the park but no such luck. We decided that we would have dinner out so quickly unhitched and only had to go a mile to find several places.  Cracker Barrel got our business for the night.  Back at camp, we found that we couldn't connect to the free wifi because it asked for a logon and password which was not in our packet of info.  There was not a lot for us to do at the park because the lake was definitely not one that we would swim in and we weren't into fishing.  The park was very clean and quiet though and had great individual bathrooms and a laundry room so not a bad place to stop overnight for Passport America prices ($17.50 plus $2 each for more than 2).  We were already to pull out at 8:30AM when the office manager arrived.  I told her it was fine except for the wifi logon and password we didn't get.  She seemed puzzled and said "you just enter your own" which is definitely not the norm.

9 July 2010 - Overnight in Lima, Ohio

The next day was another great travel day.  We stopped at roadside parks and, I think I already mentioned it, but Willy Gretchen, and Harley are great travelers.  They like the songs on the radio if I like them and they don't mind at all if I sing along.  They can take naps anywhere and anytime.  They enjoy stops at roadside parks.  You do have to be a tad careful when you stop though as they are very enthusiastic about whatever they do so when you open that door, they are ready to get out so you better be ready with the leashes.

Just before supper time, I started thinking that it would be really nice to stop at a Cracker Barrel.  Sometimes they even have places you can spend the night.  So we kept our eyes open and a couple of hours later, we saw the sign.  Once we found the exit, we had to make a couple turns to get to the restaurant.  Up close it was easy to see that even a large car would be crowded in that particular parking lot.  The was a Sam's Club a block further on so I parked there on the far edge of their lot in a row behind about 5 other RVs, walked and fed the dogs, and headed over to Cracker Barrel.

Looked good to me.  What do you think?  It was much cooler since we were further north so it promised to be more comfortable than last night.  After a quick shower, I was ready for bed.  Hmmm! What is that noise?  It appears that I didn't have to worry about the store being closed and no security as there was a street sweeper cleaning the parking lot.  Oh, well--the ear plugs worked great.