After a beautiful day yesterday, Wednesday emerged cloudy and windy and cooler. It was a good day to get some work done, so we made a list of people and places we needed to contact and started making phone calls. One thing we have already determined about living in a motorhome is things are going to break and getting them fixed isn't much fun. We are still trying to determine how and where to get the steps fixed, and now our directional television antennae has quit working. We have a warranty that will fix both, but finding a good place to get it repaired is tricky when you are in a new place every week. If a repairman is really good, he will probably be booked solid for the entire week you are there. The good news is that we can still get into the motorhome without the step, and we don't usually sit around watching much television. So we will continue down the road until we can get these two things repaired.
We had a few things we wanted to explore in Kerrville, so we set out to find them in the afternoon. Our first stop was the Hill Country Arts Foundation in Ingram.
In 1989, a Texan decided to make a 2/3 size replica of Stonehenge. While the original in England is 5000 years old and is made of huge stones, this version is steel and concrete and found in a field in Ingram, Texas. As you can also see, the "stones" are all still standing and in much better shape than the old British version.
In the same field are two "moai," the curious statues of unknown origin in the Easter Islands in the far reaches of the South Pacific. Again, these Texans thought they would be a good addition to the Stonehenge replica.
The Easter Island civilization was on one of the most isolated islands in the world. The disappearance of these people and the huge statues they left behind has been one of the great mysteries of the world. We were checking to see if any of the moai resembled Mark, but again we found that he is much more handsome than these Easter Islanders.
The next stop on our tour of Kerrville was the James Avery factory and gift shop. Denisa loves factory tours, but because of the great heat used in melting the metal for jewelry-making, tours are not a possibility. But they do have a wonderful new visitor center that shows the process they use to design and make their beautiful jewelry. It really was fascinating to us. We have sworn off shopping because of the limited space we have in the motorhome, but a tiny piece of jewelry was certainly tempting at this stop.
On the north side of I-10 is "The Coming King Sculpture Prayer Garden." The 70 foot metal cross can be seen for miles around. You can barely see Denisa standing between the metal beams at the base.
They are landscaping the entire area, and it will be beautiful when it is finished. The garden area is laid out in the outline of a cross, with the 70 foot cross at the top, sculptures at the right and left hand sides, and a statue of Jesus at the foot of the cross. It is so nice to be traveling in the Bible belt, where we can enjoy wonderful Christian gardens like this one.
After our tour around Kerrville, we had one more special evening event planned. Last Saturday, Denisa was whining that there were no Texas dance halls open in the area. So our new friend, Rich, organized a trip to the Kerrville Elks Club for the Wednesday night country dance. This was wonderful timing for us since we were parked in Kerrville, and showed great support from our new friends that had to drive an hour to meet us there. We met at Bill's Bar-B-Que for dinner, and then danced from the first to the last dance at the Elks Club.
We had a great time! Thanks, Rich, for planning the evening! He also told us that the Elks Clubs are great for allowing members to park their motorhomes in their parking lots (that often have hook-ups as well). So any friends that would sponsor Mark into the Elks Club, let us know!
After a cloudy morning, we headed into Kerrville to tour the town and check out the local park. The Kerrville-Schreiner park used to be a Texas State Park, but was deeded back to the city some years back. So our Texas State Park pass wouldn't give us free entry. But we are obviously lucky travelers because they have special free entry only on Tuesdays. The park is divided into two parts, and we headed for the larger side that includes five different bike trails.
Two of the trails were rated as "relatively easy" and two more trails were described as "moderately difficult." We really enjoyed wandering through the trees on our bikes. We did notice that the orange trail was described as "steep and difficult."
We thought they were just kidding until we got to this section that was very steep, a little rocky, and still muddy from the recent rain.
You might notice that the picture of Denisa has her off her bike and walking. She obviously doesn't have the mountain biking skills to stay on board for steep rocky rides. Also notice the water tower in the picture. We all know that you only put water towers at the highest point in town, so we were obviously high in hill country at this time.
The views from the top were nice as the town of Kerrville surrounded us just past the layer of trees in the park. It was a great place for some snacks to re-energize. It was also a good time to call our friends Mike and Bev. They retired from SWOSU several years ago, and spent their first summer here at this park workkamping. It was fun to talk to them today in this place that they knew so well!
After biking all 8 miles of the trails and then more on the park's paved roads, we headed over to the riverside area of the park. We hiked along the Guadalupe River, enjoying a beautiful afternoon. We are hoping to get the kayak out on the river before we leave Kerrville.
We didn't see any wildlife on the bike trail today, so the wildlife picture of the day must be of the ducks that entertained us on the river. It was a great day of wandering amongst His wonders!
The morning of the long-awaited driving test started with gloomy skies and pouring rain. Could this be an omen?
With a break in the rain, we pulled in the slides and disconnected the utilities. We were ready to roll, but our pesky entry steps absolutely refused to retract. You can't drive down the highway with your entry steps out. Could this be an omen?
Mark finally had to disable the steps manually and tie them up with zip ties. So we were on the road later than we planned for our one hour trip to the Kerrville DMV.
After locating the office, Denisa took the motorhome for a spin around town to get a little practice. She turned into the shopping center parking lot and hit a drainage bump a little too fast. The cabinet over the passenger seat opened, and the backgammon game fell out and hit Mark in the head. We were glad it wasn't the driving examiner in the passenger seat at the time, because we were pretty sure that would not be a good omen.
Denisa wheeled around the parking lot, practicing some backing and parking maneuvers. It didn't go very well, and her confidence level went down. Could this be an omen?
We walked into the DMV office, and every seat was filled. There were murmurs of two hour waits, so we were relieved to have a scheduled appointment. Mark's scheduled appointment came and went. We were told to be there 20 minutes early, but his test time didn't actually start until 30 minutes late. Could this be an omen?
It seemed like a very long time before Mark returned from his driving exam. He had to do an air brakes test, but he was glad to report that there was no backing or parking on the test. He passed with flying colors! Denisa's turn was next, and the driving examiner had her drive the same figure 8 route through town. There was a tricky school zone, and some pretty heavy in-town traffic, but it was basic turns and lane change maneuvers. Perhaps because they were running late, neither of us had to do the dreaded parallel parking. Prayers have been answered! Denisa also passed with not even one demerit, and no games fell out of the cabinet on the driving examiner's head! It was a great day!
We celebrated by getting the motorhome settled in our site at Johnson Creek RV Park in Ingram. We had imagined a big celebration once we both passed our driving tests. But since every day is a vacation now we opted for dinner at home at the RV Park and a walk around the pecan orchard here. We were joined by a herd of around 40 deer that were enjoying the fallen pecans and a beautiful evening. I guess tonight we have something in common with those deer--we are all Texas residents.
After spending most days exploring the area around hill country, we decided to spend most of the weekend at home at Lone Star Corral RV park.
This has been our home for ten days, and they have made us feel very welcome. The sites are good size, with room for a shed beside each RV pad. Some of these "sheds" are very fancy, but the one beside our motorhome is of the plain variety.
We think it is interesting that this is a co-op camp from a national group called the Escapees RV Club, a group "committed to enriching the lives of Rvers." There is a prison down the road, so a couple miles from this Escapee Park is an interesting sign with a totally different meaning of escaping.
The rail system is alive and well in western Texas, and the tracks a half mile from our park see a good amount of travel. We hardly noticed the train whistles, however, because our time spent living at the boys' dorm trained us well for ignoring noise.
Spring Break is spread over several weeks in Texas, and this is the first weekend. We've witnessed that the state parks were gearing up for the crowds. We tried making some future park reservations, and found that many of the RV parks will be jammed full in many places. So we decided that a day close to home might be good for this first weekend.
We did a few jobs around the motorhome that needed attention. We also put our new Texas license plates on both the car and the motorhome, so we are feeling pretty Texan now. The next thing you know we will probably start displaying one of those Texas stars that we see on every home around here.
We walked the loop around our RV park several times to get some exercise, and got to visit with more of our neighbors. We stopped at one RV at just the right time. Their neighbor was delivering a loaf of hot yeast bread, and they invited us for a slice. Knowing how much Mark loves bread, that invitation was the highlight of his month.
One of our neighbors told us that the bike riding was pretty good on the flat roads that surround the park. So we took off for a biking adventure to see what we could see.
We found that there are a lot of dead ends that end up at someone's front porch, and that every farm yard has at least two dogs. The red buds are blooming here, as are the earliest wild flowers. We saw a group of people harvesting cabbage, and saw the truck leave with a full load. We rode all the way into D'Hanis, the nearest town, and rode up and down some of the streets there. But the best find of the day was just a couple miles from where we had been sitting for a week. We came upon the Saint Dominic Catholic Cemetery, and the ruins of the church beside it.
The white sign to the right of the church says, "Restoration Contemplated, Please do not remove any rocks." The more official looking black sign explains that it was certified by the Texas Historical Commission as a Historical Cemetery on April 12, 1999.
All the people buried here were born and died in the 1800's. Some of the old-timers lived to be 60, but there were grave markers for many children.
We couldn't translate the words from many of the grave stones, but they appeared to be German. The next marker seemed to be a newer version of an old marker. We appreciated being able to read the summary of someone's life that lived here so long ago.
It was a peaceful stop in the middle of an agricultural setting that made us stop and ponder what the lives of these pioneers might have been like. The flowers must mean that they have relatives still in the area that come to decorate the graves of ancestors that probably died a hundred years before these current residents were even born.
After all the bike riding, we were hungry for a good meal. We have certainly been eating out more than we expected since we retired. We finally had the opportunity to fire up the new grill that we got for Christmas and cook those rib eye steaks. Coupled with steamed broccoli, baked potatoes, yogurt and bananas, and some home-made oatmeal cake for dessert, we had a feast. Thanks to Luke, Jordan, and Blake for the new grill!
On the last night before we left the Lone Star Corral, we were at the rec hall for the ice cream social and another game of card bingo. Last Sunday evening, Denisa won three of the 14 games, and she had to promise to come back so she could put some of her winnings back in the card bingo pool again. That is exactly what she intended to do--play and lose every game. There were 32 people playing this week, and again we played 14 games. Beating all odds, Denisa won 3 more games. She certainly wasn't making any friends by the third win! If we weren't planning to leave on Monday morning anyway, we might have gotten kicked out of the park. Denisa shouldn't be bragging, but we just had to take another picture of her winnings!
After cloudy misty days, we were so excited to see the sun shining on Friday! We had spent the rainy Thursday eating way too much, and we needed some exercise. On Thursday we went to the local restaurant--Bill and Rosa's--for breakfast with a group of people from our RV park. We returned to the same restaurant on Thursday evening with another group of friends for the all-you-can-eat-spaghetti-and-garlic-bread meal. It sounds like someone needs to be exercising more and eating less!
So after line dance class on Friday morning, we headed to the nearest state park for another day of hiking! We really love getting outside and getting exercise while we enjoy nature.
We went back to Garner State Park, where we had hiked five days before. But this time, when we were on the hill tops we could see for miles around! The picture above was taken from Painted Rock view point towards one of our earlier destinations--Mount Baldy.
In true "Wandering His Wonders" fashion, we started at one trailhead and literally wandered around the trail system for the entire afternoon. If you mapped our hike, it would look like: Crystal Cave Trail to Bridges Trail to Painted Rock back to Bridges Trail to Bell Trail to Donovan Trail to Campos Trail to Hiway Trail to Wilks Trail to Bell Trail to Foshee Trail to Old Baldy Summit to Old Baldy Trail. We could never replicate that exact hike again, but we love the many adjoining trails that allow for endless loops. We hiked about 6 miles, or probably enough to burn one meatball and a cup of spaghetti.
Our first stop on the hike was at the Crystal Cave. It's a 30-foot deep cavern that you can scramble into. Sadly, a few people with spray paint cans have already been there. Don't even get Denisa started on how she feels about people defacing beautiful areas with graffiti.
Once we traversed towards Old Baldy, we just had to stop at a view point where we took a very cloudy picture five days earlier. Now we can actually see all those beautiful valleys that we just had to imagine were there on the earlier hike.
Instead of Mark's Baldy Summit pose, "Old Baldy" took a picture of Denisa this time just to prove we did it twice.
We have been enjoying the tangerines that we brought with
us from the Rio Grande Valley. We have found that they are perfect for
hikes as they give quick energy as well as quench your thirst. Most
people are familiar with determining how far you can travel on a tank of
gas by figuring the miles per gallon. Well, we have found that we are
getting about one mile per tangerine. So today's six mile hike took
about 4 hours and 6 tangerines.
After making it through all those trail changes to hike all over the state park, we somehow managed to lose the trail coming down from the summit to the parking lot. We knew that going down was the right direction, but we missed the proper trail head. You can see that we are living on the edge, taking the dangerous route down.
We had to hurry home from the hike so we could meet friends at 5:00. We have been blessed with meeting so many friendly people!
We watched the hourly weather forecast for Wednesday, and saw that even though it would be raining in the morning and the evening, there should be a break in the afternoon long enough for a hike. So we took off for another Texas State Park in Hill Country. We traveled one of the "twisted sister highways" that motorcycle riders love. We saw a lot of these signs:
Our destination was Lost Maples State Natural Area, another park that we get free entrance to because we purchased an annual Texas State Park pass. That $70 investment has paid for itself over and over already.
This Natural Area got its name from the group of Big Tooth Maple trees that line the small river that runs through this area. Maples have a hard time surviving in west Texas. But the combination of water and the high limestone walls that give protection from the wind helped this small grove to thrive over the years. No one knows where they came from since they are so removed (lost) from other maple trees. People flock to this area in the fall to see their red leaves, because good fall foliage is few and far between in this part of Texas.
We were welcomed to the park by a group of deer. The rest of them were too quick for the camera, but this dear deer actually paused for a picture.
There are two 5-mile hikes in the park, and we chose the East Trail today. Some of the maple trees were covered with velvet green moss, and others are still holding on to their leaves. We couldn't help but imagine how stunning this hike must be in the fall.
There is also some lime green moss growing in the pools, that make for some colorful pictures.
We loved the limestone canyon walls! It is great to be back enjoying our wander through God's wonders!
One of the side trails took us to monkey rock. Mark asked Denisa to stand beside it for a picture, just so we could see the scale of the size of the giant rock.
Denisa asked Mark to stand beside the rock just so we could see if there was any resemblance. There obviously was not.
Since this park is located in hill country, there are plenty of ups and downs at this trail. I don't know what Denisa is smiling about, but this sign is obviously not good news.
And it wasn't kidding!
We spent several hours on the trail, and we never saw another person. If you like nature and solitude, there are some great advantages to hiking in the middle of the week in between rain showers.
Our plan for the evening was to drive into the town of Bandera for dinner. We had gotten mixed reviews from fellow RVers about this self-proclaimed "Cowboy Capitol of the World." But Denisa had read about "Steak Night" at the 11th Street Cowboy Bar. On Wednesday nights you bring your own meat. They provide the grill and the equipment and the live music, and you can buy the side dishes to go with your steak for $6 per person. We brought our rib eye steaks in our ice chest, and the hourly weatherman said we should have good weather for the 6:00 grilling. But the cold front and the rain blew in about 5:30 instead. When the temperatures dropped 30 degrees, we decided that sitting outside in the rain grilling steaks didn't sound like that much fun.
So we opted for the OST (Old Spanish Trail) Restaurant instead. Their claim to fame are the saddle bar stools and covered wagon salad bar.
We were pleased with the chicken dinner we ordered, and it was big enough to split. That also left us plenty of room to split a piece of buttermilk pie. Yummy! That north wind blew us back to our motorhome at the Lone Star Corral Escapee park where we faced our first night of sub-freezing temperatures. Our plan to stay south out of the cold weather has been foiled some by our driving test and some unusually cold March weather. By running our heaters to keep the inside of the motorhome warm, the holding tanks and basement storage areas are also heated. So we made it through a very cold night without any problems.
After our factory tours, we still had plenty of day light in San Antonio to go for a bike ride. We love the River Walk Trail, so we unloaded our bikes at the Concepcion Mission and headed north towards downtown. This ride would have been more enjoyable had it not been for the national park guard that stopped by as we were taking the bikes off the rack. He instructed us not to leave anything visible in the car, because they were having problems with people breaking car windows to steal valuables. Since our car serves as a mobile store room, we were a little worried about leaving it unattended. We didn't have anything valuable inside, but we had a lot of stuff that was visible inside the car while we rode our bikes.
It was very nice weather as we headed north on our bikes. The neighborhoods got more and more picturesque as we got closer to downtown, so we made several stops. For some reason, there always seemed to be a bridge in our pictures.
As pedestrian traffic picked up, we had to walk our bikes. We also had multiple offers to take pictures, so we have some rare pictures of both of us together.
The water taxis were running, and there are some beautiful blooms along the river walk even this early in the spring.
It was a delightful ride, and we made the round trip in less than two hours. We were glad to see that all our car windows were still intact when we returned! It was a great day in San Antonio!
