Why is it snowing so far south?!?

We had planned to stay another day in Hico, Texas, but an unusually wet cold front was heading our way. So we decided to make an early exit and travel a couple hours further south. We had been watching the weather forecast for a week, hoping that they had over-exaggerated it. But when we left,  the forecast called for 6-8 inches of snow in Hico that evening! That unusual forecast must have been on the national news, as we got texts from friends and family asking if we knew about the impending snowfall heading our way. Sure enough, as we headed south on Highway 281, we saw that the Texas Department of Transportation had already sprayed salting solution on the highway. The big bank of the cold-front clouds loomed on the horizon in front of us.

So we made our entrance at Blanco State Park a day early, and right before that cold front settled over us. The entrance to the camping area in this park is over a one-lane bridge that goes over the Blanco River.

When we first looked on-line for a camp site at Blanco State Park, they had no vacancies this week. But when we called the park office, we found that the reservation system only includes 50% of the sites because of Covid restrictions. In fact, their sites are far apart and they can safely rent out all of their sites if you just call and ask. So we got this great 50-amp-full-hook-up site for as long as we want because it is not in the reservation system.

This is a busy park in the summer, with great water activities. But for now, the Blanco River is a very serene place to hang out.

It was too chilly to consider kayaking, but it doesn't look like that's an easy possibility here on the Blanco River. We kept finding these dams that would interrupt a good float down the river.

Since we are at the edge of town, the only wildlife we saw were the curious domesticated white ducks that assumed the only reason we would pause at the river edge would be to feed them.

Shortly after we got set up in our campground, the cold intensified. We started getting rain during the night, then it changed to sleet, and then it became graupel. We use this new term only because the weatherman was explaining it on the local news. Graupel is soft hail or snow pellets. 

Think snow that looks like dip-n-dots ice cream as it falls from the sky.

While Hico was supposed to get 6-8 inches, our forecast here in Blanco was for one inch. They hit their predictions pretty well. We're still so surprised to see a covering of snow as we ask ourselves, "Why is it snowing so far south?"

We spent the entire day in the motor home while the snow continued to fall. Since it was a Sunday, we had a true "day of rest." We drank hot chocolate and listened to our favorite on-line church service while we sat on our new couch. 

We are now close to San Antonio, and it is very unusual for the locals this far south to see snow. While we were snuggled up inside avoiding the wet cold stuff, they were all outside playing in the snow. We saw a record number of tiny snowmen the next day, and they obviously lasted longer than the ground cover of snow.

We're still surprised to see these little snowmen on our trip south this year. After wearing our heaviest coats and gloves this week, our teeth are chattering as we ask, "Why is it snowing so far south?!?"

Visiting Hico, Texas - bad start but a good finish

The next stop on our journey south was the little town of Hico, Texas. We've driven through this town for years, pronouncing it with a Spanish accent as Hee-Koh. But now that we live here, we know that instead of Spanish roots, this town was named after a town in the east and is pronounced High-Koh. 

As Texas residents, our vehicles must be safety inspected every year--or within ten days after Texas full-timers return to the state. Our vehicles have to pass that inspection in order to renew their registration each year. Mark found this little shop in Hico to get our motor home checked, assuming that it would be a five minute stop. But that's how we found out that our blinker and brake lights weren't operating correctly! This stop in Hico has gotten off to a bad start!

We headed to our camping spot at the Hico City park, where Mark started working on the lights. Since Denisa isn't much help in these situations, she poked around the campground. She was very excited to see that the huge trees that canopy the park were filled with pecan pods. The pecans have fallen to the ground, and they were everywhere! It's no secret that Mark is the fixer, and Denisa is nutty. So while Mark worked on the lights, Denisa was going nuts picking up pecans.

Our day ended better than it started. Mark found the electric short among the miles of wiring in the motor home. Denisa is sure proud to be married to a man that can fix things! Even though we were already set up in the campground, we returned to Jackson's Auto Parts to get that safety inspection. We rewarded ourselves with a delicious piece of coconut cream pie from the Koffee Kup in Hico. They have quite a reputation for having 17 kinds of pie on their menu, and we will confirm that this piece was delicious!

This tiny town also has a chocolate shop, a bakery, and a popcorn store. With snack options like that, this is our kind of town! They also have a statue and museum honoring one of their most famous citizens, Billy the Kid. Even though most western history accounts say that the Kid died in a shoot-out in 1881 in New Mexico, our little town says that he survived and moved to Hico, Texas. Here he renamed himself Brushy Bill Roberts and lived to the ripe old age of 90.  

We like our new little home town, but the main reason we are camped here is to visit another Texas state park. Dinosaur Valley State Park is about 30 miles away, and we made reservations to visit. Because of Covid, Texas state parks are limiting the number of people that can visit each day. They recommend making an on-line reservation to insure you will be allowed into this popular park.

Two life-sized dinosaurs guard the entrance of the park. Mark got his picture with the friendly apatosaurus, while Denisa had to pose by the vicious Tyrannosaurus Rex. While these two are some of the best known of all dinosaurs, they did not ever live here in Texas. These statues were actually made for the World's Fair in New York City in 1964, and paid for by Sinclair Oil Company. When Sinclair dropped their dino logo, the Texas governor persuaded the company to donate them to the new state park.

The dinosaurs that actually lived here in central Texas were the Acrocanthosaurus--a 40-foot long carnivore,

and the Sauroposeidon--a 70 feet long plant-eater. Weighing in at 44,000 pounds, this dinosaur would make some deep tracks when it walked in the muddy river beds. We are here to see those actual tracks made millions of years ago.

In the bed of the Paluxy River, visitors can look down to see the three-toed tracks of a Sauroposeidon that walked here long ago.

We also found the round prints of the Sauroposeidon, but they were less impressive than the characteristic three-toed prints of the smaller dinosaur.

The best tracks are roped off, but there are dinosaur tracks all over the park. In the summer when the river is almost dry, visitors can literally walk where the dinosaurs left their foot prints. On this nippy January morning we were content to see the prints from afar through the water. But looking at areas like "the ballroom," it is obvious that these two dinosaurs were waltzing all over this river bed. We crossed the river a couple times on make-shift bridges,

and meandered along the Paluxy River to see more dinosaur tracks. 

We would eventually have to shed our coats as we made a 5-mile loop around the park. At times we were up high on the rock ledges, with a view of Dinosaur Valley State Park stretching out in front of us.

Our loop took us back beside the dinosaur statues, where Mark thought Denisa should have a frightened look for a picture with a Tyrannosaurus Rex. It's here that we discovered that Denisa is just no good at looking frightened. He said, "NO!" to this attempt at a frightened look.

Nope!

Not even close!

So we obviously had a good time during our stay in Hico. Even though we had a bad start, we had a good finish!

Finding Gems in Mineral Wells, Texas

Our new home town right now is Mineral Wells, Texas. We've driven through this little town many times, but we've always been in hurry to get somewhere else. So now that we're camped here, it's nice to have the luxury of taking our time and discovering the gems of Mineral Wells. We found that it got its name from the mineral-laden waters that flow here. In fact, visitors can taste the mineral waters downtown, and pose with a pair of enormous butterfly wings.

People used to come from miles around to sip the therapeutic water from Mineral Wells. That is why there is a grand old hotel in its historic downtown. We've driven straight through this town many times before, always marveling at the 14-story grand Baker Hotel because it looks so out-of-place on this flat Texas prairie. It was built in 1929, and had 450 hotel rooms, two ballrooms, and was the first hotel swimming pool in Texas. It has been boarded up for almost 50 years, but we're glad to see that renovations have begun to bring the Baker back to its original grandeur.  In fact, we couldn't get a good picture of the Baker Hotel because it is fenced off into a construction zone. How exciting for the town of Mineral Wells when this gem comes back to life!

We also never knew about Mineral Wells Fossil Park, but today we made the drive down gravel roads to find it. It's actually an old city landfill, that after twenty years of erosion has unearthed fossils formed 300 million years ago.

We read the rules and got schooled by a couple guys that had driven four hours to spend the afternoon hunting for fossils here today. They were excited that they found the "holy grail" of fossiling here--a trilobite. The finish of the signboard at the entrance was cracked, but it showed a picture of this ancient arthropod that swam in the seas that used to cover this area.

Denisa snapped a picture of that precious trilobite fossil that they found, secured in a big plastic container.

They explained that we were much more likely to find crinoids, which are the tubular remains of sea lilies. From the signs at the entrance of the park we found that even though they look like plants, they are actually ancient animals.

Now that we are educated, we made the short walk into the pit, and immediately began finding fossils. They weren't big and they weren't rare, but it was interesting to find so many. Even though we found many of the stem-like crinoid tubes, we also found tiny round discs that were one segment of a tube. We could still see the grooves and the tiny centers of a living thing from so long ago! 

We have definitely wandered into another of God's wonders today! The highlight was Mark finding his own "holy grail." The trilobite he uncovered was perfect, and we took several pictures of it.

We also took pictures of our favorite fossil finds, including some gastropods and brachiopods. What a fun day to find a free site like this in the middle of north Texas!

Fossil finders are allowed to take home anything they unearth here. The rules at the gate state that only hand tools can be used, but we found plenty of fossils exposed from the recent rains in this area. Mark also found this rock that had a fossil indention of a larger crinoid. 

We don't usually keep the pretty sea shells and rocks we find in our travels, and we decided not to keep our fossil treasures either. We left them lying on a rock in the middle of the park. Someone will be delighted when they spot that trilobite in the center!

The reason we had planned to come this way through Texas was to visit one of our nieces and her family. But they were sick, so we entertained ourselves instead. We are used to finding our own entertainment, and we love the gems we find in unexpected places as we wander God's wonders.

As the sun was setting at our campground south of Mineral Wells, we took this picture of Old Glory framed in a lovely sunset. During a week that was filled with ugly in our nation's capitol, we were glad to be reminded that God provides beauty and peace in these United States!

How many Texas State Parks can we visit as we head south?!?

We're on a southern pilgrimage to a warmer place for the winter, visiting as many new-to-us Texas state parks as possible on our way. After a two-day stop at Lake Arrowhead state park, we headed another hour south to our next park stop. We pulled into Fort Richardson state park just in time for the 10 a.m. guided tour. The fort museum's curator braved the chilly morning temperatures to take us for an hour-and-a-half walking tour to all the buildings left from 1867-1878 when this fort was in use. The largest building on the fort grounds is the post hospital. It's so big you can barely see Denisa standing in the doorway.

This was a state-of-the-art hospital when it was built in 1869. That's a time when invisible germs were still a mystery to the military doctors.

With brisk winds, we went quickly from building to building at Fort Richardson. We stopped longer inside the commanding officer's quarters. This is the oldest cottonwood frame officer's quarters still standing in the United States, so of course we needed to take a picture.

We also like to explore old trestle bridges, even if they're no longer over water. This one had been moved to the state park over thirty years ago.

We decided to try a hike at this state park, and were glad to see that the Rumbling Spring Path took us down along the creek where we were protected from the wind. We're obviously ready to head south after a day like today when we're wearing our biggest coats and gloves.

We would have normally biked the 18-mile trail that goes all the way to Twin Lakes on the other side of Jacksboro. But the winds were blowing over 20 mph by this afternoon, and biking didn't sound like any fun in that cold wind. So that gives us a reason to return to this state park again some time, where the old train depot and the rail-to-trailway runs beside the park.

After finishing our 3-mile hike, we jumped back in the motor home to continue our path south. We're traveling along Highway 281, and we stopped in the town of Mineral Wells for a two-night stay. Country Living Resort is another half-price Passport America campground, right along the highway. From here we could drive to our next Texas state park--Lake Mineral Wells.

Our first stop inside the park was to Penitentiary Hollow. We could look down into the hollow to see the rock walls that rise straight up from the lake shore.

This is a popular rock climbing area, and of course Mark had to try his hand at climbing. He didn't go too high because we didn't have the usual helmet, ropes, crash pad, and safety gear that real rock climbers use.

But even Denisa could climb into the rock crevices, and enjoy the unusual rock formations that occur naturally here at Lake Mineral Wells.

Penitentiary Hollow was a fun place to play for a cool morning!

We hiked the rocky red trail that stays close to the lake on the east side, and then we drove to the west side of the lake to hike the blue water front trail as well. This park has 14 miles of trails, but all the Cross Timbers trails are closed due to flooding. They also have a 20-mile Lake Mineral Wells State Park Trailway that we didn't have a chance to bike today. So that gives us two reasons to return to this state park again some time.

Planning to return to these parks seems to be a re-occurring theme as we've already visited three different Texas state parks in our journey to the southern tip of this big state. How many more parks can we visit as we head further south?!?