Indiana calling

Hi Folks.
Things have calmed down a little so I can take the luxury of updating this blog. Some of the blogs I read are actually updated regularly, daily even. Oh well, not me.
We left our home in Hastings on Saturday, Aug. 28, on what looked like a beautiful day. We were in no hurry, planning on stopping for the night at the Flying J just outside London Ont. About 20 minutes down the road I turned on the radio to get a traffic update for the 401(that's the major east west highway through southern Ontario in case you're unfamiliar with Ontario.) Seems there had been a major accident near Whitby and the 401 westbound was closed completely. We pulled over wondering what detour we could take. Our easy drive suddenly didn't look as good.
While we were stopped a gong sounded and a dash warning light came on. The battery charge voltage guage had dropped to 0. I stopped the engine and did what any man would do, I looked under the hood. Nothing seemed amiss. The engine still ran so we continued. We drove on thinking we would take Highway 2 from Port Hope. The radio reports kept getting bleaker and I was worried about that charging light. I did know the battery was on it's last legs and had planned on replacing it before winter. More warning lights came on so when we got to Bowmanville, we stopped at a Canadian Tire store but they were too busy to look at our problem, so I bought a new battery hoping that would help. And guess what? As we left the parking lot all the warning lights had gone out. The battery gauge read normal. Fixed, so I thought. We hadn't driven far before the gong sounded and the gauge sank to 0. By this time we were on the 401 traveling slowly but still traveling. We got across Toronto alright but I was still worried. I thought we might make it to the Flying J but instead pulled off at another Canadian Tire in Woodstock. They were close to closing but since the truck wouldn't restart they took pitty on us and had a look. Bad alternator, and of course they didn't have one in stock. And even if they could get one, they were closed tomorrow! Well Dean the service advisor made some phone calls and found the Canadian Tire in London was open tomorrow and they could get the part. The guys charged up our battery and after getting gas we were off again. (They didn't even charge us anything.) We got to the London CTC store and spoke to the manager about staying in the parking lot overnight.(He already knew our story as Dean had called) He suggested we would be safer in the Walmart parking lot around the corner so off we went again. The Walmart people said no problem so we stayed the night. It had been a long day.
Bright and early we made our way back to CTC to find it didn't open til 9:30 (We had been told 9). The part hadn't arrived yet so we waited. They told us to bring the truck into the far bay so we wouldn't have to unhitch, which was a bonus. Guess what? It wouldn't start! We just made it that far. No problem, they boosted it and they got started on removing the altenator. By about 10:30 we were out the door and on our way to the next tie-up.

Yes, there was about a 1 hour wait to cross the bridge from Sarnia to Port Huron. There was no real problen with the boarder and our GPS told us we could be at the Elkhart Campground by 5:20 if we didn't stop. We hadn't planned on being there til Monday morning but I gave them a call and they said come on down. We experienced some very poor cement roads but still got to the campsite by about 6:30.

Monday morning we had to stock up on most of our food stuffs as we have been warned to cross into the US with as little as possible. Seems the items that are forbidden change almost daily and you don't really want to get caught. A search of your RV can take several hours and things never get back where they belong,(so I've been told).

The Gypsy Gathering Rally started at 3PM.
 The Rally itself was great. Very busy and of course we (I) didn't get to see all we (I) wanted to see. Almost every attendee won a door prize at some point. We won a pass for 2 to the RV Motor Home Hall of Fame and Museum. Haven't got there yet but I expect we will in the next couple of days. Did you know they are celebrating 100 years of RVing in North America. The first 50 years were pretty shaky but in the 60's getting back to nature took off, and not just the hippies.

Had dinner last night (Monday Sept 6) with Phil and Cindy, a couple we knew from the Escapee park in Alabama. They are parked right across from us. We talked til about 9 then got home to bed.

We took a tour of the Jayco plant today (where our trailer was born) and they are produceing 10-11 fifth wheel trailers per day. That's just one plant. They have several. There are parking lots stretching huge distances full of many different RVs waiting to be delivered. And that is just Jayco. We have a list of  17 RV manufacturers in the area, and those are just the ones offering tours. We met with a Technical Specialest after the tour and he was able to answer most of the questions I had.

Tomorrow we plan on going to Shipshawana. There is a big Amish flea market there and maybe the RV Museum on the way back.

Friday we leave for the ESCAPEE ESCAPADE RALLY in Goshen Indiana, just about 15 miles south of here. Not sure about e-mail so may have to wait till we get home to update again.

Sorry, no pictures. I wasn't in the mood for the first few days but have started again.

I will figue out how to include a map soon too.

Take care and happy trails.

P&C



 

about time -update

Hi all. This blog is usually about Pat And Carolyn on the road, but we are not now on the road. But we do have plans. That's what this update is about.
Coming up soon at the end of August we are going to two RV Rallies in Indiana. The first one is called "The Gypsy Gathering". It starts on Aug 30 through to Sept. 3 and takes place in the Elkhart Campground, in strangely enough, Elkhart Indiana. This Rally is put on by Nick and Terry Russell. They are publishers of a RVing Newspaper called the Gypsy Journal. In case you want to know more I've included some links.           http://gypsyjournal.net/about_the_gypsy_journal.htm
In case you don't know, an RV rally is a gathering of RV'ers and wanna be RV'ers. They attend classes on RVing as well as crafts see shows and just generally hang out together. We have been to one Rally a couple of years ago and it turned out to be a lot of fun.
The second Rally is a week later at the Goshen Fairgrounds in Goshen Indiana. (See the pattern developing.) According to the map the two sites are very close together so we don't have a lot of traveling once we're there.
It's put on by a club we belong to called The Escapees. http://www.escapees.com/escapade/2010/  This Rally will be bigger but otherwise much the same as the Gypsy one. It's called an Escapade and it is the 50th rally put on by the Escapee club. It runs until the 17th of Sept. It's also the 100th anniversary of the first RV's ever built and we plan on going to the RV museum which is conveniently in the area. Thia is Amish country as well and we should find that interesting.
We will be rushing home after the Rally because we both have eye appointments on the Monday.
We'll be home for a week then we are off to Ireland. A place I've always wanted to see and since our youngest son is living in Belfast it's perfect timing. Our first week we will be on a bus tour of the southern part of the Republic of Ireland then a train ride from Dublin to Belfast where Jeff and Nicola (Jeff's girlfriend) will meet us. We'll spend the second week touring the northern part of the Island.

Not sure when I'll update the blog again but I should have some stories to tell.

Pat and Carolyn

Home again

Home again, or at least our other home. After spending almost 5 months and 14000+ Kilometers in our trailer we forgot where we put stuff in our home here in Hastings. It is nice to use a full size keyboard and monitor again.
We started out on November 21, 2009 heading south through Gananoque into New York state, then Pennsylvania, a bit of Maryland and West Virgina then skirting the Appalachians through Virginia and Tennessee, a few miles of Georgia, into Alabama where we arrived at Rainbow Plantation park on the 24th of November. We stayed in LA (lower Alabama) for Thanksgiving (American) and Christmas, then on the 27th of December we moved to a park called Betty's in Lafayette Louisiana, where we celebrated the arrival of 2010. From there we traveled into Livingston, Texas and stayed at the park that is the headquarters for the Escapees, one of the camping clubs we belong to. After a week there we dropped down to Rockport, Texas on the Gulf of Mexico where we were joined by our friends Terry and Barb. We stayed there about 5 weeks then headed over to Big Bend National Park. On the way there we stopped at another National Park that encompassed Lake Amastad, a lake formed by a damn of the Rio Grande River that forms the boarder between the US and Mexico. We also spent a few days at a state park called Seminole Canyon where we went on a guided tour of the canyon to see areas where aboriginal people have lived for thousands of years. Their rock paintings are amazing.  Big Bend covers an immense area of the Chihuahian Desert and completely encompasses the Chisos Mountains. After a spectacular week in what I like to call "Gods gravel pit" we traveled north into the Davis Mountains where the highlight was a tour of the McDonald Observatory, home of the 4th largest reflecting telescope in the world. We also had to get the front left wheel bearing replaced on our truck. Luckily it didn't happen in Big Bend because there were no repair shops for many many miles.
We started to think about our journey home at this point and headed north again to a disappointing place called Pecos where we were told nothing ever happens. While we were out on our first day there was a shoot out between  the police and one of the long term campers at the park. The policeman was wearing a vest so he survived but the bad guy in this case didn't as he shot himself. The park was evacuated during a short standoff and we missed everything.
We went further north into New Mexico staying at another Escapee park called The Ranch for a week. We liked it there and probably should have stayed another week. Roswell, the home of flying saucers and the US government top secret aircraft test center "Area 51" was one of the places we visited. I know because I bought a T shirt.
Now we turned east stopping at Abilene Texas (bad weather and poor campground) continuing east to a very nice campground north of Tyler, Texas. We stayed there a couple of days then moved NE to Hot Springs, Arkansas where we also stayed a couple of days. The main street of the town of Hot Springs is surrounded on both sides by Hot Springs National Park. The area has many bath houses (only two are still being used as bath houses). In the late 1800's and early 1900's many people traveled to the baths hoping to cure any number of ailments. The Veterans Administration built a huge hospital overlooking the town to care for injured armed forces personel. Today many people still come to the baths to relieve aches and pain. At several spots on the main street you can fill your water bottle with hot water fresh from the ground.
Still heading ENE we stayed in Natchez Trace State Park in Tennessee then on to Raccoon Valley, another Escapee park in Tennessee. We had to decide at that point which way to proceed, north through Detroit, northeast through Buffalo or return up I 81 to Gananoque. North was the shortest but we have never liked going through Detroit. We also wanted to stop in Mississauga and see Kevin, Sarah and the grand kids, so we went north. The weather had been quite warm and I had always wanted to see the Air-force Museum just outside Dayton, Ohio so off we went. The closest campground to the museum sounded nice and probably was once upon a time. It is terribly run done now and sits between 2 major highways and a railroad level crossing. Talk about noisy. The museum though was spectacular. 4 hangars full of any kind of aircraft you can imagine. All the planes used by previous US Presidents are there as well as the experimental planes I remember from when I was growing up. I had no idea there were so many different aircraft involved in WWII.
The passage through Detroit would have been uneventful except we wanted gas, so we took an exit sort of at random. Big mistake. Before we even got off the ramp the road deteriorated to large cracks and potholes and all the surrounding buildings were closed and boarded up. Of course there were no gas stations in sight. Luckily our GPS was telling us how to get back to the highway. We found gas just before the on ramp to I 75 and filled up. Canadian customs was smooth as well with almost no wait. We spent the night at the Flying J Truck stop just south of London then on to Mississauga the next day. After a nice visit we left the next morning (Good Friday) for what we thought would be an easy drive across Toronto. Not so. It was by far the worst drive of our whole trip. Bumper to bumper from Young St. all the way to Oshawa then still very heavy to Highway 45 where we went north again to HOME! All in all a great trip. Thanks for coming along with us.
I'll try to put together a picture slide show in the next few weeks that I can share on line.
Till next time, happy trails.

Pat and Carolyn

Moving East

Tomorrow we start on the trek home. New Mexico is a nice place that we hope to see more of someday. On Wednesday we went to Roswell. Not sure what I expected but Roswell is a lot bigger than I thought it would be. Roswell came to my attention quite a few years ago. Some of you might remember back in the late 40's on a ranch 75 miles outside Roswell something crashed in the desert. The descriptions given by the rancher at the time are very strange. Just before midnight July 4 1947 he heard a loud noise, different from thunder.The next day he discovers a debris field 300 yards wide and 3/4 of a mile long. The story has developed from there with the military declaring it was nothing more than a weather balloon. I remember my mother telling me she believed there certainly could be aliens visiting us. The universe is so large that almost anything could be out there and probably is. Whether or not they want to visit us is the question.

 Happy belated St. Patty's day. We had a traditional corned beef and cabbage dinner here at The Ranch and today the folks here sang Happy Trails To You and wished us a safe journey. The Ranch is one of the friendliest Escapee parks we have visited. It does give new meaning to the phrase "middle of nowhere". It's a nice middle of nowhere. It's the people that make the difference.The plan is to spend a day or two in Abilene then on to Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas.
Be well. Talk to later.

Pat and Carolyn

Weather report

After several days of bright blue sky and warm temps (some days over 80F) we now have rain. The forecast says possibly snow showers and a little north of here I-40 near Albuquerque was closed due to snow.  We are presently in New Mexico at an Escapee Park between Carlsbad and Roswell called The Ranch. They call themselves the friendliest park in the system and so far I'd say they are right. They even ring a brass bell when a new arrival comes  into the park so nearby people can come over to greet you. The Escapee system has two kinds of parks, the Rainbow Parks and Co-Op parks. The Ranch is one of the latter. All the sites in the park are owned by individuals and when you visit you get to stay on a site where the owner is absent. I'd say about 20% of the sites are empty.

Yesterday, on the advice of one of our neighbours we drove into The Lincoln National Forest to Sitting Bull Falls. It turned out to be quite a nice place although a longish drive. Then the local camp host told us about a little town another 20 miles into the forest where a restaurant has a very popular smorgasbord every Sunday. So off we went and he was right, a great meal. Somehow the drive out seemed shorter and the scenery was spectacular.




Before coming here we spent a few days in Pecos, Texas at an Escapee Rainbow Park. It is not much of a park. Just a big gravel lot with RV's crammed together. OK for overnight I guess. It didn't help that there was a police officer shot while serving a warrant to a resident of the park. We were away for the day so we missed everything. Seems there was a standoff with the local swat team and the park was evacuated for several hours. And we missed it all.
Tomorrow we are traveling to Roswell the home of Area 51 and the alien museum. More later.

Hope all is well with you.

Pat and Carolyn

Fort Davis, Texas

We are currently sitting in our trailer with a fairly strong wind storm happening outside. The sky is blue and sunny but the wind is fierce. We plan on moving on to Pecos Tex. tomorrow but there is a small problem with our truck. The left front wheel bearing is failing and the new part will not be here til 9am tomorrow. The mechanic says we will be on our way by 11am but I guess we'll see. I'm just glad we found it here rather than on the road.

Yesterday we went on a scenic drive on a winding twisting  big loop that took us through some very pretty countryside. It also brought us to the McDonald Observatory where we spent an entertaining afternoon. The road up the side of the mountain is the highest paved road in the US. Almost 6000 ft above sea level. Did I mention that Fort Davis is the highest town in Texas? The pictured telescope is considered the 5th largest in the world and the mirror (in the middle of the second picture, you can see the bent reflection of the support structure.) is actually the biggest but only 80% of it can be used because of movement limitations, so there are bigger telescopes. The mirror is cleaned 2-3 times per week using carbon dioxide snow. Not really sure how that works but I was assured it does. We spent a pretty intense 3 hours learning things about our closest star (the sun) and our galaxy. Did you know that the sun is not on fire? It's really a ball of hydrogen gas being held together by it's own gravity and the pressure of the gravity creates a nuclear reaction. (at least that's the way I remember it. Luckily there were no tests.)

Before coming here we spent a week in God's gravel pit (sometimes referred to as Big Bend National Park) or as one gentleman we talked to said it was miles and miles of miles and miles. The park is in the Chihauhaun (like the dog) desert so its full of plants that are out to get you. Big nasty thorns and such. The Chisos mountains are completely encompassed by the park. We went on several hikes and learned more about this amazing place that most people in the 1800's considered worthless. The few that came here had a harsh life but they found that cattle and sheep actually liked it.(Something about the quality of the grass.) They liked it so much that the grass has all but disappeared due to overgrazing. So the park got started (65 years ago) to protect it from us.
The park gets its name from the big bend in the Rio Grand River which is the international border between Mexico and the US. There were many times on our hikes that we felt you could almost reach out and touch Mexico. It's a beautiful stark place. I'm glad we finally made it. I would like to include a map of our travels, but haven't figured that out yet.

 

Lunch after one of our hikes.

Hope this finds you well.

Pat and Carolyn

Warm weather at last.

Hi all,
I’m sitting on a comfortable couch at a place called Stillwell Ranch and RV Park, just outside Big Bend National Park in Texas. They only have Wi-Fi at the office so it’s difficult to check Email.
 The gold medal hockey game is on so if my spelling and grammar suffer I’m sure you’ll understand. I couldn’t get our satellite dish working though another Ontarian I met had. He says we are on the edge of Bell Satellite coverage and dish alignment must be perfect.
We arrived on Wednesday and have spent Thursday, Friday and Saturday driving (mostly driving) and walking in the park. This place is big. We have to drive over 1 ½ hours just to get to the main visitor center then an hour to most of the other sites.The speed limit is 45mph. That doesn't help.  It’s a very impressive place. If you have ever seen a desert you’ll know what I mean. The Chisos Mountain Range is encompassed completely by the park.
It’s hard to believe that people actually lived and thrived here but we have been assured they did. For over 4000 years too. The aboriginal peoples lived and traveled throughout a huge area as their many petroglyphs and other artifacts attest.
(I think I’ll put the computer down for a bit as there are less than 7 minuets in the game and I can’t concentrate.) Oh no! Over time!
One negative watching the games here in the US is just that. Everything has a US slant. But, I can’t really complain.
I almost forgot. The temp got up to 81F on Thursday. We have finally found heat. Lucky for us it’s a dry heat and the nights are cool. Right now the clouds are gathering and we may get rain. That might get interesting as rain in the desert is a rare thing and the plants will bloom very quickly. Of course it snowed less than a week ago so go figure.
CANADA SCORED! GO CROSBY! GO CANADA!!!
The wind has really come up out of the northwest.  It looks like we’re having a dust storm. The rain is still coming.
We plan on moving tomorrow to a RV park on the other side of Big Bend. If we get wifi I'll try to update with pictures.
Take care till then.


Carolyn and Pat

What a differance a day makes

Yesterday was sunny and warm. We went on a 6 mile (round trip) bike hike to panther cave. It's only accessible by boat but we could see it well enough. It's in a rock outcrop where the Seminole Canyon and the Rio Grande  meet. Speaking of meeting, on this little hike we met 3 groups of Canadians. One from Hamilton On. another from Red Deer Alberta and one from Quebec. How bout that eh!




                                                                                              See the Panther? ^ In the top half.
Then we had a spectacular sunset (red sky at night is good, right?)

     Over night the wind came up and this morning about 9:30 it started to hail and snow. Nothing stayed on the ground but still, I felt cheated. We drove a long way to get away from this. Maybe one of those other Canadians brought it with them.
Any way we carried on and went to visit Langtry the home of Judge Roy Bean, the only law west of the Pecos.     You can learn more at  Judge Roy Bean        

                                                                       
We plan to leave tomorrow and Carolyn hopes there will be no wifi at Big Bend. We'll see.
Below is a view out our window.  Take care, hope I'm not boring you.

Back in the desert again.

We arrived yesterday after a short drive (about an hour) in Seminole Canyon State Park. It was a pleasant drive on a nice sunny day. The park area reminded us of our time in Arizona a couple of years ago. Lots of prickly pear cactus as well as many other thorny plants out to get you. It's hard to believe that people actually lived here but as our hike leader said everything needed for survival is here. We were on a 2 hour guided hike into the canyon to see were people have lived for over 4000 years. They are not sure who the people who lived here were or how long they were here. Judging by the number of pictographs on the canyon walls they spent a lot of time and effort here.

It was nice to have shorts on again. We even put the air on in the trailer for a while, but rain and possibly snow is forecast for tomorrow. I think we'll sit tight. The desert is supposed to be interesting after a rain. We will see. In the meantime there are several bike paths in the park so we'll check them out today.

Moving west again--

We arrived from Rockport Wednesday (Feb 17) in Del Rio after a bumpy ride through the South Texas Plains. Miles and miles and I do mean miles of flat scruffy plains. The only break in the sameness were the sometimes spectacular entrances to the ranches. Most were fairly simple but a few showed real imagination with huge stone works and landscaping. One place had a 6+ foot white painted wrought iron fence that seemed to go on and on. I know it was painted because it was showing signs of rust.

I was surprised at how rough the roads are since they don't experience the freeze/ thaw cycles that we get at home. Then again maybe it's the heat. I guess that could cause heaving or blistering of a sort. One lady we spoke with said they had more than four weeks of over 100 F last summer. We did see 2 road runners (more like road crossers) and several deer with long horns. Off in the far west horizon I could see mountains which I assumed are the Chisos in Big Bend Nat Park. It was almost dark when we finally pulled in to Lonesome Dove RV Park. Luckily it was a pull through and after a few minutes of leveling we were in.
I noticed that the web site for the park we stayed at in Rockport, (Anglers Retreat) has been updated with a pic of us and Terry and Barb at one of our many happy hours. Check it out  www.anglersrvretreat.com

Thursday we stayed fairly quiet.

 Friday was Carolyn's birthday and she wanted to go out for breakfast so we went out for breakfast. A place called Skillits was recommended and we enjoyed it. After that we had a look at the oldest winery in Texas. Not overly impressive (wrong time of year) but we did buy a bottle of rose'. We went to a movie that I wanted to see called The Lightning Thief. It's a Disney film directed by the same guy who did the Harry Potter series. Had to be good, right? Well it was good, with the requisite amazing special effects. It's hard to believe anything you see anymore. In the first few minutes of the film the image went out while the sound continued. One of the other patrons went out to tell the staff and after a few more minutes the light came back on. You may be wondering why I'm telling you this. Well I was impressed that a staff member was waiting  for us on the way out with complementary passes to another show all because of the technical glitch. That's service. Oh did I mention that the ticket price was $3.25?
That evening there was a pot luck fish BBQ. They served salmon and tuna and sausage (I guess for those who don't like fish) The tuna was amazing. They even had a cake with ice cream for Carolyn.

Today (Saturday) didn't start out well. I haven't said too much about Molly but after a brief respite she got much worse. She would not get up in the morning and when she finally did start moving she had no appetite and had trouble standing. She was obviously in distress and we decided she shouldn't go on like that. She was at the maximum dose of the pain meds. We found a vet who was open and he agreed we had done all we could for her. It was over in a few minutes.
We carried on with our planned visit to The Amistad Lake National Recreation Area but more about that later. 

The sun is out

Hi there,
Just a quick update. Many of you have sent emails asking about our dog Molly. So far so good. She is back on her old meds and though she still prefers her bed in the morning, once she is up and moving she does seem to be a little better. She is eating again.We keep referring to her as an older dog but according to a web site I found (Dog years to people years)she is only 73 in people years. Her main problem seems to be arthritis in her back legs. Her running days are over I'm afraid. Our main objective now is to keep her comfortable. When we where at the vet a few days ago, I was waiting in the parking lot when a lady came out carrying a small bundle wrapped in a blanket. Through her tears she said "We had to put him down". Not really knowing what to do I said I was sorry and she thanked me. A pet owners reality.

We still plan on heading for Big Bend National Park next Wednesday. The weather there seems a little warmer than here. Locals I've spoken to say this is the coldest, wettest winter they can remember. One lady even apologized, feeling all the snowbirds in the area are being robbed of the good weather they came so far to get. I agreed with her somewhat but let her know things here are still more pleasant than the temps and snow the north east are getting. Today the sun is shinning and the rain has stopped. We may even get out and do something!

As usual, I don't know what the internet availability will be once we move so I'll update when I can.

Hope your winter is going well.

Pat, Carolyn and Molly

updated news

I know I published a blog a short time ago but there is a small change of plans. Molly (our poodle) have been on medication for a while now for arthritis. (She just turned 15) We have felt for a couple of weeks that she has not been responding as well as she did earlier so we went to a local vet. He has put her on a new prescription and we feel it would be wise to put off our travel plans till we're sure she is ok. So we will be staying here in Rockport for one more week. Luckily our hosts can accommodate us as our site is available til the 20th of Feb.

 

Molly greeting the resident park manager (Butter)

Pat, Carolyn and Molly 

Not much to report

This past week has been a wet one. It's hard to believe this area of Texas has been in a drought for the past few years. Now the ground is saturated. The owner of the campground said he will have to raise the rates now that we all have water front lots.There have even been ibis and other wading shore birds fishing or frogging out behind us. The storm that made us so wet was the same one that paralyzed the US east coast with snow. If things don't improve this will be our coldest, wettest trip south yet.

The lake out back of our trailer.

I've been meaning to say a little about Rockport. It looks like it's really a summer town so we are here off-season. There are lots of Snowbirds about. And lots of RV parks. This is the only town I've ever been in were there doesn't seem to be any rules about were an RV park is located. There are small parks all over. The Chamber of Commerce has over 40 listed and I've sure there are many more. Also there are unimproved road allowances all over. Seems when the town was laid out over 100 years ago all these roads were thought to be necessary but I guess they never found the money to pave them. It drives my GPS crazy.

We are leaving on Wednesday for Big Bend National Park. I don't know if it will be an improvement but it will be a change. All the folks we have talked to about Big Bend have raved about it. We tried to find time last trip to Texas but couldn't so we don't want to pass it up this time.

We have been getting out and about here in Rockport. One cloudy day last week we drove to an area were people had told us they saw Whooping Cranes feeding.  It was foggy so photography was difficult. Didn't find any Whoopers but it was an interesting drive. We saw Sandhill Cranes and lots of other shore birds (including the Roseate Spoonbills, Carolyn's fave) )  as well as a housing subdivision with some strange looking houses. The one pictured had it's own lighthouse appendage attached. And no it wasn't a real lighthouse. At least, I don't think it is.

I've included a few random pictures because believe it or not a few blog readers have asked for more pictures. That's one thing I like about this blog, it's easy to add pics. These ducks to the left made interesting patterns in the sand as they swam about searching the bottom for food.

Trip South 09-10 #5

Jan 11 2010
Left early yesterday for the drive to Rockport Texas. Had to go through Houston. It was busy even for a Sunday morning. We plan as much as possible to go through big cities in off-hours. At least there was no construction to deal with. It was flat and easy driving on Hwy 59 south of Houston. This time the GPS took us right to our destination. Which was Anglers RV Retreat. It’s a new park (opened in June 08) and small, only 9 sites. The owners plan to put in 8 more in the future. The weather is improving. The sky is sunny and temps are getting better.

Jan 30 2010

I wrote the above the day after we arrived in Rockport. As you can see by today’s date, almost 3 weeks have since gone by . I’d like to say we have been so busy enjoying ourselves that I couldn’t find the time to write. That would not be true. Oh, don’t get me wrong. We have been enjoying our stay here at Angler’s RV Retreat. I have just become incredibly lazy. But then what, I ask is a vacation for? No, I guess this isn’t really a vacation. Going south in the winter for 5 months is more of a life-style choice.

Any way, some of you want to know what we’ve been up to. We spent the first few days reacquainting ourselves with Rockport and its “joined at the hip” sister town of Fulton. Last time we stayed here we were actually in Fulton at Driftwood RV Resort. We dropped in at the park to see if anything had changed in 4 years and no, not much. We briefly entertained the thought of coming back to Driftwood for the next month of our stay here. Gaynor (the owner) more or less talked us out of that idea. Not that she wouldn’t welcome us, there were 2 spots available, but she started raving about how nice it was in Big Bend National Park and it was only 9 hours drive from here.  So that’s how decisions are made on the road. Someone just comes up with an idea. Next move, Big Bend.
A couple of days after our arrival, our friends, Barb and Terry Ellis arrived. (You can read Terry's blog at  http://ellis2roam.blogspot.com) Carolyn had a great chili diner ready for them. We discovered that while our trailer is fine for just us, it’s a little cramped when feeding 4 adults. It was a great dinner though.

Barb and Terry reciprocated a few days later with a BBQ Halibut dinner. The Halibut was near the last of the fish that they had caught themselves in Alaska last summer. We really enjoyed it.

This trip I managed to include our bikes inside the trailer. We used them a fair bit in Plantation Park in Alabama but there wasn’t really anywhere to go except around the park. Here in Rockport, it’s just a few minutes ride to the Gulf so we have explored quite a bit. There are an amazing number of birds around here. I was going to list them but I’m sure to forget some. (And I don’t recognize them all.) The pelicans are especially interesting. We’ve seen them flying in some really interesting formations.

We’ve made it to the beach at Port Aransas, on Mustang Island, twice now. Port Aransas is at the mouth of the shipping channel that goes to Corpus Christi and down the inland waterway to Padre Island. On our first beach trip, the day started with considerable fog and we almost didn’t go at all. It’s only about 25 minuets to the ferry at Aransas Pass, so off we went. The ferry(s) are very interesting. They’re considered part of the highway system, so are free. They (there are at least 6 of them) run back and forth 24 hours a day and handle everything from walk-on passengers to the biggest RVs, busses and transport trucks. The water they cross is that shipping channel I mentioned earlier so the only thing that slows the passage is one of those ocean going freighters on their way to Corpus. We watched a couple of those freighters as they entered the pass then walked down the beach for a couple of miles enjoying what turned out to be a very nice day.
Did I mention that the beach is hard packed sand so is fairly safe to drive on. On our next trip to the beach, Barb and Terry came along and we started further south on the beach. We (well most of us, I had to drive the truck) walked north up the beach for a fair distance and reached that same shipping channel where we had happy hour while watching the birds and one crazy young fellow who had a large kite pulling him along the hard packed sand on a sort of surf board on wheels. We only saw him wipe out once too. At 5 o’clock we went to a restaurant that had been recommended by a fellow we met at the Rockport Aquarium. He said they had the best Amber Jack (that’s a fish) in the area and we just had to try it. The Amber Jack was over $20 per plate but Carolyn ordered it while the rest of us ordered from the $9.95 senior menu. All the meals came with soup and salad bar, which was exceptional, as was the Amber Jack. Carolyn shared. Overall, our friend from the Aquarium was right on the money.

Today turned cold again. Over night the temp got down close to freezing. We went to the once per month Rockport Market where the main topic of conversation was the cold weather. People who have lived in the area all their lives can’t remember a winter like this one. The temps will moderate through the coming week but they are forecasting rain till next Thursday.

As I mentioned earlier, we expect to move on the 10th of Feb. to Big Bend National Park and area. Hope the weather improves again before that.

Hope you are all well.

Carolyn and Pat

Try this blog thing again

I said back in Nov 09 that blogging didn't seem to be working for me. I've since become more familiar with some other blogs, so thought I'd try again. Hope you check it out. I hope to update more regularly but that depends on how lazy I feel and of course access to the internet.