Pedernales Falls State Park

Since returning to Austin in early March, we have tried unsuccessfully several times to "take flight" again and see the wildflowers in the Texas Hill Country. One thing or another prevented our departure, one of the most recent being a faulty switch that prevented Millennium Falcon from going into reverse gear. Undeterred, while waiting for repairs we made a quick trip to Johnson City to visit Jimmy and Danine Jacks and see the flowers in Blanco and Burnet Counties. Here are a few shots from that trip,

plus a couple taken at our farm in Hamilton County.

On Monday of this week we picked up The Falcon at the Volvo repair facility outside Waco and raced back to Austin with plans to pick up The Royals and head west. However, our Car Karma still wasn't good. Outside of Austin The Falcon blew a coolant hose and had to pull over until another could be installed. My Tahoe, in the meantime was in the shop for an alignment and balancing. Maybe solving three problems was the charm. All work was done and we took off on Tuesday and hope to be out for a couple of weeks.

We are camped in Pedernales Falls State Park, where the weather is wonderful and we have a lovely campsite (#15 if you're planning a visit. It is very private and is surrounded by clumps of Texas Persimmon, Live Oak and Ash Juniper ("Cedar" to all you Texans).

The park is only an hour or so west of Austin and about 15 miles from Johnson City. The scenery is classic Texas Hill Country, with the added benefit of several miles of riverfront on the lovely Pedernales River. Wildflowers are in bloom, and good rains over the winter are providing plenty of water. On Wednesday we explored the falls, with the dogs enjoying the opportunity to cool off at the river's edge, or chill out in camp.

Thursday provided more chances to hike and enjoy the fields of wildflowers in the park. That evening, we had company. Jimmy Joe and Danine Jacks came for dinner, and we celebrated JJ's 67th birthday. It was a wonderful chance to continue old friendships.

Choke Canyon State Park

Millennium Falcon and the Royals made the trip north from Mission with no problem, passing a number of roadside fruit stands like this one. The bags of grapefruit and sweet onions were worth the stop.

We find the ride in the truck smoother with a heavier fifth wheel in tow. We do, however, need to add another air bag to our hitch to provide a little more cushioning over the bumps.

We traveled from Retama to Three Rivers yesterday, and are camped about 12 miles west in Choke Canyon State Park. This is a lovely park with only 39 RV sites (all with shelters and very spacious) so even when it's full you don't feel crowded. Choke Canyon Lake is a 26,000-surface-acre reservoir which is fed by the Frio River. Fishing here is supposed to be very good, but right now the lake is covered with whitecaps from the strong west wind. Earlier we saw several small boats struggling against the wind to return to camp.

The birding here is good, though. On the way in, and again as we left we saw flocks of 15-20 wild turkeys. We stopped for this handsome fellow, who was showing off for the ladies in the middle of the road.

We also understand that several of the "fabulous forty" (birds found nowhere in the U.S. other than Texas) frequent this park, but so far we haven't seen any of them and may not until the spring migration begins. We have, however, seen a number of Caracara, also called "Mexican Eagles," like this one perched in a tree. They're also often seen along the highway competing for road kill with the vultures and redtail hawks.

The South Texas Brush Country has a wild, inhospitable beauty all its own. We saw some of it in Bensen-Rio Grande Valley State Park...huge, gnarly mesquite trees, yelow-flowered huisache and lots of prickly underbrush. The mesquites haven't leafed out yet. As Texans know, folklore says that they never bud until after the last frost (and they're a pretty good predictor from our experience). Once the landscape changes from gray to green, it will be a lovely spot to visit, and should have great birding as well. In addition to birds more common to us, like several species of doves and the noisy grackles, we saw Kiskadee Flycatchers and a Long-billed Thrasher. Unfortunately, I didn't have the camera with me at the time.

The brush country continues up to and beyond Choke Canyon SP. The photos of the park are followed by some of the surrounding thickets. They appear impenetrable, but if you stoop down to javelina and coyote level, you'll see a network of trails though the brush.

We returned to Austin today, and tomorrow I'll go to Hamilton to spend some time with Mother.

Grounded

Falcon has been grounded for the last couple of months.... Let me bring you up to date. While in Kansas in October, John and I had an opportunity to buy a 38-foot Royals International fifth wheel RV from friends Jack and Danielle Mayer, who had ordered a larger fifth wheel from New Horizons. We agreed to the purchase and returned home to get our fifth wheel, J.R., ready to sell. We were fortunate to find someone in Austin looking for a fifth wheel, and J.R. went to his new home several weeks ago. Consequently, we haven't been RVing for a while.

We are now in Mission, TX, at Retama Village where we have moved into up our new-to-us fifth wheel. Retama Village is an RV community where the sites are owned by individuals rather than rented. It is part of the 2,500-acre Bentsen Palm Development Master Planned Community.

The development backs up to the Rio Grande River, and is within walking distance of the thousands of acres of state and federally-protected wildlife habitat, including the World Birding Center Headquarters, the largest outdoor butterfly park in the world which is maintained by the North American Butterfly Association, and Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park. The Bagley Pack especially enjoyed the dog park, which includes regulation agility equipment.

We hope to spend a few more days here getting acquainted with our new fifth wheel before returning to Austin. However, my mother is undergoing treatment of heart issues. If her condition worsens, our travel plans will change.

In the meantime here are some photos of the Royals.

Kaw lake turned out to be one of our favorite campgrounds. It may have been the weather, which finally turned off cool and sunny. Or, perhaps it was the lovely big campsites and view of the lake.

Certainly a contributing factor was our camp-ground neighbors. Kaw lake is apparently noteworthy in that part of the country as a world-class catfish lake, and a number of our fellow RVers were there for just that reason. They were in pursuit of "blue cats." At least 1/3 of the sites were occupied by fishermen. You could spot them because morning and evening they hung their catches on lines strung between trees, or elaborate A-frame racks. The photo below is typical (though not pretty!).

Most fish are caught on trot lines or "jug lines" fashioned from gallon milk cartons, each with several hooks attached. The fish we saw were mostly in the 15-30 pound range, with some of 35 pounds or more. That's a lot of catfish filets! I wish we could have stayed another weekend for the annual "catfish tournament." Who knows what we might have seen!

We again headed south, through Central and Southern Oklahoma. The secenery was at times spectacular, like the red clay hills below. We crossed the Red River, and immediately felt at home.

On the advice of RV friends Rocky and Sheri Rhoades, we stayed at Hickory Creek COE campground on Lake Lewisville just outside of Denton. Hickory Creek is lovely, with several miles of hiking or biking trails and some sites overlooking the lake.

The dogs had a grand time watching squirrels and taking walks. However, Nickie had another "close encounter" with a skunk the evening before we left. John had released her and Feathers for a short "potty stop" before bedtime when he smelled the unmistakable odor of skunk. He called in the dogs, but not before Nickie found where the skunk had sprayed and rolled in its "perfume." Fortunately, a bath took away most of the smell, but there is still a faint aroma of eau de polecat if you get close to her.

With a cold front predicted and rain forecast, we hooked up and headed home on October 21, twelve weeks and four days after leaving Austin. We found everything here in good order, but are now trying to reacquaint ourselves with the location of the essentials of everyday life. It's amazing how fast one can forget on which side of the sink the silverwear is located, or how the TV tuner works.

Oh, and we're already beginning to plan our next adventure, so stay tuned!

Homeward Bound

We left Junction City Thursday after lunch, and drove as far as Wichita, KA, before stopping for the night. The highlight of the trip was sighting several "kettles" of migrating hawks. They were far enough away that we couldn't determine what species they were....or if there were several. It was breathtaking, though. We pulled over on the side of the road, got out and watched for several minutes until they spiraled out of site, headed south. That wasn't the end of our hawk-watching, however. Northern Harriers, with their distinctive white rump-patches, winter here. Redtailed Hawks are everywhere, soaring over the fields and woods or perched on a fence post like this one.

As evening approached, we passed up a world-class state park on El Dorado Lake just outside El Dorado because the sites that were available were muddy. We'll stay there in the future, though. There were plenty of trees and large open areas where the dogs could run.

In retrospect, I wish we had braved the mud instead of going on to Wichita. There are only three RV parks in town. One was on the far west side of town and another had sites so small that even our 33-foot RV wouldn't fit. So, we chose USI RV Park on the east side of Wichita. I will say that it was clean, and had level gravel sites and a nice grassy area for walking dogs. However, it was very close to the (apparently requisite for urban parks) railroad tracks. From what I could tell, the trains started running about 3 a.m., and continued every 30 minutes or so until morning. The park also backed up to a pig farm. Fortunately, the wind was from the other direction so we got only an occasional piggy whiff. The dogs were very intrigued, though. The squealing piglets sounded like prey to them! One night there was more than enough!

On the advice of RV friends Jack and Danielle Mayer, we drove south into Oklahoma and camped at Coon Creek Cove Park on Kaw Lake northeast of Ponca City. The park is a Corps of Engineers park, and is just lovely. The sites are large and well-spaced, with plenty of open areas. Sites have water and electric service, and there are bath houses spaced throughout.

Our site backs up to a little slough off Kaw Lake, and is a mecca for birdwatchers. On Saturday we looked out our window and saw a dozen or so species at once. Among them were Great Blue Herons, Great White Herons, a flock of Canada Geese, several duck species, American White Pelicans and seagulls.

The one below is (we think) a juvenile Great Blue Heron that John calls Leroy. He hangs out below our campsite and fishes from dawn until dusk.

We have also seen a number of woodpeckers and flocks of Eastern Bluebirds in the trees around our campsite. (I never knew bluebirds traveled in flocks!) In addition, there are medium-sized birds of some kind that travel in great dark flocks, wheeling and twirling across the sky.

This area is on the edge of the tall-grass prairie, and rolling, grassy hills alternate with oak woodlands. The grasslands have taken on their fall colors, and the rusty-red big and little bluestem are providing color to the landscape. There are a number of very large ranches in this area. We ate lunch at a local barbecue joint alongside a "real" cowboy, complete with boots, spurs, chaps and a sweat-stained hat.

When driving along the back roads, we saw miles and miles of fences, herds of fat cattle,and a scattering of oil wells, but very few houses or outbuildings. Native stone is often used to build "posts" like these to support gates or fence corners.

　

Back to The Flatlands

Eastern Colorado and Western Kansas aren't at their best right now. The landscape is flat to gently rolling, rendered mostly in shades of beige and gray. Corn fields ready for harvest are gray-brown. Just-plowed fields are brown. Roadsides are beige. Occasionally the monochrome pallette is broken by a field of maize in shades of russet-red. The only real color comes from the big green John Deere tractors, bright red Case combines spitting out streams of golden corn, and other farm equipment.

We proceeded east from Denver across 100 or so miles of eastern Colorado, then into Kansas. For the first half of the day, I didn't see a single rock except for the rock fence posts. Those rocks were quarried and shaped by early settlers because there weren't enough trees to make into posts. (Don't ask me where they quarried the rock; I didn't see any likely spots.) It's interesting that the rock posts have often been incorporated into new fences, like the one below.

Near Russell, Kansas, trees begin to appear and the landscape began to look more like North Central Texas. What didn't seem like North Central Texas (when we left on this trip) was the cold, rainy weather that set in in early October, and which has continued through mid-month. That, combined with the wind...and more wind...and more wind, has made the weather pretty disagreeable.

On the very bright side, though, has been the camaraderie of the members of the Escapee's Heavy Duty Truck group we joined in Hutchinson for their annual rally. Some 30 or so members spent the first week of October sharing stories, attending seminars and generally enjoying the fellowship of like-minded RVers. Many of the attendees are "full-timers" who live (and in some cases work) on the road. Others, like us, travel part-time, but pull their RVs with heavy or medium duty trucks. Their tow vehicles are shown here in our annual group picture.

Our truck is the one in the center of the front row to the left of the big blue Peterbilt. If you look closely at the closeup of our truck, you may be able to see Feathers "driving" and Nickie and riding shotgun.

After leaving Hutchinson, we traveled some 100 miles to Junction City, KA, for a visit to the New Horizons RV manufacturing plant where our RV was "born" some 12 years ago. We were there to have some minor repair work done on our coach, while a couple of friends were shopping for new fifth wheel RVs. We'll leave tomorrow and begin working our way back to Texas.

To the Mountains.....Finally!

When we began this odyssey, one of our goals (maybe the primary one) was to get out of Texas during the late summer and early fall, and to go someplace cool! Well, we got out of Texas, but there's a lot of the USA that isn't cool in July, August and September. We found cooler temperatures in New Mexico, Durango and Colorado Springs, Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, and in Idaho and northern Utah. However, up until late last week I had only worn a jacket twice, and we have spent most of our time in t-shirts.

So, we were excited to move to Golden Gate Canyon State Park outside Golden, Colorado, for a couple of days. GGCSP is located high in the mountains at about 9200 feet. No more sand and sagebrush....we were ready for tall pines and aspen....and much cooler temperatures. The campground was certainly one of the most beautiful we have stayed in. With the aspen and narrow-leaf cottonwoods turning, the dark green hillsides and valleys were accented with gold. Many of the high peaks had the remains of the season's first snow. It was breathtaking!

The campsites at GGCSP offer plenty of privacy, and there are lots of hiking trails, and several fishing lakes. The only thing campers need to know, however, is that the sites are very narrow, and there are lots of trees overhanging the parking areas. We tried several sites before we found one where our rig would fit. Even so, John had to park with surgical precision in order to keep from scraping J.R. against a rock or tree.

We took a nice hike with the dogs on Wednesday morning, then went by the campground office to check on more hiking trails and to get a weather forecast. BAD NEWS! The weatherguessers were predicting lows in the low 20s for the next two nights, plus a 70% chance of snow. You know they say, "Be careful what you wish for." We had wanted cooler temperatures, but having no snow chains for the truck we were a little intimidated by that forecast. So, with many regrets, we packed up and left the mountains to keep from being stranded. We'll return, but will make a note to schedule that park for a little earlier in the fall.

We hightailed it down to I-70 and headed east. The section of I-70 from Golden to Denver is steep, with sharp corners and many warnings to truckers to slow down or use the "Runaway Truck Ramps!"

Between holding our breath through the steep parts, we saw beautiful scenery along the road and managed to photograph some of it. Fortunately, the Falcon handled the steep grades and sharp corners well, and we soon arrived at Cherry Creek State Park in Aurora, Colorado, just outside of Denver.

I would never have believed it possible to establish a 4000-acre park in the middle of a major metropolitan area and have it feel like the outdoors. However, Cherry Creek is a delightful place. Not only does it have miles of trails for hiking, biking, horseback riding, etc., it also has a 1400 acre lake and a large leash-free area for dogs to run and play. (You can see that the Bagley Pack enjoyed this immensely!)

It's even possible to believe you're in the wilderness if you keep your eyes off the horizon. If you look up, the houses and skyscrapers silhouetted against the sky remind you where you are!

The campsites at Cherry Creek are large and well-separated, with full hook-ups. We found a lovely spot on the edge of the campground. Since we have no back-door neighbors, we have plenty of privacy. We'll be off tomorrow for Kansas and back into the flatlands.