Blogs from Texas, United States, North America

This morning, Colleen drove us to the airport so we could pick up our rental car. Rental cars were getting crazy expensive in Texas due to the eclipse. We found a good deal for picking up today and dropping off Tuesday morning. If we picked up a car yesterday when we landed, it would have been twice as expensive! So, we were really grateful to my mother-in-law for driving us. After we got the car, we decided to head to Brushy Creek Lake Park to check out some wildflowers. Colleen grew up in Texas and new of some beautiful areas in Hill Country, but after a long day of travel yesterday, we wanted something close by. Brushy Creek Lake Park also has walking paths, so we wouldn't have to go stomping through the fields and possibly ... read more

It was a perfect sunny day for a Caddo Native American festival. I arrived and saw that there was large attendance there. The Hasinai tribe of Caddo were very peaceful farmers that arrived there about 700 AD. They started building their three large earthen mounds about 1000 AD and finished about 1250 AD. Around 1300 AD they disappeared. The mound I visited was their burial mound; and the two larger ceremonial mounds were much farther away and I did not walk to or photograph them on this visit. I admire the Caddo, and other Native Americans for living well with nature and not overstressing their environment. The first thing I did was to visit their Visitors Center to see their exhibits and speak with the Caddo people. They did not have a visitors sign in log ... read more

After Oklahoma City, our next major objective was Quartzsite, Arizona. Because that’s just too far for a single day’s drive and we’ve grown accustomed to driving no more than 3 hours or so, and the number of reasonably decent RV parks on that route is limited, especially with all the snowbirds on the move, we made reservations for five stops enroute: Amarillo, Texas, Santa Rosa and Grants New Mexico, and Holbrook and Flagstaff, Arizona. Our drive from Oklahoma City to Amarillo was long and straight and flat, with a whole lot of very little unusual scenery. The roads were mostly pretty nice, and just amazingly full of semis and their trailers. Of course, we’re not very different when hauling our 37-foot 5th wheel, but can almost always maintain speed when going up hills while many semis ... read more

After Livingston, our next stop was Austin, where very good friends from Lynnwood had moved. We stayed at a wonderful RV resort park in a community just north of Austin named Lakeway, and it turned out to be an excellent and lucky choice because it was very close to our friend’s home and we had an excellent time with them. It certainly is wonderful to reconnect with friends, even though time is always too short. But then, it gives very good reasons to return. As we traveled from Livingston to Austin along lesser traveled highways, we noticed 2 things: There must be some unwritten regulation requiring 5 miles between Dollar General stores, if that much. Churches seem to be intermixed with them. For those who live in the northwest, this makes sense. The foliage and terrain ... read more

June 10, 2023 was the 33rd. Nacogdoches Blueberry Festival. Its hot outside, but I wouldn't have it any other way. In the downtown area churches (and other organizations) actively handed out cold bottled water to the people attending. The Blueberry Festival is centered around the Nacogdoches Visitors Center, a great place to get historical information and see its exhibits. Every year in front of the visitors center is parked the very nicely restored Tipton Ford Blueberry truck. There was some live entertainment and a selection of vendors. This is the largest annual festival in Nacogdoches and everybody had a good time. Every year I see some old friends that I have not seen in years. Just South of downtown is Festival Park where they had the Blueberry Festival auto show. I liked best the old coops ... read more