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Published: April 22nd 2010
Lots of New Information for Me
Central Texas Oil Patch Museum - Luling TXShort drive - leisurely start. “Informational Irene” (my GPS) wanted me to take I-35 to Austin. I plugged in Nixon TX as a waypoint to avoid the Interstate. We ended up going southeast on US 181 to Floresville, northeast on TX 97 and east on US 87 to Nixon. There we turned north on TX 80. A roadside display in a city park led us to the Central Texas Oil Patch Museum in Luling. The Texas travel guide identifies several oil-related museums scattered throughout eastern Texas. After having seen only one oil museum, my guess is that this one is average - worth a short stop if you’re passing through. The volunteer at the museum told us Luling is on the Texas BBQ Trail (which also includes Elgin, Lockhart and Taylor) and suggested we partake before we resume our journey to Austin. She recommended City Market - only two blocks away. Oh, yes, bubba! Plan your “pass through” Luling for the lunch hour. I even got a carryout that we stowed in the camper refrigerator until dinner. The drive to Lockhart remained rural for the most part, but urbanization dominated the landscape from Lockhart to Austin.
After a day of
Beautiful Grounds and Memorials
Texas State Capitol - Austin TX laundry and cleaning, we set out on Wednesday under rain-threatening skies for a tour of the Texas State Capitol in downtown Austin. Parking might have been expensive in San Antonio, but it was virtually non-existent and expensive in Austin without a reserved space of some sort. To compensate, the public transportation system in Austin appears to be massive, effective and well used. We finally found an available 3-hour meter that was $1.00 an hour and took only nickels, dimes and quarters. Unlike the larger cities where I have used meters (like Chicago last summer); the two half dollars, folding money and credit cards in my pocket were useless. The 20-30 minute tour of the State Capitol was informative, and the Capitol building itself was physically large and structurally impressive. One foyer was dedicated to honoring Texans from all wars that had won the Medal of Honor. On the Capitol grounds, there are monuments to the Texas veterans of various wars, fallen volunteer firefighters and police officers, pioneers and other notable groups. After leaving the Capitol, we put the last of our coins in the parking meter at the city park housing the O. Henry Museum (the short story author) and
More Elegant The Ever
Driskill Hotel - Austin TX the Joseph and Suzanna Dickinson Museum (memorializing the survivors of the Alamo). All of our activities of the day were worthwhile but life could have proceeded nicely without any of them.
Thursday was a “not anything in particular” day. Drizzle began to fall as we were eating breakfast, but we decided to go for it anyway. Our downtown search yielded a 3-hour meter in less than fifteen minutes. On our 6-8 block walk to the visitors bureau, we passed by several beautifully preserved late 19th century buildings, but could not resist investigating the interior of the Driskill Hotel. What a gem! The nearby visitors bureau told us that country music was here and there in Austin but was not widely available! Duh! Is this Austin, New York or what? We explored a few more blocks of the downtown area and set out for Lady Bird Johnson Lake. The skies still were overcast as we ate our sack lunch in the park and then began our walk. For a weekday in the middle of the afternoon with intermittent light rain, the path was lively to say the least. What might a nice Saturday hold? Austin does have its shortcomings, but
LBJ Boyhood Home
Lyndon B Johnson National Historic Park - Johnson City TX there are plenty of parks and walking/jogging/biking trails and bikeways along most city streets.
On Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings the RV park staff serves up a tasty, reasonably priced breakfast. Since we had a full day planned for all three of those days, we decided to take advantage of the luxury. After breakfast, we turned on the windshield wipers and headed west for the Lyndon B. Johnson National Historic Park in Johnson City TX. By the time we arrived, the rain had subsided. Johnson City (named for LBJ’s second cousin) was the home of LBJ from age five until he married at age 26 and is the location of the Johnson Settlement - first home of Samuel Ealy Johnson, Sr. (LBJ’s grandfather), and other historic buildings germane to LBJ’s ancestry. After a stop at a roadside table for lunch, we headed 14 miles further west to Stonewall TX and the LBJ State Park and Historic Site and the adjacent LBJ National Historic Park. The LBJ State Park centerpiece is the Sauer Beckmann Living History Farm where costumed interpreters conduct and explain life on the farm in the early 1900’s - rendering lard, milking cows, canning beans, plowing with
Explaining How Soap Is Made
Sauer-Beckmann Living History Farm at Lyndon B Johnson State Park and Historic Site - Stonewall TX horses, cooking on a wood stove.
With our ranch pass in hand and our narrative CD in the player, we started the driving tour of the LBJ Ranch. On the way to the Western White House, we saw Junction School where LBJ learned to read at age 4 (before moving to Johnson City), the reconstructed LBJ birthplace (LBJ had it restored and used it as a guest house some time after he bought the ranch from his widowed aunt in 1951), his grandparent’s second farm home, and the Johnson Family Cemetery. A visitor center is housed in the former Jetstar hanger (a 707 is too heavy for the runway) and diagonal parking is along the former taxiway. On the guided tour, the Park Ranger told us the ranch staff recalled that life on the ranch when LBJ was Vice President included some intrusion by the Secret Service - most notably when LBJ was on the premises; however, that “low-keyed” presence changed dramatically with a report and a muzzle flash on November 22, 1963. There was no ramping up prior to inauguration. Immediately, communications equipment rolled in and the Secret Service was on hand 24/7/365.
The Park Ranger reminded
Good Place For A Staff Meeting
LBJ Ranch - Lyndon B Johnson National Historic Park - Stonewall TX us that after LBJ died the Texas White House was the home of Lady Bird Johnson for 34 years until her death in 2007. She had made several changes to the structure but had kept all of the artifacts and furnishings in storage so an accurate restoration could be completed after her death. So far, five rooms have been restored, and plans are in place to complete the project within 2-3 years. The presence of LBJ is real. It is quite easy to imagine him riding his horse across the pasture, walking up to the house from the Pedernales River, conducting a cabinet meeting on the front lawn under the shade of an oak tree or leaning back in his desk chair as he talked to some head of state on the phone. The peace and serenity found on the ranch makes sense of the fact that he spent about ¼ on his Presidency at the Texas White House - a luxury made possible by the recent technological advances of the early 1960s. Take the entire day and visit all three sites. Time well spent.
In our research, we had discovered there were three events planned for the weekend
Western Trail Heritage Park
Spring Fling - Bandera TX - "Cowboy Capitol of the World" in Bandera TX - a town we had passed through on our scenic drive out of San Antonio. The event that really piqued our interest was the Chuck Wagon Races. Couple that with a goat BBQ fundraiser and the Spring Fling (a music extravaganza in several of the local honky-tonks) and we were ready to party. Central Texas appears similar to the Midwest in that when the rains come, they might stay for several days. Even though the rain was moderate when we finished breakfast, we decided to “act like Columbus” and take a chance. A few miles out of Austin, the windshield wipers could hardly keep in the fast position. Since the Spring Fling would be inside the pubs, we forged ahead not knowing if the rain clouds had bypassed Bandera or not. The rain had almost quit when we arrived to find that the Chuck Wagon Races were postponed, that the goat BBQ had been moved out of a newly formed bog to an apparently clandestine location and that the Spring Fling didn’t start until 9 PM. We walked around town under mostly sunny skies, visited a few shops and discovered a fundraiser silent auction/live auction/raffle/bake sale benefiting
Replica of LBJ's Oval Office
Lyndon Baines Johnson Library & Museum - Austin TX a local church school. I almost bought a $25 raffle ticket for an AR-15 semi-automatic assault rifle but didn’t because I wasn't sure how they would notify me that I had won!
Sunday we stayed in town and went to the University of Texas to tour the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum. Of course, some information was repetitive but I was amazed at how much of the information either was new or was presented with a much different perspective. There are gifts he received from heads of state as well as from US citizens. There is an entire exhibit wing devoted to Lady Bird and other first ladies. The Presidential Museum focuses on his life while he was in Washington as a Congressional Aide, a Representative, a Senator, a Vice President and finally President. Many audiovisual presentations cover a wide variety of subjects - including an animatronic figure of LBJ telling a few jokes. After this extensive exposure to LBJ from childhood through his Presidency, I believe I have reached a new understanding of his motivation and philosophy as Commander-In-Chief during Vietnam.
From the museum, we walk several blocks over the hills and through the valleys (this is
the Hill Country of Texas, you’ll remember) to the Bell Tower at the UT Student Union. Guided tours are offered. The views of the campus and of Austin proper are good, but no mention is made of Charles Whitman or of the tragedy that befell the campus on August 1, 1966. Whitman took an apparent delivery of a large footlocker to the top of the tower where he launched a sniper attack that killed 14 people and wounded 32 others. I asked the guides about the incident, and they were quite willing to answer questions and offer details. Even though Austin has been my least favorite destination to date, I believe I have been more historically enlightened than in any of the other stopovers I’ve made so far. Next stop, Waco TX. Who knows what we’ll find there!
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