Blogs from Texas, United States, North America - page 7

We had an early morning start -- without even breakfast -- but were thwarted once again in finding this lovely and only-here-in-hill-country-Texas golden-cheeked warbler. We hiked for about 2 hours at St Edward’s Park, seeing our first cactus anyway. The ground around here is not easy hiking, with many outcroppings of rocks and loose rocks – not like walking thru our forests of Ohio or PA where you can really sneak up on birds. We DID HEAR a few of the golden-cheeked warblers though. I am proud to say that my knee is doing great – yes, I’m tired when climbing in the heat, but no hip pain anymore, and I can’t really say the knee is anything other than stiff. We ended up at the Water Treatment Plant and were welcomed by a lovely Connie ... read more

On the road again – wait a minute, we are rarely on the road because we fly. But this time we are doing a 21 day road trip to TX, then AZ, and back just in time for the next Lutheran Marriage Encounter April 22-24. On Friday we pulled out at 7 to sleet and some snow all the way south past Columbus. It was fascinating to see the leaves on the trees getting more and more prominent with each hour driving south. By Cincinnati we saw daffodils. By Louisville KY redbuds, and then forsythia. We discovered that KY is divided into two time zones! And that the National Corvette Museum AND the Fruit of the Loom headquarters are in Bowling Green. By Nashville we were also learning about the Nachez Trace, which is evidently a ... read more

The local weatherman at our local ABC station in Tyler, Texas informs his viewers when the International Space Station is visible over the "Piney Woods" of East Texas. I had time to pick out two nearby locations where I could shoot the station coming and going. I started my shoot with my camera on a tripod. When changing location I managed to seperate camera from tripod, hence the squiggle in my results. It was a nice clear cool evening for viewing the International Space Station. note: these pics were two second exposures.... read more

I drove into Henderson on South Main Street for a short easy walk to Heritage Square for the Syrup Festival. Just before reaching the festival secured area I reached the Howard-Dickinson House, built by the Howard brothers in 1855. The Howards were carpenters and brick masons. They were the major brick makers for the area, and many old homes and businesses standing today in Henderson were built with Howard bricks. Martha Howard was a cousin to Sam Houston, and President Houston visited there often. I walked into the secured area (keeping the autos from the street festival people) and got to thr traffic light where the four Main Streets (North, South, East, and West) met at Heritage Square. There vendors were selling food, rides for children, tee shirts, crafts, nic-nacs, and lost of other stuff. There ... read more

The Killough Monument (massacre site with historic marker) is a hard to find site on an unmarked road running South of Cherokee County Road 3411. The Issac Killough family was unarmed while harvesting their crops. They were attacked resulting in 18 family members being murdered or carried off. The historic marker (and several internet sites) blamed that massacre on "Indians"; refering to the peaceful East Texas Cherokee Nation. Keep in mind that Cherokee Chief Duwali (AKA Chief Bowles) had a signed treaty in 1836 with Sam Houston (and the Republic of Texas) for permenant exclusive land rites for about three million acres of land including all of Cherokee County. In 1837 the congress of the Republic of Texas nullified the treaty and started issuing land grants to settlers on Cherokee land.Unfortunately Issac Killough did not know ... read more