Hueco Tanks State Park

After considerable administrative confusion we managed to get a site at the enigmatically named Hueco Tanks State Park.
We only expected to use it as a stopover between Carlsbad and Albuquerque, however as we entered the park we became ensnared in the timeless beauty that is Huego Tanks.
The S.P. is small. It is centred on an igneous intrusion/pluton, that is a huge lump of magma that rose almost to the surface, cooled and then the softer rocks were eroded away leaving it as a big lump above the surface of the desert. (a bit like Eyres Rock). One of its unique features, apart from the jumble of big rocks, with nooks and crannies and caves, is that when it does rain here (14" per year) the impervious rocks collect water in those spaces and hold it for many months. This in turn enables a wide variety of life to survive. It is like an oasis. The availability of food and water also made Hueco Tanks a magnet for people. So remains of habitation from 6000 years have been found. Part of the evidence for this is a large number of wall/cave paintings which date from 1000 years ago.
Boy did we enjoy wandering round.
Saturday the wind got up again (it is the windy month) and we had another White Out (like at Lee Oliver last Sunday).
I found a permanently dripping tap at one campsite and sat and watched as birds and a rabbit came and drank from it.
On Sunday Morning we took part in a guided tour of one part of the rock. It was fascinating to hear about all the different peoples that have inhabited the place and to see some of the rock art they left behind.

We pay our respects to El Capitan

We have now been in the Chihuahuan High Desert for 12 days, from Tacumcari, to The Valley Of Fires (lavea beds), then Lee Oliver S.P. (Alamogorda and The White Sands), Lake Brantley S.P. (Carlsbad) and here at Hueco Tanks S.P. In that time we have come to respect the desert as a harsh environment, yet one that is fascinating and complex. We are also appreciating not only the climate, but also the effect that the geology has had on the landscape. The whole area of central New Mexico has been subject to some intense land movement which has revealed rocks which are 350 million years old. The land has been shaped by water erosion as it has been desert for less than 10,000 years. Interestingly the major movements, which produced the Colorado Plateau (5,000 foot uplift from Utah down to Arizona, which produced the Grand Canyon) and the Rio Grande Rift Valley all happened about 65 million years ago (the time when dinosaurs died out). So although the dominant rocks are limestone (they form the major material for the big mountain ranges right up the Rockies) the valleys and basins in between are covered with aluvial sand of a variety of types. Limestone varies in hardness dependent on how it was formed. This with the major upthrusts and volcanic/igneous activity has led to some pretty awesome rock/mountain formations. The characteristic of these mountains is that they seem to rise abruptly from flat, valley floors. We have seen this time and again in our travels.
On Friday we planned to camp at Hueco Tanks State Park near El Paso, to do this we had to make our way even further south in order to get around the Guadaloupe Mountains. Almost the whole route (140miles) was dominated by driving round this most southern outcrop of The Rockies. The most dominant feature being a huge outcrop of limestone at its southernmost tip called El Capitan. From there the desert stretches all the way to Mexico in the south. El Capitan came into view within 30 miles of leaving Lake Brantley, we drove through its foothills to the Visitor Center and it stayed in view until we were about 20 mies from Hueco Tanks S.P. We stopped at the Visitor Center and enjoyed the scenery.
When we were stuck in Hickory Creek a couple of weeks ago we visited Denton Old Town, where we discovered that the Butterfield Stage coach line passed through on its way from St Louis to San Francisco. Well, we again found ourselves on the Butterfield Stage Route as we explored the Pinon Station, right under El Capitan. Because of the mountains and deserts further north the stage was forced to come this far south to provide a reliable route to carry mail to and from the West.
As we left El Capitan behind we crossed more desolate desert, including salt flats. Although this was a very good road we only saw a handful of cars on this stretch. One problem not mentioned was the wind, it was strong and against us. With a good wind and gentle driving our rig can cover 250 miles on a tank of gas. With a head wind that can be easily cut to 180 miles. However not only did we have a head wind we had to climb 2500 feet to get through the pass at El Capitan, go down the over side then climb steadily again for the next 50 miles. We could almost see the fuel gauge needle dropping. Oh by the way there are NO GAS STATIONS BETWEEN CARLSBAD AND EL PASO - 160 MILES! We arived at Hueco Tanks S.P. with barely a quarter tank left, and we still have to travel another 20 miles to El Paso, but I think we will be OK.
Although I have not described it adequately we were very impressed with the grand scenery of our trip from Carlsbad to Hueco Tanks S.P.

Dealey Plaza and South Fork

Dealey Plaza has been one of the items on 'Our Most Important Places toVisit' list since starting our travels. Strangely, although everyone in England knows the history of the assassination of John F Kennedy, the place associated with it is The Book Depository and the name Dealey Plaza is not so commonly used, whereas in the USA Dealey Plaza, quite rightly, is the focal point of the event.
We did our tour of the Sixth Floor Museum, which refreshed a lot of the information we had learned over the years. It was interesting to see the reconstruction of the 'Sniper's Nest' in the corner of the Sixth Floor, disappointingly no photography was allowed. I don't quite know what they would lose by it, still they ain't gonna change because of me.
The assassination by Lee Harvey Oswald seemed straight forward, with only a couple of question marks. However, it is afterwards that I have been set thinking. Like so many other assassinations there are only facts, possible facts and questions, no objectively true answers. The biggest question to me is: why did he not shoot the president on Houston Ave - where he had a much clearer, closer shot, with the car coming in a straight line towards him? The trouble is that once you start looking for conspiracy, you find all sorts of things which can be conspiratorial. Whatever happened it was a sad day for the USA.

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We then drove round the inner ring road of Dallas, which is truly confusing unless you are really on the ball, and by mistake we had to drive into Dallas along the road which features in the opening credits for 'Dallas'. We skirted the city and drove to the north of Dallas to visit South Fork Ranch, the home of the TV series 'Dallas'. It was fun to see the house where the series was based, although all the inside shots were done in a studio in California. It was a lot smaller than we remembered from the series, but they apparently used wide angled lenses which made the place look bigger than it actually was. Inside was still as it was when it was the home of a Texas Millionaire and it was very, very plush. Most striking was the master bedroom, which is huge, with a walk-in washroom, 2 toilet rooms (his and hers we assume), a walk in shower room and a large sunken bath room. We also saw 'Daddy's' Lincoln Continental, which was very nicely looked after.

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Ray Roberts Lake

Today we have moved on to our last campground for this trip. It is a State Park beside a huge reservoir – they say it is 30000 acres, which is 46 sq. miles. A large part of the 118 mile journey was spent in going round the outside of Fort Worth, which is a large conurbation. We decided to stop en route for lunch, rather than making a packed lunch and then cooking in the evening. Since we did not know the area when we thought it was about time for lunch we just pulled off into a town area and looked. We saw a sign which said Café, great, so we pulled up and went in, only to find that it was a Mexican Restaurant. What the hang, we had never eatn proper Mexican, as Sally was bothered that everything would be too spicey, also that everything seemed to have wheat or corn in it (fajita, burrito, enchilada, tortilla, etc.), however we were pleasantly surprised that we were able to find some great food there.

We arrived at Ray Roberts Lake and have a great campsite almost beside the lake and this evening we sat and watched a massive red sunset as the sun went down over the lake. It was very beautiful.

The Lost World of Dinosaur Valley

Wednesday we set out bright and early to take the road to another world. The Lost World of The Dinosaurs. Yes we were going to stay at Dinosuar Valley State Park.

We had a good journey, using mostly back roads, which though only two lane were very straight and fast. We travelled through the Hill Country to the north of Austin. Worth mentioning is that when we passed through Hamilton we passed a cemetery and Sally had to do a double take as she saw a sign over a gravestone which said ‘Billy the Kid is Buried Here’. Sure enough this is where Billy the Kid is buried, but we didn’t get a picture of it.

We arrived at Dinosaur Valley State Park and were set up by 3.00, so set out to investigate what the place was about. The Paluxy river is a small (15m across) river that flows in a deep gully through the park. Along the banks on either side a hard layer of limestone is exposed, providing a flat shelf of rock, in which we should be able to find dinosaur footprints. We climbed down into the gully and used giant stepping stones to cross the river. There we found our first footprints, we could see them in the bottom of a small pool of water, clearly an elongated foot with three toes. We moved on and there, under the lee of the wall of the gully was a large flat area of rock, covered with footprints. The three toed clawed feet were the easiest to see, but then we picked out big round impressions in the rock. As we moved round we could see other tracks, clearly there were four impressions showing that the animals had been walking. The footprints are huge and of two different dinosaurs. One is a large, plant eating monster, with feet shaped like an elephant’s feet, but larger, these are the footprints of a sauropod, most likely the Paluxysaurus Jonesi.

The other footprints are of a 3 toed carnivore. We could see it was a carnivore as each toe ended in a huge curved claw, leaving marks in the rock 4 inches long. The footprint impressions were made some 110 million years ago, when what is now hard limestone was a hard, shelly clay, a bit like playdo. Most likely it formed the bottom of a shallow lake or estuary as once the mud had been stepped in it was never disturbed again, but covered over by more layers of shells and mud. Over millions of years the lime/clay became hard, but the layers above stayed soft and shaley. When the river eroded down to the soft shale it was easily washed away, leaving the hard limestone exposed, complete with its fabulous footprints.

Finding these dinosaur footprints was amazing. It was something I read about as a child. The whole afternoon had a air of Jurassic Park about it. To be actually treading here dinosaurs walked was very exciting. To be doing it in this beautiful river setting made it even more of an adventure.

Tourists in Austin TX

So today we were tourists, we took the tour bus round Austin. The bus took us out into ‘The Hill Country, which is a very pretty area of limestone hills, with some great views of Austin, then a quick shuffle around the town showing some of its best bits. It was a very entertaining couple of hours. After this we were ready for lunch, so decided to go back up to the Hill Country to a BBQ place we had passed call ‘The County Line – Lake Side Place’, this as one will realise is beside Lady Bird Lake. I had combo ribs, pork and beef, Sally had combo of beef rib, brisket and sausage. I really enjoyed the ribs, but could only eat half of them, the rest we brought home in a box.

Lady Bird Lake is artificial and is a recreational area in the centre of Austin. It is named Lady Bird Lake after President Lyndon Johnson’s wife Lady Bird Johnson. They were local to Austin and there is an awful lot of stuff named after them as they were well thought of. They have several museums about them and a library (every President has a library which holds, among other things, every public speech, every bill, book and paper made or published by that President, which is pretty well everything that was done during and after their term of office. The library, I think, is always in the capital of the home state of that president).

After our meal we returned to Mount Bonnell, on the West side Hill Country, to visit the small park right on the top of the highest point in the area, with its great views of the Texas Colorado River and Austin. This unfortunately left us on the other side of Austin at 5.00, drive time (as they call rush hour in U.S.A.) is horrendous here, so a twenty minute drive turned into nearly an hour of crawling. Even so we really enjoyed our day today.

McKinney Falls State Park

We have set ourselves up in McKinney Falls State Park, we have had a quick look at Austin, which is less than 10 miles away and also had a wander round the park. It is a very plwasant park, there is lots of space betrween sites. the hard standing is now quite old and often uneven. No Foraging for wood is allowed and the logs are very expensive: $1.00 PER LOG!!!

Christmas lights and The Riverwalk Boat Parade

We hope today will be a special day as we are planning to go into San Antonio in the evening to see the Boat Parade and the Lighting up ceremony for the Riverwalk lights.

But first, I needed to go and visit with Clint and Joan to make sure that they were happy with their new mobile broadband and to finish giving them campground details.

They surprised us by inviting us to have lunch with them at the local Mall. So we set out to see for ourselves the other Thanksgiving tradition that has frown in the U.S.A. –‘Black Friday’ not, as you would think, an evil day! (though some would think that) but the first day of the Christmas Celebrations – Thanksgiving is over, out come the Christmas lights, the canned music and –Christmas Shopping. The shops have sales and everyone is out looking for bargains. We needed to see this first hand (we have always been at the Thanksgiving Bluegrass Festival before), so we set out at about 11.00 to join the traffic jams and the general throng at the Mall. It was busy, but did not seem unusually so, still it was good fun to just get those last bits of Christmas shopping. At 1.00 we met Clint and Joan for lunch at a cafeteria called Luby’s. The food is cheap and was surprisingly good, even that nemisis of American restaurants – the vegetables, we cooked properly (not done to death). After a pleasant lunch we returned to the trailer to get ourselves organised for the evenings entertainment, because the weather forecast had let us know that the temperature was going to plummet down to freezing, so it was two pairs of socks, two pairs of trousers, T-shirt, shirt, sweatshirt and fleece for me, carrying a blanket and a cushion (those folding seats can get very cold). Sally was similarly prepared, just as well because although it was not down to freezing while we were there it was jolly cold and frost appeared on the car the next morning.

The parade would pass where our allotted seats were at about 7.15, so we were advised to get there early – by 5.00!, so being overprepared we decided to get there for 4.30, of course we found a parking space very easily and then had a couple of hours to wander round and look at what was happening. Sally wondered if anything might be happening at the Alamo (a stones throw away form the Riverwalk), as we approached we could hear music, the all lady Mariachi band was playing, there was a massive tree erected in front of the Alamo’ distinctive front wall and crowds of people were standing listening. San Antonions were celebrating the lighting of their City Christmas Tree.

We stood and watched the spectacle as the band played and Santa arrived in front of The Alamo in a white carriage, lit with fairy lights (Not Santa Anna this time) and flags were trooped and the national anthem sung and then the switch was thrown and the Christmas Tree and the whole area was lit up with little lights (which we had been assured were energy friendly LED’s). Oh what fun.

This was the appetizer, we now wandered our way, along with the whole of San Antonio, through the streets and down the elevator to the Riverwalk level and to our allotted seats for the Boat Parade. There we sat by the riverside, across the river the restaurants were serving to those people who were making a night of dining on the Riverwalk (and paying up to $100 a head to do it). At about 7.15 the Riverwalk was suddenly lit up as the lights came on, lots of twinkling coloured lights set in the trees all along the banks, which added to the restaurant and house decorations made a very pretty sight. As we sat the decorated boats came along with lots of music, some of it live, some of it canned. Lots of Santa’s, fairies, elves, a Ronald Macdonald, waved madly at us all, it was another great American Spectacle.

We made friends with a lovely family sat next to us (as well as about a dozen passers by, the volunteer steward, his wife and a security guard), who had come down from Fort Worth for the weekend. So ended another great day as we drove wearily home.

Thanksgiving Day at Travelers World

Today is Thanksgiving day for Americans, a national holiday set aside to celebrate God’s provision for their safety and well being (although of course the U.S.A. has no link between church and state). This year we are celebrating it in Travelers World Campground in San Antonio. The centrepiece of the day is dinner and the management have done us proud, they have generously provided turkey and ham and ‘taters’ I n large quantities, everything else has been brought in the form of ‘cover dishes’, or ‘dishes to pass’ by all those taking part and there was more than enough excellent food to go round. For the rest of the day we relaxed and in the evening we had a pleasant game of Rummikub with a very pleasant couple from near Vancouver in Canada, called Clint and Joan. We have seen them on and off all week, so we spent a quiet evening with them. They are planning to travel East to Florida to meet their family in January, so we bored them by giving them lots of info about campgrounds we know and love. I also helped them get their new Mobile Broadband up and running, so they are now in touch with the rest of the world

A Mission to A Mission

Tuesday. We have now moved our trailer to a new campsite as we are going to stay in San Antonio until Saturday.
This campground is called Travellers World and though quite expensive is very pleasant and only 10 minutes from the city centre. The sites are well sized though a little too close to each other. It has good facilities, pool, laundry, hall, library. Lots of long term snowbirds, many of whom are Canadians. Apart from the price of $37 p.n. I would recommend this campground.
Moving was hot work as the temperature climbed again to 80, so we cooled down for a bit, had some lunch and then set out to have a look at one of the other local missions. The closest one to us is San Jose Mission, just about half a mile down the road. It is a 7 acre enclosure which was started in 1720 and finished by about 1780, though it has had lots of changes to it in it's past. The mission was placed there to provide an outpost for the Spanish, as a way of converting the local Indians and giving the Indians a chance to improve their lives.
It seemed to work, but when the Spanish left in 1810's the Mexicans secularised the mission and it became a village, then a fort to keep out the Apache and Comanche Indians. Over the years it fell into disrepair but was restored in the 1930's as part of Roosevelt's WPA plan

Return to the Riverwalk

On Monday we decided to return to the Riverwalk, partly because we had enjoyed the boat trip, but partly because coming up this Friday is the Annual Lighting of the Riverwalk and Boat Parade!!! We had delayed our departure from San Antonio to go to this and ordered tickets on line, but wanted to pick them up in person to make sure that they understood Sally would be in a wheelchair.

Although this should have been a pretty straightforward task, the use of the wrong address on the internet meant that we criss-crossed the Riverwalk district a couple of times to find the ticket office. However, that meant we were able to explore the streets at ground level, above the Riverwalk, because from above you would hardly notice the almost secret world of the Riverwalk. When we collected the tickets we actually talked to the director of the event on Friday night and he was able to reassure us that our tickets were OK for Sally, but suggested that we should arrive by 5.00, for the show at 7.00, as there would be a lot of people and parking may be difficult. They expect 150,000 people to come and watch, each with a reserved seat! We also found out that the event is televised on national US TV (don’t know which channel). So we are looking forward to this event, which is Friday, the day after Thanksgiving – Official start to Christmas!!!!.

After this little adventure we felt in need of a drink, we found a Starbucks which had a terrace overlooking the Riverwalk and relaxed for a while. Following this we descended to the Riverwalk in one of the elevators and strolled round one section of the Riverwalk, just relaxing and nosing, it was great fun.

Gosh then it was time for lunch, so we chose the Saltgrass Steakhouse in the basement of Landry’s Hotel, where we had a balcony table, again overlooking the Riverwalk, where we could people watch, boat watch and Mariachi watch.

Mariachi are wandering Mexican musicians who cluster round tables with their instruments and play traditional Mexican music while you eat, until you pay for them to go away. It adds a very nice background atmosphere to dining on the Riverwalk. We had a great lunch, in fact one of the best we have had this trip. Sally went for a steak and shrimp combo, while I had baby back ribs, very nice. We then wandered home feeling very full and ready for a good stretch out. In the evening we had a wander round the campground and sat and talked to a couple from Colorado Springs and a chap called Clint from Canada. Yes it was warm enough to sit out and there were no mosquitoes, an experience that has been all too rare this trip.

The San Antonio Riverwalk

Sunday, though tired, we visited San Antonio's second biggest attraction, the Riverwalk. Rather than walking, we took a boat trip, which on reflection was a very good idea. The Riverwalk is a small section of SanAntonio which has a small river flowing through (about 20ft wide). In 1928 some architect, called Hugman, had the bright idea of using the river as a nice spot to have a town walk and a place for restaurants, so he drew up a plan for creating a small loop in the river, putting walkways either side, and since it was below street level, lots of stairways and elevators to create easy access. America’s Corps of Engineers put in a weir and later flood control so that the water stays at a constant level. The effect is a delightful walk through a narrow river valley, with buildings on either side, but plenty of trees, tropical shrubs, cool shade and spaces with many places to stop and have a meal or drink, it is quite delightful.

It sometimes has a feel of Venice about it (although I have never been there), a narrow waterway with tall buildings on either side, also it reminded me of the Pirates of the Caribbean, as the architecture has a very Spanish feel and the whole environment is controlled with the gently meandering waterway, with its unexpected turns, narrow arched bridges and tour boats. The boat trip is very good value at $6.00 (senior rate!)and takes you at a very gentle pace round the whole of the Riverwalk, with lots of useless information about special bits of it. We loved it.

Remember the Alamo

We arrived in San Antonio on Friday after a difficult journey.

On Saturday we decided to take it very easy, so we decided to drive into San Antonio (we are only about 5 minutes from the centre) and found a vacant Parking Meter to park at. (Sally's disabled parking badge means no payment needed )

Then we set out to see that most famous of all historical Cliche's - The Alamo.
We had a great time as we took the audio tour and found out about how they built the Mission.

The Mission is a fascinating place. It is really old, by any standards, dating back to the 1700’s when it was built as a Spanish Mission. Because of hostile Indians, the Missions were often fortified. It is most know for the Battle of The Alamo which took place in 1835 as part of Mexico’s civil war, which in turn brought about Texas independence from Mexico in 1836. I am still not clear why Americans such as Senator Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, Travis and John Wayne were mixed up in a foreign war, but they were. The story of the Alamo can be read in a number of places, most accessible being Wikipedia. However it remains one of the central stories of American history and the site is treated as hallowed ground by all who visit it. For us it (a) filled out a bit of America’s history, that everything West of the Louisiana Purchase was Spanish, then Mexican, for about 300 years, (b) started to place into context the relationship between U.S.A. and Mexico. It is hardly surprising that the border is so flexible as many people of Mexican origin lived in Texas from when it was part of Mexico, indeed it often appears to be more Mexico than U.S.A.

We listened to the Daughters of The Texas Revolution tour guides tell us all about the battle at The Alamo, and about the fascinating history of Mexico, then we went to see the John Wayne Collection of memorabilia from the film The Alamo.

The battle of the Alamo was about claiming equal rights with other areas of Mexico and did not solve much at all, indeed the battle was lost by the Texans. However it galvanised the area into declaring its independence from Mexico and after a couple more reversals Texas was allowed to become a separate and independent country, which it remained for some ten years before entering into the United States in 1846.

While on the tour we listened to a couple of excellent expositions from the staff at the Alamo.

After our visit there we decided to eat out, so stopped at a local steak house The Red Barn and had a very mediocre steak - still you can’t win them all.

Gorgeous day in Galveston

Today we hit the jackpot.
The sun rose in a cloudless sky - there is a cool breeze and it has been cloudless all day. High in the upper 70's. Even by Gulf coast standards this is a great day.
We had a leisurely breakfast (Sally's Special Pancakes, maple syrup and bacon), then we said a leisurely goodbye to the Canadian friends we have just made (they are going off to live the winter life boondocking on the sea shore further south). We then took a leisurely wander round one of the nature trails, followed by a leisurely walk to the beach (after parking the van 20 yards from the beach. We returned for a leisurely nap with a cool breeze blowing through the trailer. Then we gathered three weeks of washing and I have come to the local washateria, called Soaps, to do a leisurely (ha!) mega clothes wash. I am writing this blog as the three loads are going through the wash cycle. (another 4 minutes to go).
On our wander round we have seen the return of the Roseatte Spoonbill, Red tailed hawks, blue heron, large white egret and White Tailed Kite.
Tomorrow we move on towards San Antonia to do a remake of The Alamo.

Leaving Louisiana

Tuesday

In leaving Sam Houston Jones State Park we were leaving Louisiana and the Cajun culture we had come to see this trip. In some ways I felt that I had not seen enough, yet we knew that we had had enough of Louisiana, not that there were any bad experiences, quite the reverse, just that we knew it was time to move on.

We rose early today and were on the road by 10.10. One of the things I have noticed with Sally that I think may be the result of her diet is that she is waking much earlier and has been alert much earlier in the morning, which has been great. We bumped along the rough Louisiana Interstate 10 and crossed the Sabine River to land in Texas. The first thing I noticed is that the roads are much smoother.

We were planning to stop at Galveston State Park, now Galveston is a town built on an island, well really a 20 mile long sand spit which has been cut off from the land. We found it difficult to understand the scale of the waterway it is built on. It is at the mouth of what is called the Bay area, this bay is about 15 miles wide. The Intracoastal Waterway is the strip of water between the sand islands and the mainland. This waterway is up to 10 miles wide and stretches for many tens of miles along the southern coast of Texas. It is part of the offshore sand strip which is a couple of hundred miles long and goes from Louisiana to Mexico.

This was a long trip for us – 180 miles – and we were both weary and stiff by the time we arrived in Galveston, only to find that the State Park was 9 miles the other side of it. Still it is a beautiful park, if you like sand dunes and wetlands. We had the choice of a site right by the sea shore, but out of site because of a fence/hedge, or a waterside site on the edge of the Intracoastal Waterway, so we chose the waterside site. We have a great view right across the waterway. Out of the trailer window we can watch pelicans dive bombing the fish, Macawber like herons, waiting for something to turn up, large Red Tailed Hawks soaring across the wetland, an Osprey perched on a stake sticking out of the water and Killdeer skittering round the wet sand/pools. I have been keeping a good lookout for dolphin, but have not any confirmed sitings. But it is very relaxing just sitting watching.

As we were leaving Sam Houston Jones S.P. we met a couple of Canadians, who were also on their way to Galveston, so we endeavoured to meet up when we arrived. I had to go back to the Rangers office this morning and ran into them. They have moved onto the Intracoastal campsite and invited us to eat with them, we have just come back from a lovely time spent with them.