Deming and the Turquise Trail

We made the long drive across West Texas through El Paso and up to Deming, New Mexico.  The only reason I wanted to get to Deming was to have SteerSafe installed on the RV at the factory.  SteerSafe is attached to the steering mechanism and prevents the wheels from being turned by wind gusts, road hazards, blow-outs, etc.  We had been to Deming before and there's not much there; we have seen the City of Rocks before and everything else revolves around rock hunting, climbing or off-roading.  SteerSafe proved itself the next day driving north to Albuquerque.  The wind still moves the coach but not the steering wheel so much.  The springs do make a "sproingy" sound when you turn the wheel at very low speed.  (That's the technical term for the sound.)

Just outside of Albuquerque there is a National Scenic Byway called the Turquoise Trail.  It runs almost to Santa Fe and encompasses old mining towns which are now home to art galleries, inns, etc.  We're at the southern end of the trail at 7000 feet and it's back to long pants and jackets!  Clear skies and lots of sun though.

We found a nice little restaurant in Cedar Crest - GreenSide.  Nice menu and wine list with items marked as Vegan, Vegetarian,  Gluten Free and Meat Freak!  Unfortunately most of the shops and galleries on the Trail are apparently on the National Historic Register because none of them are accessible.

On to Lamy, just outside of Santa Fe to visit Al Webster and Roberta Armstrong and then we'll start home.

Fredericksburg!

We moved from San Marcos to Fredericksburg today and what a beautiful drive!  I have to retract the last post's comment about the Hill Country - Lockhart just isn't in the Hill Country - we most definitely were today!

And forget about New Braunfels being German - we had lunch in the Fredericksburg brewery today and the sausages, German potato salad and kraut were all excellent. 

On the way here I smacked a turkey that flew out in front of us; amazingly enough, no damage.

Also on the way here I bought an addition to our art.  It's kind of "Trailer Trash Meets Art Deco" - you'll just have to see it.  Barb's not sure...

Just Say No To More Red Meat!

We drove down to New Braunfels yesterday afternoon and had supper at Freisenhaus: the German restaurant that everyone raves about.  Pretty mediocre actually.  These people might all have German heritage but they didn't grow up in Sheboygan with German butchers and grandmothers and mothers.  I make Schnitzel that good and (since Barb taught me) make German Potato Salad a lot better!

Smitty's today - I think they all strive for funky.  Like the rest so far, you order and pay for your meat and then exit the smoky, hot cooking area and order and pay for your sides.  Smitty's has the fire outside of the cast iron "pit" and the line starts right by it.  Sure makes everyone move right along!  We took this to a state park near by and had lunch - good tastes once again.  The plan of bringing home a freezer full of TX BBQ isn't going to work; it's just not the same if it cools, is refrigerated or is frozen.  Is there a smoker in my future? 

Had some home-made ham soup and bread for supper; I think we're suffering normal food withdrawal.  I'm thawing out some Italian sweet sausage tonight and we'll add it to home-made tomato sauce for pasta tomorrow.  And we're going to go buy mass quantities of fruit!

Barb said she was home-sick this afternoon and it turned out she was home-sick for her dogs.  So we called Chelle and crew who are caring for them.  Shauna was as quiet and shy as always but reassured Barb that they're doing fine.

Super-moon tonight - bigger in Texas of course!

Lazy day tomorrow; then to Fredericksburg Monday.  It's another German town in the Hill country.  And by the way, we decided today that they call it the Hill Country because it's not table-top flat like the rest of TX.  The State Park we had lunch in today I swear was made a State Park because it had a pretty good sized hill in it.  It was a pretty wooded hill with a golf course around one side of it but, come on, that's just an ordinary country road in Wisconsin!

Mid-Week in San Marcos, TX

Sitting in the shade to let the breeze cool us - it's 82 at 5:00 PM after downing about 5 pounds of chopped brisket - really a little over 1/2 pound each but it feels like more! Pinto beans and slaw and a Shiner Bock to wash it down (Good Beer!) This is from Kip's in San Marcos and it's our favorite so far. Went to Kreuz yesterday - German/Czech heritage and pretty funky. Sign on the front door says "No salesmen! We shoot every third one and the second just left." We didn't like their meat as well but I think it was because we brought it back to the campsite and rewarmed it. Seemed to dry it out.

We usually like to stay in parks - from City/County parks to State or National. It didn't work out for any stops on this trip so we're in commercial parks with a couple of Walmart parking lots thrown in. This is a particularly nice one however - lots of big trees and the San Marcos river to play in. Lots of families and kids and dogs but amazingly quiet. I think the kids are busy all day and asleep by 7:00. Barb is suffering from dog withdrawal but that started Saturday!

We went up to Austin yesterday and found El Interior: a shop that sells clothing and arts and crafts from Guatemala and Mexico. Barb had wanted a long colorful skirt - she ended up with 3 and 2 blouses and I got a shirt. It's a great store and they're on the web and ship all over the world.

After shopping we visited the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. A little early for everything to be in bloom but a nice start to Spring.

San Marcos: BBQ and Wildflowers

We're in San Marcos, on the river of the same name, for a week.  The reason for this trip came about in 2008 when Texas Monthly magazine selected a #1 BBQ place for the first time.  They had previously selected a top 5 - they did that also in '08 but named one of them, Snow's, numero uno.  Then the New Yorker picked up the story and let Calvin Trillin write it (New Yorker Article).  That did it - I wanted to eat at all 5.  Snow's is only open on Saturday's from 8:00 until the meat runs out (Miss Tootsie starts smoking at ~ 11:00 Friday night).  So Saturday will be an early day.  San Marcos is close to all four towns with the farthest being 80 miles away and the closest 17.

Sometime this week we'll go back up to Austin to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.  I've wanted to see that since Mark Tomlinson did our kitchen tiles.  He did the wildflower tiles in the entrance of the Wildflower Center. 

Texas Bound and Down

Love that song from Smokey and the Bandit - OK, actually it's Eastbound and Down by Jerry Reed.  But this is blogerary license (as opposed to literary).  It's On the Road Again, Spring Fever, and Spring is Here all rolled together.  We left WI Friday with the alarm on and neighbors, including the St. Croix County Smokey who lives on our road, watching the house for us.  It was 22 degrees (above, thankfully) and we drove straight through to Lewisville, TX, arriving at noon Saturday.  I napped a couple of times in Missouri and a couple in Oklahoma and it was an uneventful drive.

We had reserved one of the sites that is right on the lake and the city hasn't raised the rates on this municipal park/RV park so for old farts like me it's $8.00.  We pulled in to 74 degree sunny weather with a light breeze and it was heaven.  We've had a long, cold, snowy winter!

I de-winterized the coach, got fresh water loaded with bleach to shock everything and we sat in the sun till we had to move to the shade.  We're going to lunch today with Jim and Janet Moffitt and be here again tonight and then mosey on down (Hey, I'm in Texas!) to San Marcos where the highs have been 80.  Y'all stay warm, now!

Catching Up The Last Few Months

We had a busy winter but I want to focus on two things: Barb has been taking a watercolor class and we did "Fat Sunday" on Feb 27. She is really enjoying this; some photos of her work:

This isn't based on anything but I want to be in that hammock!

Coming back to Bayfield, WI from Madeline Island.

From a photo of a big horn ram in the Desert Museum in Tucson.

From a photo of a blooming cactus taken in Arizona.

We did our largest Fat Sunday on 2/27 - 19 people! Pics and the menu at Fat Sunday Album

Now it's packing the RV and heading to Texas and New Mexico - posts to come from the road!

Madeline Island

The last week of September 2010, we went to Madeline Island just off Bayfield, WI in Lake Superior.  Madeline is the largest of the Apostle Islands and is the only one not part of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. It is inhabited and there is a small town (LaPointe) and a WI State Park, Big Bay.  We camped in Big Bay State Park and our friends, the Nelson's, joined us for 2 nights.

We hit the peak of the colors and had great weather with only a few gray hours and a little rain.  Mostly sun and beautiful colors.  Pictures at Picasa.

Madeline Isle was discovered in the mid 17th century, and the French built a trading fort there in the 1690's. The English built a fort in the 1790's (always a day late and a dollar short!)

Part big top, part bar, the café was born in 1992 when Leona’s, a popular night spot, burned to the ground. “Thirty-six hours after the fire we were tapping beer on the front lawn” said owner Tom Nelson. Recognizing a good thing, Nelson propped up the surviving floor and deck with two old Cadillacs, stretched a tarp over head, and backed a semitrailer up to the makeshift bar to hold the beer and snacks. Signs greeting patrons convey the informality of the place: “Build it first; design second.”  Signs are a big part of his exterior decoration:

If we are to save ourselves, economists must learn to subtract.

The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it. –George Bernard Shaw

It doesn’t take a Mason to make potato salad.

Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention. – Molly Ivins, 1944-2007

You can always count on Americans to do the right thing, once they have exhausted all other possibilities. – W. Churchill

A page in history is worth a volume of logic. – Oliver Wendell Homes

Children are more important than a comfortable retirement for the generation that got us into this mess.

The people must believe that they are not manipulated in order for them to be manipulated effectively.


Next trip is next week to Rochester and the Mayo Clinic.  Two referrals for Barb so we know we'll be there almost all of next week but don't know how much longer.

June/July 2010 - G's Cottage and then Big Bear Head Lake State Park, MN

We went to the Gabrielse' cottage just outside of Big Rapids, MI in June, stopping in Sheboygan on the way to pick up brats and hard rolls.  It was a great week with all the families there at times, and at times all together!

For an album of pictures: Picasa

After a few days at home we went to Big Bear Head Lake State Park in northern Minnesota for a couple of days, camping with Wendy and Bob Nelson.  It's a gorgeous park near Vermillion. When we got back home, we heard about the AT&T competition for "your favorite park".  You could log onto an AT&T page and vote for your favorite park (as many times as you wanted!)  The winning park would get $100,000.  At the time Big Bear Head Lake State Park was ahead of second place Smokey Mountain National Park by ~1,500,000 to 1,000,000.  By the time the competition ended, Big Bear had won by over 600,000 votes.  $100,000 being nothing to sneeze at in these financial times!

Some pictures:

Barb with Spanky & Darla, the Nelson's dogs.

 

                                                Barb with Spanky.

Finally! An Update!

It's August 2010, only a year since my last update - what do you want!  I'm retired, busy, sometimes depressed and often napping!

We missed out on the Blue Ridge Parkway, Virginia and North Carolina trip; Barb was having medical problems so we stayed home. We bought a car set up for towing behind the View: a '93 Honda Civic Si. One owner, only 2300 lbs. and only 131,000 miles (and 20,000 of those towed). Very nice!

This is a stock image - ours is black but doesn't have the rollbar!

Barb solved her medical problems by drinking enough water each day so we celebrated by going over to Michigan and visiting her Sister and family at their lake home just north of Grand Rapids. That's the next post!