San Antonio

On Monday morning, we pulled out of Port Aransas in a misty rain, and headed north on I-37. The rain continued throughout the day and evening.

San Jose Mission

We found our RV campground, dropped the rig, and drove to the San Antonio Missions National Historic Park. We started at the visitor center, and took a walking tour with a ranger. The San Jose mission is large and impressive, including some excellent stonework. These missions are about 300 years old, and were in operation for about 100 years, converting Indians into Spanish Citizens and Catholics. We drove to the small San Juan mission, and then walked along the river to the Espada mission. All in a drizzle.

We had dinner at theYard House pub, where the national college football championship game was on the TV; we had to ask who was playing. The food was good, and they had 170 beers on tap. Our waitress had just returned from Telluride, and was considering a move to Denver.

Everything is damp, it seems, nothing is drying. We thought about turning up the heat to dry things, but the outside and inside temperatures are about the same. The forecast for tomorrow is more rain. We hope that we don't mildew.

Alamo

Wednesday started out drier, and we headed downtown. We decided to get a bus pass and use the bus that runs in front of the campground, to avoid parking hassles. Our first stop was the Alamo, which Sandi had never seen. We then headed to the riverwalk, where we ate at Casa del Rio. About that time the sun came out, which we were very happy to see. After a bit of walking on the riverwalk, we headed for La Villita, a craft and shopping village, where we spoke to interesting people, and Sandi bought earrings. The copper store was run by a family from Micheoacan; most of the family has left Micheocan due to the violence and insecurity there.

We stopped at Mission Conception on the way back to the campground, completing our circuit of 5 missions, including the Alamo.

After resting in the camper for a while, we headed for the free evening at the San Antonio Art museum, which included many antiquities from all over the world, in addition to art. We had a nice dinner at their restaurant, overlooking the river.

Houston

I bought a new battery Friday morning, and we headed south on I-45 towards Houston. The scenery was wooded, unlike the high plains in the panhandle region. The traffic in Houston was intense, and the drivers are aggressive, so a challenge with a large vehicle. We found our campground, the Highway 6 RV park, which was quite nice. We paid a bit extra to get a site on the lake.

After we got settled, we headed the Brazos Bookstore, a local institution, and bought a few books. Then we drove to Ryan's bar, Darwin's Pub. We ordered food and beer, and waited for Ryan to arrive; it was good to see him. Ryan describes the pub as a five star dive bar, and explained how he runs the place, with many activities and events. They don't open until 4 PM; many of the clientele are waiters and servers, who want to relax with their friends after work, so it is a late night crowd.

On Saturday, we headed to the Johnson Space Center, which has many artifacts, the most impressive of which was a 747 jetliner with a shuttle on top. The jetliner was used to return the shuttle to Florida after it landed in the California desert. The visit to the restored Apollo mission control room was memorable, with a simulation of the first moon landing. The mission had to change landing sites on the fly, and had only 17 seconds of fuel left by touchdown. Of course, we remember the 1969 moon landing, so this was very meaningful to us.

We then visited the San Jacinto Battlefield and Memorial, which is slightly higher than the Washington Monument in DC. We did not elect to take an elevator to the top. The monument commemorates the victory of the Texans over Santa Anna, who was taken captive, in 1836. This battle gave the Texans their independence, and led indirectly to the Mexican-American war of 1846. This was an important part of US history, since that war resulted in Mexico seceding California and most of the west to the US. The battleship Texas is located nearby.

We had dinner on the picnic table next to our camper, as it was not too cold with jackets on. We did not need a jacket during the day, which was quite pleasant.

On Sunday, we went to church at St Catherine of Sienna in Houston. The priest was a very funny Irishman. The gospel was the Three Wise Men, but he reminded us that the scripture does not say if there were three wise men or some other number, or even if they were men or women. We were drafted to bring up the gifts, and he joked that maybe there were two wise men (us).

After mass, we went to Goode Company Barbecue to take out lunch. The décor was 100% Texas, down to the stuffed bison with a saddle. ;-) We headed to Ryan's house, where Sandi met Cindy, and we both met Orren, about three months old. They have a cute house that they bought a couple of years ago. We had a nice visit, and then headed back to the campground.

Driving South – Palo Duro State Park and beyond

On Monday December 30^th we got on the road about 8, and drove southwest through Limon and Lamar. It was sunny but cold, with a strong breeze; the highway department had wind warnings for high profile vehicles, but for us it was mostly a tailwind. After crossing the panhandle of Oklahoma, we stopped for the night in Dalhart Texas. Our GPS sent us on the wrong side of the railroad tracks; after bouncing for a while on the dirt road in the dark, we were able to get turned around and head back to the main road.

On Tuesday, we got a slow start, including wandering through Dumas Texas, looking for cheap gas and a propane fill. We drove through Amarillo to Canyon, where we ate at Feldman's Wrong Way Diner, a local institution, where each table had a different theme. We sat at the UFO and Area 51 table, and watched the G-scale train go overhead around the restaurant. 

The Panhandle Plains museum was huge, with exhibits on oil, firearms, the settlement of the area, paleontology and more. Note the photo of the Allosaurus with the Santa hat.

We proceeded to the nearby Palo Duro State park, where we were fortunate to have a camping reservation, as all the campsites were booked for New Year's Eve. We will need to change campsites tomorrow, as someone else has this site tomorrow. Palo Duro Canyon is beautiful. We bought a couple of books about the area. We enjoyed looking at the stars and listening to the coyotes howl. 

On New Year's Day, hiked on the Paseo del Rio trail, following the Prarie Dog Fork of the Red River, a casual hike on a warm but windy day. 

On Thursday we headed for Dallas on US287. The drive was routine. We are staying in a campground on the edge of Dallas, apparently the only overnight guests in the place.  Everyone else was a longer term visitor.  Our truck has stalled twice today, not normal behavior. When the guy at O'Reilly hooked up his test equipment, about the only thing he saw on the error log was low voltage. But when he tested the battery and alternator, it checked out. We had a problem starting it a couple of weeks ago, after leaving it on for hours while I was working on the trailer wiring. The battery is almost four years old, so we will probably replace it, and hope that solves the issue.