Buffalo Gap

August 21, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

The judge used this actual table and court room!

After working on projects and flights in the morning, I went to Buffalo Gap in the afternoon. This is a small community southwest of Abilene. They have a well-known historic village of old buildings converted into an amazing museum.

Help! the jail is gross.

Although the town is called Buffalo Gap, the animals are really bison. They had a courtroom and actual table that used to be used by their judge in the 1870s! I sat in their chair and banged the gavel. Upstairs was the jail.

The train station had one waiting room for whites and a colored waiting room.

For some reason, I was drawn to the textures of this door.

Abilene, Texas

August 20, 2015August 21, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Wow! This was an impressive museum!

Abilene is a very nice community.

After a wonderful visit with John and Michelle, I left Georgetown (suburb northeast of Austin) and drove to Abilene. There was no rain in Georgetown or in Abilene, but I was in a huge downpour about half way through the trip. The Abilene RV park is amazing because it has 100 foot pull through sites in the whole park. There is also tons of space between sites. Having elbow room is always nice to enjoy!

This was a great place.

There are many beautiful things in Texas.

As soon as I got the coach setup, I ate lunch and headed to Frontier Texas! It is a very impressive museum that is filled with videos of people playing different historic characters. I thoroughly enjoyed spending the whole afternoon looking at everything. The videos really brought the history to life. The whole museum was extremely well done.

Buffalo had a huge impact in this area of the country.

Buffalo (i.e., bison) had a huge impact in this area of the country.

Everything is big in Texas, including the skulls.

I next drove to another historic site that was a fort back when there were wars between the Comanches, buffalo (bison) hunters (they specifically said buffalo, not bison, although I think they are bison), white settlers, and US soldiers. I then found a restaurant that had a Tex-Mex version of Mexican food. Very yummy indeed!

Gorgeous flags

Breakfast Tacos in Austin!

August 15, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Wow! These breakfast tacos were fantastic!

After a wonderful bike ride where I saw 2 deer, I met John and Michelle at Tacodeli for breakfast tacos. Apparently, this is a very popular thing to do in Austin, Texas. The line was out the door when we arrived, but seemed to move fairly quickly. I do not think I have ever had breakfast tacos. These are not your standard tacos with beef and cheese, but an entire menu of different combinations of ingredients. Two tacos was a full meal and they were absolutely wonderful! Lots of yummy flavors to savor and enjoy.

Austin has been hot and humid (105 yesterday), but today there was rain at the motorhome in the morning, some cloud cover, and a nice breeze. The temperature is heating up, but it is much more comfortable compared to the previous few days. I have really enjoyed the opportunity to visit with John and Michelle!

Balcones Distillery

August 11, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Balcones Distillery was a jewel to find!

Several years ago there was an article in Forbes about a distillery in Texas that made fantastic whiskey. The article joked that they made the whiskey in a tiny location under a bridge in a not so great area of town. Since they both live in Texas, I told Amy and John if they ever found a whiskey by Balcones Distillery to buy it and I would repay them. Last Christmas they surprised me by giving me a bottle.

As I was reading about Waco today, I saw a brief mention of the Balcones Distillery and I immediately recognized the name. I looked up their address and entered it into the Jeep GPS and headed off to find them. However, they are a very difficult company to find. I drove all around with the Jeep GPS telling me I had reaching my location and it was an old tire shop. I finally pulled into a parking lot and started walking all around the area. I walked down an alley next to an old cement and steel bridge when all of a sudden I could smell something tangy. I walked a little farther and I saw a steaming still sitting right under the bridge. Literally, there were cars driving over it just a few feet above the still. I walked a little farther and I found some wooden barrels sitting outside a metal storage bin. I knew I had found the place, but I still could not find their building. Very strange! As I was walking around the barrels, a women on the telephone walked out of a small grubby building and asked if she could help me. I told her I was looking for Balcones Distillery and she laughed. The building where she works IS the Balcones Distillery. I told her I had been driving and walking all around trying to find her building. She laughed again and said she hears that all the time. Inside, there was a tiny rack of a few bottles available for sale. She told me I could buy a maximum of 2 bottles. However, at $70 per bottle for their classic single malt whiskey, I figured one bottle would last me a long time. She was gracious enough to take my picture in front of the whiskeys available for purchase. I asked if they had tours and she said they only have tours on Fridays and that all the tours are booked from now through October. Wow! Traveling to new places is so much fun and it is especially fun to find a business like the Balcones Distillery. They are not much to look at, but boy, they sure do make some wonderful whiskey!

Waco, Texas

August 10, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Beautiful flowers and Homestead Heritage!

I cruised through Oklahoma after leaving Elk City. I was going to stop at the south end of the state, but decided to keep going and pass through the Dallas – Fort Worth metroplex since it was Sunday and there would be less traffic. I decided to stop in Waco at an RV park with huge pull-through sites. After getting the motorhome set up, it was really nice to enjoy their pool and cool off. It is well over 100 degrees here, so the pool was especially refreshing. Note to self, reconsider visiting some parts of Texas in August.

A classic Texas scene at Homestead Heritage

Another discover is that there is a very impressive community called the Homestead Heritage Traditional Craft Village. This is a Christian community that creates all kinds of products from handmade furniture, to quilts, to cheese, to crafts, to grains, to pottery. Many of the items created are used internally by the group, but they also sell all kinds of items. It was wonderful walking from building to building seeing so many things. The quilts and furniture were quite impressive! I also enjoyed seeing the flowers they were growing outside. They had a nice video summarizing their activities and all the kids and tours they host each year. It was very impressive.

Colorful yarn used to make all kinds of things

These butterflies were really moving!

I learned several new things today. One is that Dr. Pepper was invented in Waco, Texas. I enjoy drinking Dr. Pepper, so this was a fun discovery. There is a Dr. Pepper Museum in Waco and I had fun going through the exhibits and remembering some of the commercials highlighting Dr. Pepper.

I never knew that Dr. Pepper was invented in Waco, Texas!

Oklahoma!

August 7, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

These guys are huge and powerful!

He has his eye on you!

Charlene is planning to join Amy and Neil on a trip to Denver for a medical visit and I headed east to explore new frontiers. I stopped in Elk City, Oklahoma and had a chance to visit some fun places. It was smoking hot here today; Google says the high was 105. Fortunately, the RV park has many trees to shade the coach. It makes me grateful that we have 3 air conditioners. They are noisy, but it is nice to be cool.

After setting up the RV, I headed to nearby sites. Right next to the RV park is Clinton Lake and it was overflowing at the dam. It was an interesting contrast that Arizona, Nevada, California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana were so dry and here, Amarillo, Texas and Elk City, Oklahoma had water everywhere.

I next went to Foss State Park. It is an Oklahoma state park and it has full hookup sites for RVs. They had a heard of bison and I enjoyed the opportunity to take pictures of these huge animals. I definitely would not want them to be angry with me because they are immense and powerful.

My, my you have a big tongue.

This guy was doing a jig!

Afterwards I went to the Oklahoma Route 66 Museum in Clinton, Oklahoma. Growing up in Flagstaff, I relate deeply to Route 66. However, here, I saw the Oklahoma perspective. There was emphasis on John Steinbeck and the Grapes of Wrath as people used Route 66 to migrate to California (and back). It was fun to watch how people celebrated traveling to the Big Texan in Amarillo and the Painted Desert and Grand Canyon in Arizona.

Amarillo!

August 6, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Cadillac Ranch is a famous tourist site in Amarillo.

Today I went to a couple of the classic places to see in Amarillo. Cadillac Ranch is a place where these crazy cars are sticking in the ground next to I-40. It is only a couple of minutes away from my RV park. The fun thing is to buy spray paint and then cover the cars with new colors, write your name, or create a crazy design. I have been to Cadillac Ranch several times, but it did not feel right to leave Amarillo without stopping by again. A lady and her son (both from Germany) were laughing and taking pictures of all the cars. She was gracious and took a picture of me with my cell phone.

The Big Texan is extremely famous. People from around the world eat here.

Probably one of the most famous restaurants in the entire state of Texas is the Big Texan in Amarillo. It is famous for offering to give someone a free steak if they can finish eating the whole meal within one hour. They have all the rules highlighted on their website. I have seen people try to earn the free steak, but I have never seen anyone able to finish the meal.

The Big Texan

Walking Dead Marathon

August 2, 2015August 2, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Ed, Charlene, Amy, and Neil all enjoyed watching the Walking Dead marathon.

Charlene had the fun idea of watching the Walking Dead marathon. I have never seen the program, but it is quite popular. To create the right atmosphere, Charlene created a skeleton out of vegetables. She also found a ZOMBIE drink and BLOODY Mary mix. Charlene also bought some pork ribs that were quite messy to continue the blood theme. The food was absolutely wonderful and fun to all be together!

Charlene’s creativity is seen in her vegetable skeleton!

A drink all ..ZOMBIEs love

Although I am a rookie to watching Walking Dead, I soon found myself drawn into the program. I understand why the series is so popular!

Yummy Red fruit to eat.

BLOODY Mary mix.

Snake!

July 26, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

The bike trail has a nice entrance and map.

Today I tried a second location that was supposed to have some nice mountain bike trails. I drove south to Canyon, the town just below Amarillo, where West Texas A&M University is located. Just north of their football stadium is a fantastic set of bike paths.

I just started riding on the “fence” pathway around the perimeter. It started with a meadow and then went downhill into a grove of sunflowers much taller than me. I was peddling through the narrow path between sunflowers when suddenly I went straight into this HUGE spider web. As I entered the spider web, I saw this large spider (probably 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter) crawling around. Instantly, I had spider web in my face, along both arms all over my handle bars and covering my thighs. I looked down and saw the spider dangling from my handle bars, right next to my left knee. I stopped my bike and jumped off and started trying to get the spider off my bike. I was able to pull over a sunflower branch and sort of get him off the bike and to the edge of the bike path. As I was doing this, suddenly a woman riding her bike came up behind me. We laughed as she saw me covered in spider web. It took a few minutes to get all the spider web cleaned off me. She rode into the remaining spider web of the path edges and was trying to get it off her arms too. She lived nearby and rode over to the bike path. She told me about different areas and what trails I might like the most. I told her since she knew the trail, she could go first and I would follow her lead. She was a much better biker than me and soon left me in the dust. However, on two occasions, I heard her cry out and as I caught up to her, she was stopped trying to get spider web off her arms and face. I guess no one has ridden these trails for a couple of days to have so many spider webs between the sunflowers.

With most bike trails, you have to splash through water. Instead, Canyon built a nice bridge to ride over.

I had fun ridding through the meadows. While peddling through the grass areas, hundreds of grasshoppers would jump up in the air on both sides of the bike. It was like forming a wave of grasshoppers as I peddled. The lady was waiting for me at the top of a ridge and showed me a couple paths I might like. I finished the loop and decided to go around everything again. This time there were not really any spider webs as we had cleaned them all out the first time around.

My bike has 24 gears and I needed to gear down to the lowest gear to get up several hills. The first time around I had to push my bike up that last 5 feet or so in several places. The second time around, I was ready for the hills. I geared down to my lowest gear and was able to power up the hills! I then had to stop at the top to catch my breath.

This turtle was just sitting next to the trail.

Going through another meadow, I saw a turtle just sitting next to the trail. I stopped to take his picture and he never moved at all.

There was a 5 foot snake right here. However, by the time I got my phone out and swiped the screen for the camera, the snake had slithered away.

I headed back up the hill and around the perimeter fence path, when suddenly I saw a brown snake laying right in the middle of the trail. He was about 5 feet long and all stretched out. I had just been on this very trail about 20 minutes ago on the initial loop and now there was a huge snake right in the path. I hate snakes. I stopped my bike as fast as I could. I took off my backpack, got out my phone, and swiped the screen so I could take his picture. However, by the time I did all those things, this sneaky, slippery, serpent had slithered off the trail. I went ahead and took a picture of where he had just been. I took another loop across only this top meadow to see if he would reappear for a photo, but he was nowhere to be seen. I just peddled quickly through the area as I scanned back and forth looking carefully for the snake. Seeing a snake right in front of you will definitely get your heart pumping fast! As I rode back to the Jeep I saw a rabbit running along. I wonder how long until a snake finds him? So today was unique with seeing a spider, grasshoppers, snake and rabbit. Ridding my mountain bike is so much fun!

Amarillo Mountain Biking

July 25, 2015 / Ed Armstrong

Wonderful mountain biking trails in Amarillo.

It is nice to be back in Amarillo and it has been great to see Charlene. To check out new areas in Amarillo, I went to a bike shop and asked about places to ride. They gave me the locations of several places and I was able to try out one route today that was called The Children’s Home Trails. This trail has its own Facebook page and I think they use it for community fund raisers. It was fantastic to be out on a bike trail enjoying the countryside. I saw rabbits, a roadrunner, and beautiful views. I also came across 3 eggs about 4 inches high that had hatched. I have no idea what type of eggs these were. Some of the trails had signs naming a trail “Spaghetti,” “Fence,” and “Murphy.” Several times I could not make it up the steep, rugged limestone rocks and needed to walk my bike through a section. I thoroughly enjoyed myself riding all over the trails.

I was the only person riding my bike, although I met three people running on the trail. One lady agreed to take my picture along the path. She then showed me a photo of a rattlesnake that had killed a rabbit on the path where I had just ridden. I forgot about snakes. I do not like snakes. I do not like them in a zoo and I especially do not like then on a bike trail. The lady told me to be careful with the high grass down by the creek. I decided to go up a different trail. Gratefully, I never saw any snakes.