Wednesday November 11, 2015-Inks Lake State Park

We are pretty well settled in here at Inks Lake. We still can't believe how many folks are in here to host along with us. I guess it will be okay, just a bit different. We had a park host meeting yesterday and the topic was brought up that NO host can boss another around. I don't know how that is going to be received by some people here but I guess we'll see. 

Some of our old Texas Boomer friends, Jim and Kitty Gardner, came to stay at the park for a few days and it was good to see them. Today we took them to Cooper Barbecue in Llano for supper and we had a great time. We got caught up on our travels and some plans for the future. It was a very nice time with old friends.

While we were there, a group of U.S. Army soldiers came in to eat. We learned that they are at Fort Hood fr training but not where they are from. It was nice to spend time in the presence of Army heroes that are still serving on Veterans Day. I would also like to add my congratulations and thanks to all the veterans out there that served. As some of you know, my Dad served in the Navy during World War II and was injured when the LST he was on was bombed and sunk. 

My work in the park will begin in a few more days and until then I will have to find something to do. I'm sure that I can find something...

So long.

Monday November 9, 2015-Moving day-Johnson Creek RV Resort to Inks Lake state park

Dave came over yesterday and with the help of a few other rally-goers, we got the new tire replaced onto the trailer and the spare put back into the storage under the trailer. Everything went very well except for the cable that lowers and raises the spare tire got off the roller and required some work to get straightened out. 

Later in the evening we had a nice meal of leftovers from the potluck. It was a fine way to end the rally and we visited for a long time before coming back home to begin preparations to leave in the morning.

We woke and had a nice breakfast before beginning our packing up to leave and still were ready to go about 9:30. We saw Dave and Nancy & Tom and Marti off before we left, but we only have about a hundred miles to go to the Inks Lake state park.

We made a very uneventful drive to our new home for the next couple of months. We were shocked when we arrived at the number of hosts that are here. There are 22 park host sites here and we got the next-to-last one. We are pleased with our site except that there is no Internet service at our site. We still have our own MIFI service but it is somewhat limited, so we won't be able to spend a lot of time "surfing" the net. 

Our site, #205. This is near the first site we were in a few years ago.

Our site showing our neighbors behind us. Paul and his wife are directly behind us and Roger and his wife are to the right. 

I went down to see my fellow deer hunt guides this morning and saw our hunt coordinator, Chris. We will just have to find something to do until the end of this month and the hunts will start on December 1st. I will be busy after that and I am looking forward to it.

So long.

Sunday November 8, 2015-Johnson Creek RV Resort

To bring you up to date on things, we took the blown out tire to Discount Tire in nearby Kerrville. I didn't know what to expect because the tires are at the end of their life in the RV world but nothing was said about their age and $38.75 later the tire was replaced. No strain, no pain. There was a delay in getting the tire installed because they were very busy and their phones and computers were down because someone had cut through a fiber-optic line somewhere, causing this outage with AT & T service in town. We ran some other errands and returned to get the new tire and were on our way!

One day we went out to eat lunch with Tom and Marti at a place called Classic Burgers and More and man, were we glad we went! Good, old fashioned burgers and great fries and onion rings were on the menu and they were great. So good in fact that the next day we took Dave and Nancy there. 

There was another reason to take Dave and Nancy out. We had gone to get the truck serviced and I took a wrong turn. We ended up on a loop around Kerrville and I pulled into a driveway leading to a city water well, intending to turn around to head back into town. I didn't realize how soft the ground was because of all the rain and slid off close to the fence. I wasn't stuck in the sense that I was buried but couldn't get traction to get out. I called Dave and he came out with his 4 wheel drive truck and pulled me out.

We had a park sponsored potluck dinner on Friday night and then had our rally Meet and Greet and Blue Bell ice cream. Several people from the park came to the Meet and Greet since they are Heartland owners and two of them actually joined the club!

Saturday was the club potluck and of course it was delicious. I always enjoy the potlucks but it's hard to watch what or how much you eat at one. I did the best I could and feel pretty good about my diet. I'm working on it slowly but surely.

This is a bittersweet day for us. The rally season is over for us until March of next year. We'll miss our friends but will keep ourselves busy at the state park.

So long.

Tuesday November 3-Moving Day-Stephen F. Austin State Park to Johnson Creek Resort, Ingram TX

It was very foggy this morning but we were all up and ready to go pretty early this morning. We were way a little after 9 and soon on the highway heading west to Ingram, which is a small place near Kerrville.

The cloudy and foggy morning makes photos difficult to do well. In the foreground is Dave and Nancy's Big Country. Behind them is Mike and Peg's new Bighorn and behind them is our Landmark. The white unit on the right is Lin and Debbie's Landmark. George decided to leave before us and said he knew the way to the park.

Remember what I said yesterday about the jungle-like condition of the park? The grass is long and shaggy outside the actual sites and there are several dead trees nearby.

Here we are, taking our lunch break at the Buccee's in Luling. Everyone loves Buccee's for their clean restrooms, their food and their shopping experience. They have just about anything you could want in their stores and their fuel prices are usually the best in the area.

After lunch, we continued on down the road, making good time and I thought to myself that this trip was certainly going well. We had made it through Houston with no problem and skirted San Antonio on Loop 1402 and were soon to arrive at our destination. About 12 miles from Kerrville, I heard the dreaded BOOM and saw rubber flying from the right side of the trailer. Oh no, a blowout! I quickly pulled over along with my friends and went to check out the damage. Luckily for us, we suffered little physical damage to the trailer and of course, the tire is ruined, but we have road hazard warranty from Discount Tire. We'll go see them tomorrow to see about coverage. It only took Dave, Lin, Mike and me to get the tire changed out and we were again on our way. 

There had been some discussion on the route to take to get to the park. Stella and I have never been here but Mike said he has, so we finally decided on the route we were now taking. I followed the GPS directions, which had been verified by both the address and the GPS coordinates, but we drove down a very narrow road to a dead-end at an RV park. The problem was, this is the wrong park! Wow, how did this happen? After lots of discussion among ourselves and consultations with GPS units, we decided that we could wind around through the neighborhood and get to the right park. We made it through the hood and over some deep dips in the roads. The last obstacle was a hairpin turn to get to the exit road. Mike and Dave successfully made the turn, but Lin hung the rear cap of his trailer on a landscape timber and tore the cap off the trailer while breaking the back window. Big whoops!

After finally getting around the corner we pulled over to survey the damage to Lin's trailer. We decided to secure the cap as best we could do and continue on the to RV park for the night. He will call his insurance agent to see what they want to do to make repairs. We used good old duct tape to close up the cap and limped on into Johnson Creek RV Resort, our home for the next few days.

This park is nice and has won honors for best small park in Texas as well as having won a 10-10-10 rating from Woodalls. That pretty well makes this place as good as it gets in Texas. We are looking forward to our stay here and the last rally of the season.

We hope tomorrow is better than today has been!

So long.

Moving day-November 2-Cajun RVera to Stephen F. Austin State Park, San Felipe TXh

A group of us that were in New Iberia LA for the rally there are going to the rally in Ingram, so we decided to convoy down together. We started out this morning with five of us, Stella and I, Mike and Peg, Dave and Nancy, George and Lin and Deb. We got away right on time, about 9AM, and after a short but bumpy drive down Louisiana Hwy. 90, we made it to I-10 west bound for Texas. Actually Interstate 10 wasn't bad in Louisiana and we made good time. We stopped for a break at the Texas Welcome Center just after crossing the border into Texas. We stopped for lunch at Buccee's in Baytown and Lin bought some fuel while there for $1.91 a gallon, a great price!

I had convinced the rest of the unbelievers that Houston traffic wouldn't be too bad at this time of day, and luckily I was proven right. We breezed through without slowing down and we pulled into the Stephen F. Austin state park about 4. The main road into the park is closed down due to the replacement of the bridge into the park. The park still looks terrible to us with high grass and downed trees and tree limbs but I guess they like the "natural" look. 

Mike & Peg and Lin and Debbie chose to stay home and eat but the rest of us went to one of Stella's favorites, Orlando's Pizza in Brookshire. After finishing our meal, we discussed the world problems which we were able to solve and it was time to return home to rest for another trip tomorrow. 

So long.