Spring Flowers!

Spring is definitely here!

I love hearing all the birds chirping, seeing all the flowers blooming, watching the garden grow, and mowing all the green grass in our yard.  It is all a part of Springtime here at the edge of the woods!

                                           Spiraea bush

                            Dwarf azaleas and geraniums

                           Wildflowers growing in the ditch

                           Faithful purple irises that come back every year!

                            Sedum (that comes back every year!)

I am continually amazed each year when these amaryllis bloom.  I dig out the bulbs in the fall, put them in a paper bag, let them dry out all Winter, plant them in a small pot in Spring and here they are!

This is a black iris that my friend Mary Ann dug up out of her flower bed last year and gave to me....planted in a bed behind our house and this is our first bloom!

Last Summer Tom and I saw this yellow iris growing in the ditch down the road from our house, dug it up, brought it home and planted it behind our house, and this is our first bloom this year!

 Due to the cooler than normal, wetter than normal Spring we are having this year, Tom's garden is just now beginning to grow.  He has had to replant some seeds due to the heavy rains we have had (more than 9 inches of rain this month!).

This is the first time in several years that Tom has planted potatoes.  We'll see how it goes, since we usually are plagued by gophers in the garden!

Day 8 - Going HOME!

Saturday  - March 7

When we woke up this morning, we both decided that we had really enjoyed our Spring vacation, had been to lots of places, seen lots of sights, but now we are just ready to be home.  So we enjoyed our hotel's good breakfast selection, loaded the car, and headed north  out of Schulenburg, Tx. on U.S. Hwy. 77.

What??  T E X P U ?  ?   All made with painted tires!

We are traveling under heavy skies, but the sun is coming up and trying its best to shine on us.

  We passed thru La Grange, and then we drove on State Hwy. 237 to the tiny town of Round Top (pop. 90).

Round Top may be tiny but it is a "happening place"!  We had heard of it before and now here we are.  Established in 1822 and chartered in 1870, this community is one of the smallest incorporated towns in Texas.  The area was named Jones Post Office in 1835, but after German immigrants arrived in the 1840's, the town is said to have received its current name from "the house with the round top"--an early stagecoach stand.  Round Top is famous for its large antique festival and its music festivals held by the Round Top Festival Institute.  There are several restored homes, barns, and other structures open for tours also.

We continued thru the small town of Burton, then skirted around Brenham (wish the Blue Bell Creamery was open for tours on Saturdays!), then took Hwy. 105 up to Navasota, crossing both the Brazos River and the Navasota River before arriving there.

We took Hwy. 90 out of Navasota and soon came to Anderson (pop. 222), the seat of Grimes County.  Historic Anderson was established in 1834 on the La Bahia Road, a centuries-old Native American trail that stretched from Louisiana through Texas.

I just love photographing the sky!

The majestic Grimes County Courthouse, a 1894 Edwardian Victorian structure is made of hand-formed red bricks and native stone.  The courtroom has a pressed metal ceiling and original furnishings.  Full restoration was completed in 2002.

We stayed on Hwy. 90 to Madisonville where we picked up Hwy. 21 to Crockett.   The town of Crockett is named for frontiersman Davy Crockett, who died at the Alamo.  It is one of the oldest towns in Texas, and Davy Crockett stopped there to visit friends while on his way to the Alamo.

Davy Crockett and a small detachment of men camped here on their way to defend the Alamo.  A historical plaque marks the site where the spring still flows. 

The 1850's Strode-Pritchett log cabin is also in the Park.

After our stop in Crockett, we headed north on Hwy.19, a highway we have traveled over too many times to count!  The town of Palestine was our next stop--to Eilenberger's Bakery!

 I lived in Palestine for many years.  Fran Eilenberger was in my high school graduating class.  I am glad to see this bakery is still going strong!

We perused the many delectable choices and decided on cookies, leaving there with a bag full of cookies for the road!

There are so many historic old homes and buildings throughout this area.  Here are a couple of photos I liked:

And there are several of these really cool sculptures made with railroad car steel wheels....

 ...and other random parts....

...after all, Palestine is a railroad town!

When we arrived home this afternoon, we were surprised to see bits of snow remaining....on our roof and in some shady spots!  This crazy Texas weather!

It doesn't matter though because it is so wonderful to be home.
No place like it in the whole wide world! 





  

Day 7 - Spring Vacation!

Friday - March 6

We enjoyed a lazy start to our day today and after doing our little driving tour around Kerrville we headed east toward San Antonio.  Our plan was to try another "Taco" from one of the locations on my Texas Monthly magazine article list "63 Tacos You Must Eat Before You Die".  We timed it so that we entered San Antonio after the morning traffic rush was over.....remember the HemisFair Tower...from the 1968 World's Fair...it still towers over downtown...

and enjoyed the drive thru some nice older neighborhoods just north of downtown to "Taco Taco" , a small but very busy neighborhood café on E. Hildebrand that is only open for breakfast and lunch, 7:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.  Since we arrived there just before 11:00 a.m. we ordered breakfast tacos...made on very large flour tortillas and filled with meat, cheese, onions, and everything good!  So yummee!

We made our way back to I-10, out the eastern side of San Antonio, then picking up U.S. Hwy. 90 toward Seguin.  Seguin is one of the oldest towns in Texas, founded in 1838 by a group of Texas Rangers and named in honor of Juan N. Seguin, a distinguished Mexican-Texan.  We wanted to see the "World's Largest Pecan", a concrete statue on the courthouse lawn that pays homage to a valuable local crop. 

                    Seguin's art deco courthouse....

What a gorgeous sunny day today!  Still just a little cool with a slight breeze blowing as we made our way to Gonzales to visit the Gonzales Memorial Museum....

 ....which is fronted by this serene reflecting pool.

The museum was closed today for a special function so we meandered about the grounds surrounding the Memorial.

Gonzales is know as the "Lexington of Texas" because the first skirmish of the Texas Revolution was fought here.  In 1835, as political unrest grew in colonial Texas, Mexican soldiers came to retrieve a six-pound cannon given to the town for frontier defense.  Colonists resisted, and waving a flag that read "Come and Take It", they turned the cannon on the soldiers---firing the first shot in the fight for Texas independence.

....And, as they say, "the rest is history"!

 The museum grounds are very well manicured and has a couple other historical buildings.  The Eggleston House is a carefully restored log house, originally built in 1848 and furnished with antiques to depict Texas pioneer life.

There is so much history in and around Gonzales.  What a striking Gonzales County courthouse silhouetted against a cobalt blue sky!

We then continued our drive eastward on U.S. Hwy. 90, next stop a few minutes away in Shiner, Texas which was founded as a railroad stop in 1887 when the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railroad was built, and was named for the town-site donor, H.B. Shiner, owner and founder of the K. Spoetzl Brewery, still in operation today, still utilizing the original old historical building.  Due to all the construction/expansion the brewery was only offering an abbreviated tour today.

I love this sign....much better than a simple "No Parking " sign that some folks tend to park in front of anyway.

Such beautiful architecture in this old church in Shiner!

Next, it was on to Halletsville, situated on the Lavaca River, equidistant from Houston and San Antonio.  The Lavaca County Courthouse built in 1899, was modeled after the county courthouse in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Oh boy, this brings back memories!  How many years since we have seen signs like this?  The sign was still up but this business looked closed long ago!

In Hallettsville, we turned north on U.S. Hwy. 77, and made it as far as Schulenburg (just a few miles!) as the sun was setting, a beautiful end to another great day of seeing sights in Texas that we had never seen before.

Booked a room here at the Holiday Inn Express for the night.

We'll see what we find to explore tomorrow...day 8 of our Spring Vacation!

Day 6 - Leaving El Paso

Thursday - March 5

We were awake early, packed up and left our hotel just before daybreak.  Since we had stayed the last two nights at the Candlewood Suites on the northeastern edge of El Paso, we knew we had to navigate our way southeast on I-10, right thru downtown El Paso, so we were hoping to beat the "morning traffic rush", which we did.

Yesterday when we left the El Paso Saddleblanket World Headquarters we saw the most fascinating "artwork sculptures"  gracing a couple of overpasses on I-10.

 The top section on each of these huge things was twirling in the breeze!

 Well, this morning in the early morning light they were glowing!  Apparently powered by laser technology?

Such a unique sight to see as we headed east out of El Paso on I-10!

We also were blessed with an incredible sunrise!

When you see this Speed Limit 80 highway sign, you know you are in the middle of nowhere, and likely many miles from the next town.  Oh boy, set the cruise control and cover some miles across the barren landscape that is west Texas very quickly!

Looking to the southwest the sky was looking very ominous.

We pulled off the highway at Sierra Blanca to check out the Southwest's only in-use government structure made of adobe, the Hudspeth County Courthouse.  Sierra Blanca, which is named for Sierra Blanca Mountain (6,950 feet) to the northwest, grew at the juncture of the nation's second transcontinental rail route in 1881 (Southern Pacific and Texas & Pacific).

While we were snapping a photo of the adobe courthouse, we noticed that the temperature here was 23 degrees!  Yikes!  As we continued to travel east on I-10 our car's windshield began to freeze over because apparently the windshield washer lines had frozen so the wipers were useless! 

 We pulled over to use the ice scraper to scrape the windshield clean.  Thankfully these conditions only lasted for a few miles!  We soon reached the I-10/I-20 split where we stayed on I-10 and the weather warmed a little to above freezing as we gradually drifted southward toward San Antonio.

As we neared the town of Fort Stockton, these large metal cut-outs of cowboys and cattle sits high on the hill welcoming travelers to Fort Stockton.

 We stopped in Fort Stockton to get fuel.  We pulled into a Wal*Mart where we noticed cheap fuel prices, and was surprised to find a new Wal*Mart convenience store located at the fuel pumps.  How nice!  It contained basic traveler needs inside....restrooms, coffee, cold drinks, snacks....such a nice added convenience!  I would love to see these at all Wal*Mart fuel stations.

We continued on our drive east, now enjoying milder temperatures and sunshine and blue skies!  Our next stop was in Ozona, the seat of Crockett County, and the only town in the county's 3,215 square miles, a vast ranching and oil area, and also one of our nation's top areas for wool and mohair production.

We stopped at the Davy Crockett Monument, located in the town's square, the monument is a tribute to the legendary frontiersman and Alamo hero for whom the county is named.

 Interesting architecture in the Crockett County Courthouse!

 We walked across the street to the Crockett County Museum.  this three-story museum features a blacksmith shop, a Western heritage room, wool and mohair room, a bank room, a business room, and much more.

I was totally captivated by the many displays of women's slippers!  The Madye Slipper Factory started in the basement of this building.  I thought about my Mom as I admired the hundreds of pairs of slippers displayed throughout the museum.  She loves these slip-on slippers!

How would you like to get your hair curled with this early hot roller machine?

 

In the bank room, seeing all the early ways of banking (donated by the Ozona National Bank) I thought of my sister, Donna, and my niece, Carla, who both work in banks

 We really enjoyed the three floors of the Crockett County Museum and all the history so well-displayed there.  And it was a nice break during our drive across west Texas!

We then traveled to Sonora where we planned to check out the Caverns of Sonora.  This cave ranks as one of the most beautiful show caves in the world.

 We were greeted by a bunch of peacocks (the owner's pets) as we arrived at the Caverns of Sonora gift shop/ticket office.

We went on a two-hour guided tour.  We saw formations growing on the caves ceilings, walls, and floors as we walked along the almost two miles of passageways and hundreds of stairs.

 I took so many photos during this tour it was hard to decide which ones to upload to this blog.

 Caverns of Sonora has such spectacular beauty, rivaling anything Carlsbad Caverns has to offer.  Also, Caverns of Sonora are less "touristy", sort of off the beaten path, more intimate with only three other couples on our tour.

                                    Awesome!

                                                  Incredible!

Following our Caverns of Sonora tour, we then drove the short distance to Junction where we rolled in to Cooper's Bar-B-Q for a delicious lunch!

Afterward we drove into Kerrville where we planned to stop for the night.  The next morning we did a driving tour around Kerrville, up to the hilltop along Rim Rock Drive, overlooking the town, and saw a deer roaming the neighborhood.  It is under the big shade tree!

 

On to Gonzales, via San Antonio, on day 7 of our Spring vacation...NEXT!