Places Visited:

Texas: Kerrville, Oscar Scheriner SP, New Braunfels, Gruene, Texas.

Saturday, May 24, 2003
Alamo KOA San Antonio, Texas. $29.50 full hookup with 50-amps very
near downtown San Antonio.

Along with everyone else in San Antonio we headed north on I-35 to New
Braunfels and Gruene (pronounced Green). New Braunfels is home to the
famous "Smokehouse" Restaurant and we wanted to experience that. The
Smokehouse has good brisket, BBQ & sausage but the best brisket in my
opinion can only be obtained by special invitation to Rob and Linda
Farrell's home. VBG New Braunfels is also home to Schlitterbahn, a
BIG, water park/resort. To get an idea of what Schlitterbahn is all
about, it is rated America's #1 Waterpark by the Travel Channel and
has been for the past four years.

Gruene is a restored German farming community and business district
now filled with shopping, craftsmen, bed & breakfasts and restaurants.
Gruene is actually inside the city limits of New Braunfels. Gruene
is a truly quaint "wide spot in the road" still very-much clinging to
the 1850s. The Grist Mill has been cleaned up and is now a first
class restaurant. Next door is historic "Gruene Hall" one of the most
popular dance halls in Texas. Gruene Hall has not changed one whit
since the early 1900s.

The Guadalupe River flows through town and along with it thousands
upon thousands of tubers in every form of colorful floating rubber.
Floating in Texas must be illegal without an obligatory cooler packed
with beer. Every party is bringing back huge onion sacks filled with
evidence of the day's fun. It is a HOT day and perfect for floating
down the cold, spring fed Guadalupe. Ice-cold Bud-Lite obviously
enhances the experience. While I was at the bridge watching throngs
of tubers & rafters a big 18-wheel Bud-Lite truck started to cross the
bridge then stopped and started blowing his "Big-Rig" horn. The crowd
went wild as only a crowd can do late in the afternoon, after downing
several six-packs each. I just laughed and thought to myself he had
best get that 18-wheeler in gear and out of there before the crowd
stormed his supplies. They didn't and he eased on down the road after
the crowd had yelled their selves hoarse. It doesn't take much to
entertain a crowd loaded with "BUD". VBG

Joyce strolled through the Shoppe's of Gruene while I spent my
afternoon at the river being an armchair observer. I can attest to
the fact that everyone passing by on the rafts was much cooler than I
and having a much better time. I was wishing that I had a swim suit.
It was sooooooo HOT but I couldn't just jump in the COLD Guadalupe
with my clothes on no matter how good it would have felt. I have to
admit it was tempting.

Late in the afternoon we spent an hour or so in Gruene Hall listening
to a talented band. We had planned to hang around Gruene until 9:00
when the Memorial Day weekend band was scheduled to start. To our
disappointment it was a "blues-band". With that information we
decided to skip dinner next door at the Grist Mill and instead just
head back to San Antonio. Gruene Hall is where George Strait, Hal
Ketchum and Lyle Lovett got their start. Both George and Hal spent 5
or 6 years each as the house band. George had the owner's save him a
spot when he headed off to Nashville. Of course he did not have to
come back and the rest is history. Gruene Hall's legacy is more than
just being the oldest, continually operating dance hall in the State
of Texas it is known throughout the world as a music venue. The stage
has seen the likes of Bo Diddley, The Dixie Chicks, Jerry Lee Lewis,
Garth Brooks and Willie Nelson to name a few. Gruene Hall hosted
baseball great Nolan Ryan's 50th birthday party and has been featured
in numerous music videos and movies. George Strait's first album
featured Gruene Hall. The dance scene from the movie "Michael"
starring John Travolta was filmed there. Just to put things into
perspective we did not see any of those folks there but we did see
autographed pictures.

For those of you not familiar with Texas dance halls let me tell you
"they ain't fancy". Like Gruene Hall they are usually big barn, tin
roof affairs with wooden floors. All sides are open to catch the
breeze. No air conditioning if you get my drift. Children play in a
fenced in area outside while parents dance the night away. Most but
not all dance-halls have the sides screened. The old dance halls in
Texas must have served as the meeting place after a hard day of work.

This is one of those days where everything did not go as we had
planned. Oh well, possibly next time the band will be more to our
liking and I will have a swim suit with me!

Sunday, May 25, 2003
Alamo KOA San Antonio, Texas. $29.50 full hookup with 50-amps very
near downtown San Antonio.

We headed downtown to the Menger Hotel for the Sunday Lunch Buffet. It
is one of the few places in town that serve something other than
Tex-Mex or BBQ. That stuff is good but it gets old. The Menger
specializes in a "high-end" buffet with things like salmon, ham,
crab-salad, boiled shrimp, calamari and a salad bar with everything on
it but iceberg lettuce if you get my drift. I tried the "stilton
cheese dressing" on my salad since I was not familiar with "stilton
cheese". In my opinion it is very similar to blue cheese both in
texture and taste. The house-dip for the fresh melons and fruit as a
divine banana yogurt concoction. Unlike during the week a variety of
juices were available like mango, grapefruit, tomato and the other
normal breakfast juices.

On some of the historic markers around the Menger Hotel we learned
that Teddy Roosevelt actually recruited his rough riders from the
Buckhorn Saloon and Menger Hotel. Back in those days I suppose
Officers had to do their own recruiting and training. I suspect a
guaranteed paycheck, meals, horse, clothes and roof over your head
appealed to many of the cowboys. The great poet and musician Sidney
Lanier lived in San Antonio for 6-months in 1872. Sidney was born in
Macon Georgia in 1842, spent some time in Brunswick, Georgia and died
in North Carolina in 1881. For a man who only lived to the age of 39
he sure got around in the 1800s. I am passing on this information for
our friends back in Brunswick because we know Brunswick claims Sidney
also. Brunswick has a giant bridge over the Brunswick River that is
named the Sidney Lanier Bridge. I think it was Sidney that coined the
phrase "Brunswick and the Golden Isles" in one of his poems, that is
used to describe Brunswick to this day.

As we made our way to River Walk through the Mall we stumbled upon an
instrumental group from the Andes Mountains playing a variety of music
featuring the woodwinds & flutes the Andes musicians are noted for. We
settled into good seats under an umbrella where we could enjoy the
music, the people walking by and the boat-loads of tourists on boats
traversing the river.

Monday (Memorial Day), May 26, 2003
Alamo KOA San Antonio, Texas. $29.50 full hookup with 50-amps very
near downtown San Antonio.

The KOA Park we are staying in experienced a mad rush as "normal"
people headed home after the Memorial Day weekend. All that was left
by 11:00 this morning is the retired folks who are just bumming
around.

Before heading out this morning we slowly drove around the RV-Park
looking at the wildlife and empty spaces. We spotted a pair of Black
Bellied Whistling Ducks with 7-ducklings in tow. It is a prize that
birders seek when visiting South Texas. It is a largely tropical
species occurring southward through Mexico and Central America and
into South American lowlands. Its U.S. range is centered in the Rio
Grande Valley north to Corpus Christi. Joyce and I can now confirm
that their range has been extended to San Antonio. The black-bellied
whistling duck's markings are so distinctive there is no getting them
mixed up with another species of duck. Other than the ducks; fox
squirrels, white winged dove, grackles and sparrows completed park
wildlife this morning.

For individuals planning to visit San Antonio I have a hint for you.
Free parking in San Antonio is non-existent. Most lots charge $5 and
up. However, the city of San Antonio operates parking lots under I-37
very near the Alamo & River Walk Mall for just $1.50. We enter our
favorite parking lot from E. Houston Street as it passes under I-37 it
is just one block from the much more expensive lots plus it is in the
shade.

I learned more information about San Fernando Cathedral today. It was
built by Canary Islanders as their parish church and completed in
1749. The church was elevated to cathedral status in 1874 when the
diocese of San Antonio was formed. It is the oldest continuous parish
in the U.S. This is the second time in our travels we have run across
Canary Islander's populating early North America. A few miles down
river from New Orleans is the community of Saint Bernard. Saint
Bernard has maintained many of the Canary Island Customs, have a
museum showcasing their heritage, and have a festival celebrating
their homeland. As I recall the Canary Islands went through a time of
extreme drought. Residents did not have much choice but to find other
places to live. When Spain offered them land they obviously took the
offer.

San Fernando Cathedral is also where in 1831, James Bowie, (of Bowie
knife and Alamo defender fame) got married.

In last week's travelogue I went over how awesomely magnificent San
Fernando Cathedral was inside. It should be! It just recently
underwent a $50 million dollar renovation including the addition of
new religious statuary, retablos, baptismal font and the preservation
of its beautiful stained glass windows. I knew I was in the midst of
something special but I had no idea that it was $50 million SPECIAL.
Silly me. I thought only the U.S. Military could spend that much
money in such a small space.

Tuesday, May 27, 2003
We drove 67 miles to Kerrville Schreiner SP. Kerrville, TX. $15.00 full hookup with
30-amps, 2 to 3 miles from downtown Kerrville yet out in the woods
with wildlife.

Where is the Texas Hill Country? To my knowledge there is no
scientific boundary established. However, as we drove out I-10 this
morning as we left San Antonio heading for Kerrville it was evident
the hills started within the city limits of San Antonio. Also
generally speaking I-35 north out of San Antonio is the eastern
boundary. It is fairly easy to tell when you are in the "Hill
Country" because the rich farm land to the east and south gives way
immediately to dry, rough, limestone outcroppings and ranch country.
Row crops like corn, wheat, oats etc., are cultivated right up to the
barbed wire fences that provide the demarcation line.

We took the Mooney aircraft plant tour this afternoon. Mooney is one
of the few single-engine, light-airplane manufacturers left in the U.
S. A. Product liability insurance has driven most manufacturers out
of the market. Mooney specializes in making small planes with the
speed and performance of larger craft. There were only 4-tourist on
the tour guided by a tool & die maker that had been with the company
for 45-years.

Walking through Mooney's processing plant was like entering a small
scale Naval Air Rework Facility like the one I used to be employed by
in Pensacola. This place only had 169 employees where the Navy
Facility had over 3,500. We entered a spotless "sheet-metal" shop
where stretch presses and drop hammers were used to shape pieces of
sheet metal and aluminum into aircraft skin and structural parts.

The place was relatively quiet for a manufacturing facility where
parts fit together with rivets. Anyone that has been around a place
where metal parts are constructed using rivets knows the deafening
noise this process can generate. The cacophony of noises I am used to
hearing on the "floor" were there but muted. Some of you will know
the sounds: grinders, buffers, bucking rivets, metal on metal as parts
come together combine to make that industrial music.

Those of you that like industrial tours the Mooney Aircraft facility
in Kerrville is a good one and it is FREE. That information is
provided for those of you that would skip it otherwise. VBG (Very Big
Grin) Phone them at 830-896-6000 for tour times.

I spotted some cactus pads and yucca roots in the produce section of a
Wal-Mart Super Center here in Kerrville. Joyce and I have not found a
place serving cactus on this trip but we are looking. An elderly
gentlemen, saw me looking at the yucca roots and ask me if I was going
to make bread? He indicated that is what the roots were used for. I
suspect the huge brown carrot shaped roots are used for other types of
food than bread. Does anyone know?

Several signs have caught our fancy lately. Entering Hondo, Texas on
US-90 west of San Antonio is an official sign welcoming you to the
city, it says,
"Welcome
This is a little piece of heaven
Don't drive through here like it was Hell
Hondo"

Toad's Road kill Café
A small café in the town of Leakey.

And on the side of a well established auto body shop in Kerrville:

"Its not a question of IF your are going to hit a dear."
Cecil's Body & Frame

Other parts of the country may not understand that sign but out here
EVERYONE understands it. We had to evict four deer from our RV site
before we could set up this morning. I counted 10 of them when I went
outside around 8:00 tonight. Driving at night, even in the city
limits, is hazardous.

And some interesting facts for the scholars among us. In 1846 Texas
became the nation's 28th state. It was the only state admitted by
treaty between two sovereign republics. With this annexation, Texas
retained the right-and still does-to divide itself into as many as
five states. Think about that for a minute. Instead of having 2
Senators they could have 10 Senators. That could really shake up the
political world.

Wednesday, May 28, 2003
Kerrville Schreiner SP. Kerrville, TX. $15.00 full hookup with
30-amps, 2 to 3 miles from downtown Kerrville yet out in the woods
with wildlife.

We packed in a variety of activities today. Before lunch we toured
the Riverside Nature Center a 5-acre site with self-guided walk
through the center's arboretum and botanical garden of native plants.
More than 100 species of trees and shrubs are identified on the walk.
Identification plaques help reinforce our identification skills for
the trees and flowers we frequently see in this area of Texas.

We dined at "Joe's Jefferson Street Café" in downtown Kerrville.
Located at 1001 Jefferson Street, Joe's is in a beautiful old home
constructed in 1890. Not much has changed in the 2-story structure.
The house features high ceilings, big bay windows and porches.
Architecturally attractive gables filled in with ornate fish scale
siding finish off the important features. Joe's is a relatively
high-end lunch place for the downtown professionals. It was a great
place to dine with a "big-city" menu.

Our next stop was the home of Kerrville founder Captain Schreiner. The
historic Romanesque mansion built in 1879 doubles as the hill country
museum. Limestone from a quarry down the street was used in the
construction. Captain Schreiner brought a stone carver in from
Germany to shape the stone. Polished pink Granite columns were
quarried not far away in Marble Falls.

A large pinion pine tree in the front yard came from a seed brought
home from Colorado by Schreiner's son Gus after a cattle drive.

Captain Schreiner was born in the Vosges Mountains (upper Alsace,
France) of France and came to Texas with his family as a young boy.
His father died of a rattle snake bite 4-months after arriving in San
Antonio. Not long after his Mother passed away. He became a Texas
Ranger at age 14 then fought for the Confederacy.

When the war was over he migrated to Kerrville and started buying
property. He owned ranches, a mercantile store, bank, Telephone
Company to name a few of his ventures. At one time his ranch holdings
exceeded 600,000 acres. Our docent confided to us that a series of
divorces with his descendents has decimated the original holdings. It
seems with each divorce the ex-wife got half. His original holdings
are still known as the YO-Ranch. At one time it was the size of the
famous King Ranch in South Texas.

We plan to take a tour of the YO-Ranch tomorrow.

A three piece band was playing from 6 to 10 at Chili's on the bank of
the beautiful Guadalupe River. We did not know what to expect but
when we arrived the band was outside on a small pavilion and throngs
of people were waiting for outside seating. We sat and listened to
the band for an hour or so before our buzzer went off. Good band,
good weather, good food, good scenery and good company, what else
could we ask for?

Ain't life great?

Thursday, May 29, 2003
Kerrville Schreiner SP. Kerrville, TX. $15.00 full hookup with
30-amps, 2 to 3 miles from downtown Kerrville yet out in the woods
with wildlife.

Today was the day we had been anticipating for several years, the day
we were going to finally take the YO Ranch tour and see their world
famous exotic game. The tour did not live up to our expectations.
While we were the only people on the tour, and even did the tour in
our guide's private pickup truck we did not see nearly as many exotics
as expected.

The YO Ranch today is 40,000 acres. Scarcely a shadow of the 600,000
acres Captain Charles Schreiner controlled in the late 1800s. Today
the Y.O. specializes in quarter horses, Texas long-horned cattle, and
exotic game. Ranch managers like long-horned cattle because they have
a 90% calf rate and need very little if any veterinary attention. They
also do not need help in the calving process and fend for themselves
well on the native grasses & vegetation. Texas long-horns are
descendents of cattle the Spanish introduced when they were trying to
colonize the area in the 1500s, 1600s and 1700s. The cattle got lose
and became wild. By the 1800's thousands of longhorns were roaming
wild around Texas. Charles Schreiner is purported to have rounded up
over 300,000 of them himself.

Although we saw a variety of exotics we did not see anywhere near what
was available on the ranch. Our tour only consisted of around 500
acres of the 40,000acres (60 square mile ranch). We saw most of the
wildlife that was within those 500 acres where it appeared they had
fenced a variety of species in just to show tour groups. The Y.O. is
the most famous and largest private hunting ranch of its kind in the
world. It is home to the nation's largest collection of natural
roaming exotic animals. Over 10,000 animals make their home on the
Y.O. including 55 different species of which 25 are available for
hunting.

We saw all the world's big flightless birds the ostrich, emu and rhea
all together. This helped us to be able to distinguish between the
species. Emu and rhea are very similar in size and coloration while
the ostrich is double the size of the emu or rhea.

Hunters pay good money, as in $1,000 to $9,500 to shoot trophy animals
like ibex, elk, markhor, eland and other exotics. Exotics are not the
only thing hunters are after on the ranch. Whitetail bucks 7 points
or less go for $1,000 while 8 points or more go for $2,250, wild
turkey for $450, and wild boar $1,000. That is good money for the
ranch however, it takes 5 or more years to grow a trophy size animal.
The only way to manage herd size is to control the female population
of the species. The Y.O. manages herd size by calling in a packing
house operation that arrives after dark with sharp shooters,
spotlights, a processing van and freezer truck complete with a federal
inspector, to thin the female population. Exotics (non-native game
animals) do not have a hunting season or bag limit in Texas. Since
the meat is going to be sold as a food product a Federal Inspector
must be on hand to certify the butchering process. Essentially, the
sharp shooter must shoot the animal and deliver it to the processing
van where it can be butchered within an hour of death. The butchering
team can handle around 6-animals per-hour.

In addition to selling exotic animals for the table market they also
supply zoos, other ranches starting exotic game herds, and even ship
some of the animals back to their native countries. There are 4 to 5
species of deer and ibex that Texas now has more of than the native
countries. Some of the species are actually extinct in their native
ranges. Restocking in their native countries is being attempted from
the Texas herds.

In Texas you gotta have a "Ranch" like you have to have a waterfront
home in Florida. If you have a "Ranch" you gotta have an exotic. It
used to be that a llama or alpaca would fit that bill but they got
common. Now the "Big-Boys" have to have a "real-exotic" like a
giraffe, oryx, red stag, zebra or any of several dozen spectacular
exotics from Asia, Africa, and India. If you have a "BIG" hat you
also gotta have peacocks, ostrich and emu running lose around the
ranch for the amusement of guests. Otherwise you are just trying to
act like you have a "BIG" hat. VBG

Our tour guide did not get along with one of the wild camels. The
ornery critter would attack his truck when we passed in the camel's
"territory". Thank goodness the road was good through there so the
truck could go fast. Many places we went in the truck we could only
go very slow as we drove over football size boulders in search of
animals hiding in ravines and draws. In a place like that we would
have been "dead-meat" for that critter.

A family of giraffes approached our truck in anticipation of a handout
that must have been normal from the tour group. Our tour was anything
but normal so we had nothing to feed them.

Part of the tour package was lunch in the "YO Chuck wagon". The
front gate to YO Ranch is located an hours drive west of Kerrville.
The ranch buildings are located another 7-miles from the highway. If
you did not quiet catch what I just wrote; after you leave the highway
and enter the gate of the ranch you have to drive seven-miles to the
actual buildings on the ranch. After all 40,000 acres is a BIG place
(60 square miles to put it in perspective). When you are as far away
from town as they are you have to feed employees and guest and that is
done in the "Chuck wagon" an ordinary lunch room affair that can feed
a hundred or so ranch hands and guests for each meal. Guests staying
at the lodge were also eating there. Hunters and their family stay on
the ranch in the hunting lodges.

If you want to know more about the YO-Ranch try 830-640-3222 or
www.yoranch.com

For RV'ers touring the area make sure that you stop in the "OLD" store
at the junction of US-83 and Texas 41. The store has been there since
the 1850's and looks it. They have gasoline and an outhouse or at
lease a "detached rest room". Don't laugh it is the only publicly
accessible "potty" within 20/30 miles. What might not be acceptable
under normal circumstances may resemble something heaven sent if you
get my drift. The owners laugh and say it is open and available 24/7
for just that reason. Being open and available 24/7 may be why it is
detached from the store. The Y.O. Ranch front gate is about 6-miles
up Texas 41 from the store.

Friday, May 30, 2003
Kerrville Schreiner SP. Kerrville, TX. $13.00 water & electricity
30-amps, 2 to 3 miles from downtown Kerrville yet out in the woods
with wildlife.

We had to change campsites this morning. The full-hookup site we were
on has been reserved by someone else for the weekend so we moved to a
water & electric site for the next 3 days. We would have spent the
entire 6 days in a water & electric site but they did not have one
available when we arrived. Such is life. When I went to dump gray
water this morning I pulled the handle and NOTHING happened. I mean
NOTHING. With a little troubleshooting I determined that the
handle/shaft was not connected to the blade, in other words the thing
was broken. Thank goodness it was not the black tank! That is a
major relief. For you RV'ers this is something you do not want to
happen when you have 40-gallons of gray water in the tank. I decided
that I had to get to the blade somehow and pull it open it with vice
grips or needle nose. In order to do that I had to saw off the
housing on the valve where the blade goes when the valve is open. A
small saw cut right through the plastic housing. However, there was
NOTHING to grab with needle nose or vice grips. I knew the blade had
to be located between the housings but all that was visible was black
plastic. I decided to drill a small pilot hole into what had to be
the blade, into that I inserted a skinny 3"long wood screw. I did not
screw it in far but far enough for it to hold when I pulled on the
screw with vice grips. Wa La___. The screw was firmly imbedded into
the blade. I now had a handle (actually a 3"screw) on the blade and
was able to pull almost like normal and water ran from the tank like
it is supposed to. With the tank empty it was an easy job to remove
the valve assembly and replace it with a new one.

RV'ers are always trading information on what tools to take. I can
say that a saw with a 6" blade can come in handy. A hack saw blade
would work but something with a handle would be preferable. Spare
dump valves would be another item to carry. My black tank has a 3"
valve while my gray tank has a 1&1/2" valve. Know what sizes your rig
has. Some gray tanks have 2" valves others 1&1/2".

The rest of our day was spent doing domestic functions.

Did I mention that the temperature here was 102 this afternoon. It
was brutal in the sun but just fine in the shade.

Mike & Joyce Hendrix