Our First Week in Texas

We limped into Texana Park and Campground near Edna, Texas on Saturday, 1/21. The first order of business was locating a new set of chassis batteries. Edna is a flyspeck of a town, so Rog made several calls to business in Victoria about 30 miles away. A bit of a drive, but since you get to go 75 mph it doesn’t take too long to get there. Lol.

His preference was for a set of Interstate batteries which were out of stock until Friday. We booked eight nights here so we had some leeway on the time and found another brand in stock which would work – so with a Plan B in place we felt comfortable waiting. Our spot has full hookups so we could plug in and not worry about the chassis batteries holding a charge.

The campground is nice with several walking trails and it’s situated right on Lake Texana. But that is about the extent of the activities. Luckily there are several herds of deer wandering around for entertainment. We’ve seen a dozen lovely does together and a macho 8-point buck minding the harem. We’ve also been serenaded by a huge owl. There is nothing quite as eerie as an owl hooting right outside your window in the dead of night. Lol.

We've seen as many a dozen does right outside our coach.

Here comes Mr. Macho to make sure the girls are behaving. Lol.

Handsome dude.

Lake Texana at dusk.

Silhouetted against the sunset. What a poser. Lol.

We’ve used the time just to catch up on some housework and do a little coach maintenance.  Of course, we are also committed to getting in our steps. My brother Tim and I are engaged in a 30-day duel on Stridekick to get at least 10K steps every day.  We’ve been at it for 18 days and so far we’ve both been successful. Rog said it’s like we’re in a staring contest to see who blinks first. Hopefully our weather will hold, without the option of a treadmill, I’m thinking the first truly miserable cold, rainy day will give Tim the lead. Lol.

Morning coffee. Domestic bliss. :)

This huge, old live oak looks like he has his elbows on the table. 

Red Shouldered Hawk

Fields next to the campground.

Sunset on the lake.

We did get the kayak out for a paddle here around Lake Texana. So, let me tell you a little story about that. While we were inflating the kayak an older guy stops by and chats us up. Did we know there’s a 14-foot alligator in the lake? No, we didn’t. The “Danger, Alligator” signs are everywhere, but then we’ve seen them in nearly every campground since Florida. Yeah, he says. The Ranger saw it too and said it must be at least 14 ½ feet long. Really? Hmmmmm.

Rog and I launch and begin our paddle. I keep a sharp eye out for gators of any length and don’t see anything. However, the water is so murky and muddy you literally can’t see down 3 inches. It’s a nice sunny day, not too windy and we’re enjoying the paddle. Then something bumps the boat and I feel it swim under my butt. What the hell?? The water dimples about 8 feet away, but we never did see what it was. Now, I’m not saying a 14-foot alligator swam under our boat, but I am saying something sure did. Rog felt it too. He thinks it might have been a monster catfish since we were in fairly shallow water. I’ll go with that theory. Lol.

Muddy waters of Lake Texana - anything could be hiding in there! Lol.

Got a huge kick out of the American Coots - these birds can walk on water! :)

Mr. Turtle enjoying the sunshine too. 

We took the bikes out one day and rode about 10 miles on the campground trails and explored the Breckenridge Recreation Center across the road. They have sports fields, a horse arena, mini-golf, and a paintball course. But there wasn't much going on in the off season. Guess I could go one-on-one against Rog in paintball, but only if I have a death wish. Lol. We went into Victoria on Wednesday to do some shopping and check out the park. The Guadeloupe River was too high and fast to kayak and the park trail was only 2 miles long, so not worth biking.

However, we did find a great place to eat in Victoria – the Guerrilla Gourmet. Originally just a food truck, they’ve expanded to small café open only for lunch. Creative food with fresh ingredients. We were talking with the chef about our travels and found out he was born and raised in New Orleans and that’s where he learned to cook. He brings out some of his gumbo to sample. Oh yes. I had the “Alligator Egg” – a half avocado stuffed with pulled pork, lightly breaded and deep fried served on fresh greens. To die for good. Rog opted for the “Eat What I Tell You To” special which is essentially chef’s choice and they made him a boudin (Cajun sausage) stuffed pork chop with baby carrots and fresh greens. Rivaled anything we had in NOLA for sure.

Guerrilla Gourmet - awesome food!

Rog couldn't resist!

Delicious!

We were heading back into town on Friday with a long list of errands and to pick up the batteries. We couldn’t get reliable cell phone service at the campground and then the Wifi went down. Luckily there’s a Starbucks in Victoria so we planned to take advantage of their Wifi to download some tax documents and make some phone calls. I also wanted to get the laundry done, Rog needed a haircut and to get a prescription filled. All the usual stuff that gets just a little more complicated on the road. Even more so when you have one of those OMG can you believe I did that senior moments.

Friday morning we gather up all our stuff to head into town. Got the computer, mouse, charger. Check. Paperwork, prescriptions, addresses for where we’re going. Check. Laundry baskets, detergent, dryer sheets, hangers, quarters. Check. First stop – laundromat. We drive the 30 miles to Victoria, pull into the laundromat and I turn around and look in the back seat. Crap! I look at Rog. What did we forget?? He turns around. What?  The CLOTHES! Lol.  Guess what I’ll be doing on Saturday. 

We leave here Sunday, 1/29, and head to Padre Island on the Texas Gulf Coast. It will likely be out last shot at oceanfront living for a long time. We are hoping the weather will be a little more cooperative this time. The forecast is looking pretty decent, we’ll see if we actually get some sunshine to go with our sand. :)

Beachfront Property and the Price is Right!

As I’ve mentioned before we use several aps/websites to help us choose our campsites. We read a review of Rutherford Beach on Campendium and decided to check it out. Just outside of Creole, LA you can park your RV right on the beach and stay for FREE! Yes, it sounds too good to be true, but it’s public land managed by the Dept. of Fish & Wildlife and it is awesome!

I am always a little nervous when we take the short bus off road, so when we arrived on Tuesday afternoon (1/17) we unhooked the CRV and drove down the beach. There was a hard-packed sand “road” that was smoother than many a highway we’ve traveled and a broad area of pretty firm sand to park on just above the high tide line. The beach is easily a mile long with plenty of spots to pull off and it was nearly deserted!  We picked our spot and got settled in. We had a lovely sunset and were set to enjoy several days of beachfront living! Whoohoo.

Our beachfront property (at least for a few days). Lol.

Lovely colors at dusk.

Beautiful sunset our first day on the beach.

And that was the last decent weather we would see. Lol. Leave it to Mother Nature to throw us a curveball. We knew there was some rain forecast, but we got that along with days of dense fog, lightning and thunder, and wind. We had lots of time to read and relax. Rog and I would time our walkies around the rain. It was still a lot of fun. We would beachcomb for hours and I have two bags of shells to show for our efforts. Some days we were completely alone and on others there would be maybe one other RV or a few locals fishing. The cows in the nearby field were our closest neighbors. With the fog, we literally couldn’t see anybody else, so it felt like we had the place totally to ourselves.

Good day to stay inside and read!

Sunbreak - quick time to walk!

Our nosy neighbors. Lol. 

Enjoying the foggy solitude.

Beachcombing - who needs sunshine?! 

We found this cache left by another camper.
Apparently we're not the only ones who love a treasure hunt. Lol.

 We got lots of reading done too.

Nature's compensation for the damp weather - beautiful!

We noticed on Wednesday that our chassis batteries weren’t holding a charge like they should. The RV has two battery banks, the “house” batteries run the lights and 12v appliances in the coach and the “chassis” batteries start the diesel engine. We weren’t too worried, we ran the generator a couple times to charge both sets of batteries and just monitored the situation. By Friday, the chassis batteries were losing their charge overnight with no load. We made plans to stay a week at our next stop and get them replaced. In the meantime, we figured we could just use the battery booster which shunts power from the house batteries to the chassis if we needed to. 

Rog kept a sharp eye on the weather reports and the National Weather Service alerts. There was a big storm due in early Sunday with winds gusting close to 60mph. I’ll pass on that, thank you kindly. Our plan was to leave early Saturday morning and beat feet for Texas, getting west of the stormfront.

Apparently Mother Nature missed the memo and decided to get things started early. While we were watching a movie (making good use of the time the generator was running to charge the batteries, Lol), a tornado watch was posted for our area. There were hours of lightning, thunder and howling winds. The worst of the storm and the tornado alert ended around 2am and you can bet we didn’t get much sleep before then. Lol. Since this was just a warm up for the action on Sunday, I was really glad we weren’t hanging around.

Sunday morning we finished our preparations to leave, but when Rog went to start the coach… nothing. “Well, try the booster”, I said. “That was with the booster”, he said. Uh-oh. We started the generator, hooked up the trickle charger, did everything we could think of, but not a click. We left the generator run for an hour and the chassis battery amps were actually going down instead of up. Arrrrrrgh!

We decided to try to use the CRV to jump start it in conjunction with the booster. The first try got a tiny cough, but wasn’t enough to get the big diesel engine going. We left the CRV running and hooked up to chassis batteries for awhile and tried again. Sweet success!  There was no way we were staying on the beach another night, our next plan of action would have been to call for roadside (beachside??) assistance, but luckily that wasn’t necessary.

Even with the late start, we made it to the campground in Texas by 4pm. We are safely tucked in under the oaks and will be getting a new set of chassis batteries you can be sure.  :)

Last Days in NOLA: A Sculpture Garden, Venetian Gondola Ride, National WWII Museum, and Cajun Crawfish

Since we’d driven into the city yesterday, we decided to try an alternate means of transportation today. We parked the car and rode the Algiers Ferry across the Mississippi and docked right at the base of Canal Street.  City Park was too far even for us to walk, so we bought a “Jazzy Pass” for $3 which gave us access to the bus and street car lines for 24 hours. We took the street car all the way to the end of the line right to the City Park entrance. Perfect!

View of the French Quarter from the ferry.

The street cars were a great way to get around town.

City Park has a lot to offer – it is a huge green space with a botanical garden, lots of sports fields, walking paths and it is the home of the New Orleans Museum of Art. The park is known for its gigantic live oaks, some of which are said to be 800 years old. I could hang out for days under those amazing trees. Rog gathered up some acorns for me, now I just need to get them planted and live another couple hundred years. Lol.

I want this in my back yard! Now, please. 

We decided to skip the art museum in favor of a leisurely stroll through the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden which features over 60 sculptures by major 20th-century artists. There was a huge range of styles. It was fascinating, loads of fun, and free!  I think I need some sculpture now to go with my live oaks. Lol.  Here are some of my favorites.

These are all pictures of the same sculpture from different angles.
It was three sided - Blue Dog, Red Dog, Yellow Dog or half of each depending on how you looked at it. Genius!!

I think he wants to come home with me.

This sculpture was intriguing, it created an optical illusion.
I had to touch it, my eyes literally couldn't focus to determine how deep the indentation was. Very cool. 

This one just resonated with me.

LOVE - yep! :)

Even the oaks got some bling!

Another one I'd love to have under those oaks I'm planting. Lol. 

At 5PM we had reservations for the NOLA Gondola. This was a belated anniversary treat for us – a romantic ride through the lakes and canals of City Park on a Venetian gondola. It was highly rated on Trip Advisor, but you never know. It turned out to be one of the highlights of our stay in New Orleans. The gondolier, Robert, was an interesting guy and it was clear he truly loves his work. He decided he wanted to be a gondolier when he was 17 and saw James Bond racing through the canals of Venice in a movie. Hey, he made it happen even though his family thought it was nuts. He had great stories to share how he got Bella Mae (his gondola) built and about surviving a hurricane in Florida and then Katrina in New Orleans. He also gave us plenty of quiet, couple time to enjoy seeing the park from a unique perspective.  After our ride, we hit the 24-hour Morning Call café in the park for beignets and café au lait before taking the street car and then ferry home.

Robert, our NOLA Gondolier.

The lake in City Park with the Modern Art Museum in the background.

These guys were also enjoying the City Park canals. 

A unique perspective, this was Rog's favorite sculpture. 

A fun and romantic anniversary treat.

The Morning Call cafe in City Park. Excellent!

NOLA at night.

Lovely full moon rising by the Algiers clock tower. 

The next two days we spent hanging out at the campground. I spent more fruitless hours than I care to recall trying to get Windows to play nice and do its updates. Finally, my personal IT guy extraordinaire (brother, Tim) walked me through a clean install. I used more than 9GB of data in one day messing with my machine and getting all the updates installed. Ugh. Had to up my Verizon allowance or cut off the girls – lucky for them I decided to buy more data. Lol.

We started off Monday, 1/16, our last day in NOLA, at Café Beignet and then we visited the National WWII Museum.  It was both a thought provoking and heart rending experience – the exhibits and interactive displays are extremely well done and they include the personal stories of many of the soldiers in the field. There is a great 4D movie narrated by Tom Hanks and several buildings to explore – it took us from about 10:30am to 5pm to see most of the exhibits.

Cafe Beignet - Coffee and French fried dough, a great way to start the day. :)

I found a bunch of work by the dog sculpture artist! Fun, fun, fun!

New Orleans has so many beautiful buildings in so many architectural styles. 

National WWII Museum, definitely worth a day. 

Rog was a model plane buff when he was a kid, so he especially enjoyed all the WWII aircraft. 

We finished our day with a splurge – dinner at the Bon Ton Café, acclaimed for their down-home authentic Cajun cooking. New Orleans is an old city and full of history. Many of the more famous eateries, including the Bon Ton, have been in the same family for generations. We wanted to cross crawfish etouffee off our must-have list and the Bon Ton did not disappoint. Of course, we also felt obligated to try their famous bread pudding with whiskey sauce and butter pecan ice cream. Hey, when in Rome… Lol.

Bon Ton's Crawfish Dinner - Jambalaya, Etouffee, Laurie and Omelette

Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce and Butter Pecan Ice Cream. Soooo decadent!

We tried to walk off some of our dessert with another stroll through the French Quarter. We walked down Bourbon Street – this time at night. Still not my scene. Guess I need more than the whiskey sauce on the bread pudding to get in the right frame of mind. Lol.

That wraps our stay in NOLA. This is the first big city we’ve visited on our trip and we had a blast. But, neither of us is city folk and we were glad we had a quiet campground to retreat to. Given that our plans are now open, we had to decide if we wanted to stay along the Gulf or go further inland through Texas. The water won. For our next stop, we chose a boondocking location right on the Gulf of Mexico. We’ll be parking the coach right on the beach – or at least that’s the plan. :)