Dallas in December
Odometer 59519
Trip 295 miles
Joan and I had planned to stay at a local RV park while visiting her brother and family, however, we could never connect by phone with the RV park host and actually arrived in Dallas without having gotten a reservation. This turned out to be good for us because Sally and Jim insisted we stay in their front yard.
Long time readers will recall that last time here, we nearly buried the bus up to the axles in mud attempting to get into this spot. This year the ground was dry and hard and after a lot of pruning tree branches we slipped in and hooked up to the water and sewer connections from the mobile home that occupied this spot previously.
Our arrival, was timed to coincide with our niece's graduation from The University of Texas at Dallas. Savannah is graduating from the Jindal School of Management with a degree in Human Resources. Even better, she has already landed a job with a large insurance firm as a Human Resources Analyst.
In the days before the ceremony, Jim kept me busy with projects. I wanted to upgrade the electrical plug-in for the RV space from 20 amp to 30 amp so- I went to the hardware store and got what we needed. Jim is considering an all electric car in the future, so he was also interested in a 220v outlet for that. Jim and I had no trouble getting the outlets installed. Joan was delighted that the power upgrade meant she could use the toaster and the coffeemaker at the same time!
Jim and I also tackled removing and installing a new entry door in the garage- the existing one was rotting from the bottom up. We had done some patching two years ago, but even the patches were falling out. Jim and I got a replacement door and exterior molding, paint and a brush, and in no time we had a new door installed.
Sally is one of the greatest cooks we've ever met and we are going to leave Dallas a little heavier than we arrived.
Anytime Jim and I get together there has to be some great Scotch whisky involved. Jim is a whisky aficionado and has built up a pretty good collection from which I am privileged to be able to sample. Jim took a day off work, and between projects, he took Joan and me to a Goody Goody liquor store that had a particularly good stock of single malts and blends. We both came away with more precious gold to taste.
We tasted and read up on 6 or 7 of our collective whiskies. Jim showed me a clever app for your smart phone called Distiller. The App has information on zillions of individual distilled spirits, including reviews, cost info, tasting notes, flavor profiles, and more. Jim also surprised me with a hardcover copy of The World's Best Whiskies by Dominic Roskrow. Nice!
Sally took the whole week off from work, so we tagged along with her when she ventured out on shopping errands. On one such day we had finally decided that we (Joan and I) would use the opportunity to shop for new carpeting for the bedroom of the motorhome. When we bought the bus in 2011, we replaced all the old flooring from the cockpit back to the bedroom with vinyl. Now the carpet in the bedroom has to go. Joan wanted more vinyl, I on the other hand, like the feel of carpet on my bare feet. I also recognize that tufted carpet is hard to keep clean. We decided to compromise and look at carpet tiles. On our way to visit a carpet showroom we stopped at a dollar store and while perusing the aisles I spotted a stack of "cat rugs" on a lower shelf that looked just like carpet tiles. Sure enough, closer inspection showed these to be 3-M brand carpet tiles for- you guessed it- a dollar each! I started sorting the stack to get the same color tiles and found at least 20 beige tiles that I began laying out in the aisle. Joan found me standing on my carpet of tiles grinning from ear-to-ear.
We left with our $20 new floor! When we settle down for more than a few days, we'll get it installed.
A week fled past and all too soon it was time for us to head back to Arizona. Jim and Sally always ask us to stay longer, but we prefer to leave while there is still some welcome left, rather than overstay. Another determinate is that we have reservations at our winter home in Ajo, and many snowbirds head south right after Christmas- we need to beat the rush to get our favorite spot.
Saturday, the day before our launch, it started raining late in the afternoon. At first it looked like a passing shower, then it turned into a fairly steady rain and lasted til midnight. We were not sure if the wet ground would hold the weight of our bus and we'd be able to leave. Sunday dawned grey and foggy! I have a new route laid out for us today- we like to take a different route each time we come and go to Dallas. This route takes us south and east to Terrell and then loosely follows state route 34 and 22 down to US 84 and eventually to US190 which will take us to I-10 into El Paso.
My desire to stay off the interstates as much as possible, means that it takes a little more time to get anywhere, and sometimes the frequent route changes are frustrating. The line looks very linear on the map above, but what doesn't show is this is dozens of zigs and zags from one small road to another.
I Started out the day feeling pretty chipper, but by noon I was feeling the grip of a cold or flu coming on. Joan sensing my distress suggested a short day, and began searching for a campsite. The Town of Meridian has a Passport park which meant 1/2 price overnight stay. The GPS could not locate the entrance to the park and neither could we. We found a gas station that had diesel but could not get into the pumps without having our car stick out into the street a bit. The local sheriff waved us off and whelped his siren- so we cut back onto Main street all chastened, and looked for another station.
The next fuel stop was really grimy and the delivery truck was there delivering fuel- two bad omens, but I was tired and grouchy- so I filled anyway. On our way to this second fuel stop we passed the entrance we'd been trying to find to the Bosque Bottoms RV.
We didn't need reservations at Bosque Bottoms.
We were the ONLY RV in the park that evening. We did our set-up and then bundled up in warm jackets and hats to take a quick walk around town
We spotted this mural on the wall of a downtown building and it got us to wondering, so we Googled up the trail back at the bus. Turns out the Chisholm Trail (or one part of it) ran through this area. The trail gets it's name from a Trader named Jesse Chisholm and was started as a wagon road for his trade goods going north to Abilene, Kansas. Texas Cattlemen found the tracks and drove herds of cattle north along the same route. Interestingly though, the trail started at the Texas-Oklahoma border (Red River) soon all parts of the connecting trails in Texas also adopted the same name.. By 1884, over 5 million cattle had been moved over the Chisholm Trail- the largest migration of livestock in world history.
Back at the bus, Joan got out all the cold remedies that we had in the cupboard and I doped up and fell asleep in the easy chair.
Your Traveling Friends,
Jeff and Joan
Trip 295 miles
Joan and I had planned to stay at a local RV park while visiting her brother and family, however, we could never connect by phone with the RV park host and actually arrived in Dallas without having gotten a reservation. This turned out to be good for us because Sally and Jim insisted we stay in their front yard.
Long time readers will recall that last time here, we nearly buried the bus up to the axles in mud attempting to get into this spot. This year the ground was dry and hard and after a lot of pruning tree branches we slipped in and hooked up to the water and sewer connections from the mobile home that occupied this spot previously.
Our arrival, was timed to coincide with our niece's graduation from The University of Texas at Dallas. Savannah is graduating from the Jindal School of Management with a degree in Human Resources. Even better, she has already landed a job with a large insurance firm as a Human Resources Analyst.In the days before the ceremony, Jim kept me busy with projects. I wanted to upgrade the electrical plug-in for the RV space from 20 amp to 30 amp so- I went to the hardware store and got what we needed. Jim is considering an all electric car in the future, so he was also interested in a 220v outlet for that. Jim and I had no trouble getting the outlets installed. Joan was delighted that the power upgrade meant she could use the toaster and the coffeemaker at the same time!
 |
| proud parents with the new graduate |
Sally is one of the greatest cooks we've ever met and we are going to leave Dallas a little heavier than we arrived.
Anytime Jim and I get together there has to be some great Scotch whisky involved. Jim is a whisky aficionado and has built up a pretty good collection from which I am privileged to be able to sample. Jim took a day off work, and between projects, he took Joan and me to a Goody Goody liquor store that had a particularly good stock of single malts and blends. We both came away with more precious gold to taste.
We tasted and read up on 6 or 7 of our collective whiskies. Jim showed me a clever app for your smart phone called Distiller. The App has information on zillions of individual distilled spirits, including reviews, cost info, tasting notes, flavor profiles, and more. Jim also surprised me with a hardcover copy of The World's Best Whiskies by Dominic Roskrow. Nice!
Sally took the whole week off from work, so we tagged along with her when she ventured out on shopping errands. On one such day we had finally decided that we (Joan and I) would use the opportunity to shop for new carpeting for the bedroom of the motorhome. When we bought the bus in 2011, we replaced all the old flooring from the cockpit back to the bedroom with vinyl. Now the carpet in the bedroom has to go. Joan wanted more vinyl, I on the other hand, like the feel of carpet on my bare feet. I also recognize that tufted carpet is hard to keep clean. We decided to compromise and look at carpet tiles. On our way to visit a carpet showroom we stopped at a dollar store and while perusing the aisles I spotted a stack of "cat rugs" on a lower shelf that looked just like carpet tiles. Sure enough, closer inspection showed these to be 3-M brand carpet tiles for- you guessed it- a dollar each! I started sorting the stack to get the same color tiles and found at least 20 beige tiles that I began laying out in the aisle. Joan found me standing on my carpet of tiles grinning from ear-to-ear.
We left with our $20 new floor! When we settle down for more than a few days, we'll get it installed.
A week fled past and all too soon it was time for us to head back to Arizona. Jim and Sally always ask us to stay longer, but we prefer to leave while there is still some welcome left, rather than overstay. Another determinate is that we have reservations at our winter home in Ajo, and many snowbirds head south right after Christmas- we need to beat the rush to get our favorite spot.
Saturday, the day before our launch, it started raining late in the afternoon. At first it looked like a passing shower, then it turned into a fairly steady rain and lasted til midnight. We were not sure if the wet ground would hold the weight of our bus and we'd be able to leave. Sunday dawned grey and foggy! I have a new route laid out for us today- we like to take a different route each time we come and go to Dallas. This route takes us south and east to Terrell and then loosely follows state route 34 and 22 down to US 84 and eventually to US190 which will take us to I-10 into El Paso.
My desire to stay off the interstates as much as possible, means that it takes a little more time to get anywhere, and sometimes the frequent route changes are frustrating. The line looks very linear on the map above, but what doesn't show is this is dozens of zigs and zags from one small road to another.
One nice thing about this route is that we get to see a lot of very ornate county courthouses. We snapped photos of the courthouses in Hillsboro, Meridian and Brady as examples.
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| Meridian Texas |
A little research reveals that Texas has 254 counties, (more than any other state) that means a lot of county courthouses like these complete with all the levels of administration that go along with county government. It no doubt had to be like this in the early days, because of the sheer size of Texas and the limits of early transportation.
Today's needs are not well met with the old architecture, we noticed that most towns had annexes, but luckily the old buildings seem to be all well maintained- some even decorated for Christmas
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| Brady, TX |
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| Hillsboro, TX |
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| Bosque Bottoms RV Park Meridian, TX |
The next fuel stop was really grimy and the delivery truck was there delivering fuel- two bad omens, but I was tired and grouchy- so I filled anyway. On our way to this second fuel stop we passed the entrance we'd been trying to find to the Bosque Bottoms RV.
We didn't need reservations at Bosque Bottoms.
We were the ONLY RV in the park that evening. We did our set-up and then bundled up in warm jackets and hats to take a quick walk around town
We spotted this mural on the wall of a downtown building and it got us to wondering, so we Googled up the trail back at the bus. Turns out the Chisholm Trail (or one part of it) ran through this area. The trail gets it's name from a Trader named Jesse Chisholm and was started as a wagon road for his trade goods going north to Abilene, Kansas. Texas Cattlemen found the tracks and drove herds of cattle north along the same route. Interestingly though, the trail started at the Texas-Oklahoma border (Red River) soon all parts of the connecting trails in Texas also adopted the same name.. By 1884, over 5 million cattle had been moved over the Chisholm Trail- the largest migration of livestock in world history.
Back at the bus, Joan got out all the cold remedies that we had in the cupboard and I doped up and fell asleep in the easy chair.
Your Traveling Friends,
Jeff and Joan
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