February 3 – 5, 2014
Gulf Coast RV Resort, Beaumont, TX
Trip MileMarker: 2,649

Monday morning we pulled out of New Orleans. Starting from our downtown location, the outgoing traffic was light. Our intention was to stop outside Lafayette, LA and spend a couple of days in Cajun country. The day was cold and drizzily and the weather forecast called for more of the same the next two days. Enough of this weather, so we put the exit for Lafayette in our mirror and drove on to Beaumont, TX as our stagecoach stop on our way to Hill Country.

Gulf Shores RV Resort, just off I-10 was a nice little park with a good rating from all our RV resources. Our plan was to stay one night and depart the next day for the long drive to Kerrville, TX. Good intent but a bothersome noise in the right front wheel sounding like a bearing or suspension issue was enough for us to pause. A quick trip to a Freightliner service center only two miles away and a little persuasion and I had an appointment early the next morning for the big bus to get its underside poked, prodded and examined.

Beaumont, mostly centered around oil is a nice little spot on the interstate but not a hotspot for tourism. So a quick drive around a rain soaked town viewing mostly big box corporate stores and navigating the convenient but sometimes confusing Texas access roads that parallel the interstate and we were ready to turn in for another cold night with the all too familiar freeze warning, calling for water supply hoses to be unhooked.

The next morning, Freightliner service was excellent. Sure enough it was a loose bearing in the right wheel. Fortunately no damage to the bearing and with quick authorization from Freightliner the warranty work was performed, including a set of new bushings in the front suspension. No cost, just time spent.

Since it was midday when we finished at Freightliner and the rain and fog had highway visibility down to a ¼ of a mile, we wisely decided to ride this weather out one more day. We took in a good afternoon movie and hunkered down for another cold night, which is getting way to familiar.


February 6 – 9, 2014
Buckhorn Lake RV Resort, Kerrville, TX
Trip MileMarker: 3,000

The next morning, Wednesday, we launched early for our 340 mile drive to Kerrville, TX. Passing through Houston and San Antonio uneventfully we made our way to Buckhorn Lake RV Resort, just off I-10 about 7 miles west of Kerrville and in the heart of Texas Hill Country. Last year we spent a little time in nearby Fredericksburg, had a great time and planned to come back to take in a little more of Hill Country. Buckhorn Lake is a very nice RV resort with a loyal following of RV'ers in the winter. They are well organized and active with planned functions for its guests and RV lot owners who have built very substantial and impressive structures for bedrooms and entertainment areas.

We arrived early enough to discover an event planned for that evening. The bus was full but we could follow in our car and join the gang. Our destination was the 11^th Street Cowboy Bar in Bandera, TX. Very rustic with a unique approach. We carried in our own steaks to cook. They checked at the door to assure you brought no water or other refreshments in the bar, only meat to cook. We cooked our steaks on communal barbeque grills, chatted with the fellow patrons, paid $5 for salad and a baked potato, took in the sights of the real cowboys around us and listened to the music (the band didn’t show up). We met several of our fellow RV’ers and had a great time.

Freezing weather again for the evening, so water supply hookups are discouraged and we use our freshly filled internal water supply once again. This cold stuff is getting way too old and we are wishing again we had stayed longer in south Florida.

Thursday, our first full day in Hill Country was another cloudy, cold day which is never good for photographs. We cruised the beautiful backroads, actually topped one tall hill at the lofty altitude of 2,100 feet, wished for sunshine, browsed the stores in Bandera and made very few photos. Interesting and pretty now, this would be a super beautiful drive in the springtime when the grass starts to turn green. Back to the RV resort we joined a small group to listen to one couple’s interesting travel adventures in Cuba and Peru and view their photos. The warm sunshine in the photos made us wish we were there.

Friday, Mary shopped the stores in Fredericksburg and I did my drive arounds in the countryside outside the city. An interesting conversation with a pecan grower, a purchase of some wildflower seed to combine with the unplanted seed purchased last year, a visit to a winery, a little browsing in the local hardware store and I was ready to do an extraction of Mary from the stores of Fredericksburg and have some lunch at a nice German restaurant.

Saturday was committed to a 100 mile drive to Austin. In all my travels, I had never had a business trip to Austin. It was my loss. Austin, built on hilly terrain is different than the other major Texas cities that are usually flat and lacking in personality (perhaps the exception is nearby San Antonio). Austin, the capital of Texas, has all of the buildings and prosperity of a big state capital city. Plus it has a robust economy in technology and other good contemporary job sources. My major objective was to tour the Bullock Museum of Texas History located near the capital building. It was worth the time, providing a detailed history of Texas from the days of Indians and Spanish explorers to its wealth in cotton and challenges in slavery and the civil war and then its amazing transformation to an oil producing state that would forever define Texas and probably forever keep its state income tax at 0. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every state had the oil that Texas has found. Success is found by many origins and Texas found theirs in oil. A quick trip around Governor Perry’s office, the Texas state capital (big and impressive), another lunch at Panera, a visit to a grocery store and we were ready to head back to Kerrville.

Back to Buckhorn Lake we joined other RV’ers in the big barn for a spaghetti dinner and entertainment provided by some of the campers who form up as a little band each winter. Calling themselves "Exit 501" (the Buckhorn Lake interstate exit off of I-10) they put on a good show demonstrating some good but not quite ready for Nashville talent.

Waking up Sunday morning to bright sunshine and the prospect for temperatures in the 70’s we were cheering the opportunity to leave the sweaters, jackets and gloves in the bus and enjoy Texas hill country in the sunshine. Unfortunately we look at the weather forecast for Fort Worth, our destination for the following day and here a doom and gloom driving forecast of ice and snow. Having flight reservations for a Tuesday morning flight to Chicago, getting to Dallas by Monday was essential. So we change from our little used sunshine clothes back into our cool weather clothes and head out a day earlier for our 250 mile drive to Fort Worth.

Texas hill country, Kerrville and Buckhorn Lake RV Resort have provided a cold but enjoyable stay. The hill country is always a welcome break from the boring flat landscape of Texas, Austin is a nice city to visit calling for more time in the future and Buckhorn Lake is a very active and fun RV resort where we met a lot of interesting people and enjoyed some of their many activities.