Goodbye Desert

Pulling out from Seminole Canyon State Park, I photographed this windmill, which was on the park property and, I think pumping all the water for the park. It was whirling around at a great rate with all the wind, even though it doesn't look like it in the picture! We have come across many of these same fully operating windmills in western Texas. I've seen lots of similar windmills back home in BC and Ontario, but I never remember seeing one that is still operational.

 

The wind continued blowing all night last night, rocking the motorhome like a boat. But, we have an anchor, both sure and steadfast, who kept us through the night just fine, perhaps with a little less sleep than normal. The wind continued as we drove east on Route 90, this time hitting us on the right quarter, so that it pushed us both back and to the side. It felt like Miss Travelaire wanted to go jump into the ditch with each gust.

 

Today was a day of rapidly changing landscape, starting out a desert, and ending up with trees and green grass. And the area started out looking barren and depressed, and ended up looking busy and prosperous. Tanner likes it; he has his grass toilet back again! And, we are now down to just over 900 feet elevation as we head toward the east coast.

 

We skirted around San Antonio. We had visited there two or three years ago, saw the Alamo and the river walk (the latter is a must if you are near here), and we didn't feel like battling the traffic to go in there this time. We ended up at an Army Corps of Engineer's park called Cranes Mill Park (N29 53 27.7, W98, 17 31.8), on Canyon Lake. It's always fun registering at these parks because we use Doreen's Senior's Pass, which is for Americans (of which Doreen is one), but we have a Canadian address. They have a computer program which has nothing Canadian - like they want to know what state we are from, and there are no Canadian provinces in their computer program, and we have a Postal Code, rather than a Zip Code, which just doesn't fit their program. So we can watch the person getting more and more frustrated trying to get this computer program to cooperate.

 

A couple from Manitoba came in just after us and parked in the next campsite in a big motorhome. After they got set up the fellow opened up a big compartment in the side of the motorhome and sat down in front of it in the cold and wind.

 

This second picture (taken through our window) shows what he was watching. I figured I just had to get a picture of this, and went outside to get the first picture thinking no one would see me :) and wouln't you know it, his wife was just walking by. Serves me right! However, she joked about her husband having to watch his TV in the smokeing room! They were both really nice people.

 

The wind is still blowing some, and it is still somewhat cool with the wind, but the weather is supposed to improve tomorrow.