Heading South

Yep, that’s right. We packed up and headed south. After a great week with our kids, who came for a Christmas visit, and two months workamping in Townsend, TN we left for warmer weather and new workamping gigs in Texas.

December 31, 2013

First stop was Nashville, TN for an overnight stop at Camp Walmart and a visit with my nephew. We are not the party goers, especially on New Years Eve. After a wonderful visit with my brother’s eldest son, we called it a night. In the morning, we paid for our site by refueling at Camp Walmart.

January 1, 2014

Happy New Year! Wishing a prosperous and joyful new year to our readers and friends. Our target destination for today is Memphis, TN. We crossed the Mississippi River to park at Tom Sawyer RV Park in West Memphis, AR. This allowed us a view of the Mississippi from our front window plus we were close to Memphis BBQ on Beale Street. Tom Sawyer is not a fancy place, and certainly has little ‘IT’ factor unless you like an RV park with very few amenities.

Memphis known for its BBQ and Blues. It is home of the world’s largest Pork BBQ competition and a large Blues festival. We decided to test the BBQ at Blues City Cafe across the street from B.B. Kings Blues Club. Blues City Cafe had better review for ribs than BB Kings place.

After a belly full of ribs, we headed back to Tom Sawyer’s. The weather was getting colder as an arctic hurricane was bearing down on us. By the time we got back to the RV, the temperature was significantly cooler. I took the fur babies for their evening stroll, disconnected our water hose and hunkered down for the night. After a light breakfast, we pulled up stakes and headed for our next stop – Hot Springs, AR.

January 2, 2014

We had an uneventful drive to Hot Springs, AR where we parked at Hot Springs KOA. This was our first KOA park. As expected, the park was just about empty. Temperature was a bit warmer due to the sun shining brightly. Our site was not level at all. Front left wheel was 4″ off the ground, right front wheel was 6″ off the ground when we leveled the RV. Good thing we had extra blocks to put under our jacks.  We were just about half-way through our journey to our destination in Corpus Christi.

January 3, 2014

Our next stop was in Marshall, TX. We could have stayed in any other town in the area so why Marshall? Well, I mistakenly took Marshal, TX for Huntington, VA, the location of Marshall University. The university suffered the loss of their football team and coaches in an airplane crash in 1970. In 2006, their story was released into movie, We Are Marshall. It was ironic that I was able to catch the movie on TV just the other day. In researching online about Marshall, TX, I discovered that George Foreman was born here in 1949 and Lady Bird Johnson graduated from Marshall High School in 1928.

It does not take much to make this Texan happy, especially since we have been out-of-state for a bit. We decided to enjoy a Texas tradition of Whataburger for dinner Friday night. What a treat. In the morning we paid for our overnight spot at Camp Walmart. Oh yes, we went back to Whataburger for breakfast Tacos before taking off.

January 4-7, 2014

Next stop was R&R at my brother’s place in Burton, TX. Burton is a small town just a few miles northwest of Brenham, TX – home of Blue Bell Ice Cream. Our plan was to rest up for a bit and relax. By Saturday, I was pretty miserable dealing with what we call the Texas Crud. Texas Crud takes a few weeks to run its course. If it is severe, it can turn into viral bronchitis. Somehow on the way, I missed a turn at Henderson, TX. By the time I realized the missed turn, I began making routing changes on the fly. I recommend you do not do that. My error added about 35 more miles and almost an hour drive time to our route. When we finally arrived, the temperature was in the mid 60’s and we were both tired.

For the next three days, I needed rest. The weather was also turning bad on us. Remember that arctic hurricane we left behind in Memphis? Well, it caught up with us. We had forgotten how it felt to be in Texas when it the weather is wet and a north wind begins to howl. Sunday, the temperature began to fall. Monday the north wind began to blow and the air was full of moisture. Tuesday morning we were down to 19 degrees. East Texas winters are known for misting rain mixed with cold temperatures. There is no way to stay warm in that kind of weather.

Carol and her sister, Donna, decided they needed a sister project. They decided to make a new quilt. While I rested and slept, Carol found fabric and borrowed our sister in law’s dining room table to began cutting out the material. The quilt style is called a Sampler. That means each square is machine quilted in a different pattern. The pattern is often used in a block of the month group where each participant makes and shares quilt blocks. Once each block is completed, all the blocks are then pieced together. While I do not understand the details of this, I am sure our quilting readers will understand.

January 8-11, 2014

Next R&R stop is Potter’s Creek on Canyon Lake just north of San Antonio, TX. We stopped by Carl Wendler’s Ranch in Ledbetter, TX first. This is where we spent the winter of 2012. The ranch is doing fine. We enjoyed the short visit with Maurice.

Carol went on ahead of me to stop for gas and BBQ from City Meat Market in Giddings, TX. My last stop was Buc-ee’s for gas. ($2.98/gallon). If you are traveling through Texas and come up on a Buc-ee’s, it is worth a stop. We arrived at Potter’s Creek shortly after 3:30PM , got set up a took a short nap. Carol called her brother and we made plans for dinner Wednesday evening at Italian Garden. WOW, what a great place. Service and food were very good.

After sleeping late on Thursday I fixed breakfast around 11:00ish, then we took a trip to New Braunfels for a few groceries and fur baby food. By the time we got back from town, Carol was beginning to feel the drag of her bought with the Texas Crud. We had Baked Potatoes with the BBQ from City Meat Market

After two years of living on the road and living in less congested areas, I can tell you, I dislike congestion with a passion. Drivers are most inconsiderate and rude when they are in a hurry. Roads in New Braunfels are being expanded again. That is good news for road construction folks but bad news for travelers.

Friday, Carol took a day off and stayed in PJs until 3PM. She needed the rest. We had a little rain overnight but nothing serious. This afternoon the temp rose to 75. I am wearing shorts for the first time is several months.

We will be leaving Potter’s Creek on Sunday as we continue our journey south. Last stop of our R&R will be Corpus Christi. We will be parked at Sea Breeze RV in Portland until the end of January.

I leave you with our site photo at Potter’s Creek. Tomorrow I will give you an update on where we will be working next.

Thanks for stopping by. Y’all come back now.

Camp CampingWorld

One of the benefits of having work done on your RV at Camping World (CW) is dry camping in the parking lot. I know some CW locations have very nice RV Camping sites while others, like New Braunfels, have basic hook ups in the very back. Since we arrived late, we just pulled into the front parking lot.

We woke up on Thursday 11/1 and decided to drive down the street to Burger King for a quick breakfast. We could leave the fur babies in Cramalot-Inn since we now have a toad. When we got back I met with service department to get checked in. They disconnected the U-Haul and drove our home into a service bay. The trailer got parked in front of the service bay were our old Cedar Creek was parked. CW provided a couple of folks to help me dig out the couch/bed that was going back into that unit. I also dropped off our never used Blue Boy and the tripod that took the shake out of the fifth wheel. I no longer needed either of these nor did I want to mess with selling them on eBay.

After repacking the trailer one more time, I was able to speak to the service tech who wold be working on our motor home. I verified the work that needed to be done and gave him our cell phone numbers should something come up. Carol, meanwhile was napping in the car with our fur babies. We had a day to kill. As we drove off, we decided to see if PetsMart could take Cody, MeiLing and Patches for day boarding. We felt it would be better on them if they had a place to hang out rather than be stuck in a car while did a little shopping.

We needed to find a TV stand for our 37″ HDTV that would be mounted somewhere in our living room where a swivel recliner used to be. Target was in the same center as PetsMart so we stopped there. As we wondered about aimlessly, the store manager asked if we needed help. She was extremely helpful and found a few possible solutions that may work for us. We decided to continue our hunt.

We were about 10 miles away from Tanager Outlet Mall so we decided to head there. It was cool shopping out there during the week because there were very few people milling about. It was getting close to lunch time and the BK breakfast was wearing off. We found a cool fifty’s style dinner, Johnny Rockets where we enjoyed a supper lunch. Then we headed next door to Starbucks to borrow their free WiFi and kill more time.

Around 3PM we decided to head back to CW to check on the progress of the work that needed to be done. We meet with our salesman who gave us a box of stuff we forgot to move from 5th wheel. He checked with the service department and told us everything was ready. Now it was time for me to inspect the work. Horn works, new Microwave/Convection oven is in place, new backup camera and video monitor was operational, and passenger’s power visor worked. Looks like everything is done and we are ready to hit the road again after a stop at Buckee’s for fuel. While I did that, Carol headed to PetsMart to get the fur babies. Our strategy was to head north towards Austin, take the SH130 toll road around the east side of the city to US290. Then East on 290 to the Ledbetter, TX.

We arrived at the WalMart in Giddings and decided to stop for the night. If we were to continue to Carl Wendler’s ranch in Ledbetter, it would be country dark. (FYI – for you city folks, country dark is much darker than city dark.) We did not want to mess with unloading a trailer in the dark, especially country dark.

So here we are at Camp WalMart, in Giddings. I walked across the parking lot to Subway for sandwiches. Finally another very long and busy day has come to an end. Friday 11/2 we will have a short drive to the ranch.

Thanks for stopping by. Y’all come back now.

New Addition – New Shop

If you have been following our Casa De WagginTails Facebook page you know we have a new waggin tail in the family. Say hello to MeiLing. On Facebook she was introduced as MeiSong but that did not seem to fit. MeiLing works better.

MeiLing is a 9 month old Chinese Crested who came from a breeder who is transitioning from Chinese Cresteds to Poodles. We landed in Pipe Creek, TX on Wednesday 9/26. Friday 9/28, I drove Carol to San Antonio where she met up with her sister Donna from The Happy Traills. Together they drove to Tomball, TX to pick up MeiLing.  She is cute as a button, very quiet and calm and loves to play like a puppy. And most important, she is house broken.

She loves our fur babies and is a good blend for our family. Patches our cat is cat is doing a pretty good job of teaching MeiLing how to leave cats alone. MeiLing just thinks Patches is another small dog.

Qianna will be going to her new home on Monday. Our Corpus Christi daughter & grandson are ready for a new addition to their family. Gage is old enough for added responsibility. They are coming up to Pipe Creek to visit us this weekend. We will miss Qianna but she will be going to family and is close.

Today was my first day at work. First I need to remind you what my wood shop in Corpus Christi looked like. This photo was taken a couple of weeks before out estate sale in November 2011 so things look a bit messy.

This is my new workshop. The door on the left is the intake area. Furniture to be restored comes in this door. The double door on the right is the spray room where the stripped and repaired furniture ends up for staining and finishing.  Can you make out two bay doors in that middle section? Those doors open to the workshop.

And here is an inside shot of the workshop. This is the back wall of the shop.That large thing on the let is our clamp rack. Pretty cool.

This is the front wall.  The tall  bay doors opens to the middle section of the building. The shorter bay door opens to the intake area and wood rack.

Speaking of wood rack?  Smells real nice. Walnut, Cherry, Quarter-Sawn White Oak and other goodies. Sweet!

Well, that’s it for today. Tomorrow Laura and Gage come for the weekend. Saturday is Market Days in Bandera. Looking forward to a cool time.

Thanks for stopping by. Y’all come back now.