Day 188: Wes Cooksey County Park, TX

With three good climbs on today's route, we decided to head out early to decrease the likelihood of having a long, grueling climb in high heat later in the day.  So we made sandwiches the night before, which we ate for breakfast just as the sky was starting to brighten up.  It was a chilly 54 degrees when I hit the road, but it was quite pleasant a short time later when the road start climbing upward.

Quite some time ago I had a front flat tire, and after I had replaced the tube it was obvious that whatever caused the flat was still in there.  But it was a very slow leak.  So for weeks now I've been starting out the day by adding as much as 70 pounds of pressure to the tire, which has kept me going thus far.  But the rough chip sealed roads finally brought the tube to the point of failure.

The sign warns that about one motorcyclist per year dies on this stretch of roadway.

I was about two thirds of the way up the first climb of the day when I realized the tire had gone flat.  I hoped that by adding a CO2 cartridge of air to it that I could keep riding on it until I caught up with Alea, but no luck.  It looked as though the summit was just around the corner, so I decided to walk up the hill a ways, in the hope that Alea was nearby.  While it was indeed a false summit, that strategy paid off.  So once I got to the van, I got a fresh tube and utilized the bike tools in the van so that I wouldn't have to unstuff and restuff my seat bag.  It turned out the culprit was a piece of steel wire, likely debris from some exploded tire, which I had acquired hundreds of miles back down the road.

With that taken care of, I was once again on my way.  It wasn't long until I reached the true summit, just as another rider coming from the opposite direction was doing the same.  It wasn't long before he had turned around and caught up with me.  His name was Casey and he lives in San Antonio.  He was out doing some hill climbing for some sort of climbing challenge that he was participating in, and these happened to be the closest hills to where he lived with any significant elevation gain.

Since the road was narrow and winding, when Alea caught up with us she decided to put her flashers on and follow us up to the summit, much to the chagrin of a few impatient motorcycle riders. 

Normally Lana sleeps while riding along in the support van, but I guess the sight of two cyclists on the road in front of her demanded her full attention.  Especially since one of them was me.  She was quite engaged by the spectacle.

Casey and I rode the ascent for the second climb of the day together, making those miles seem to simply melt away.  The only thing I remember was struggling to find enough breath to keep up the conversation - keeping the momentum to continue climbing wasn't even a part of my conscious thought.  It wasn't long before we reached his car at the base of the second descent and we parted company (I was remiss in not getting a photo together).

It was still quite early and the temperature was still perfect for cycling when the final climb of the day came along.  Despite being longer than the other two climbs, it also seemed a bit easier, so it wasn't long before we were up and over that and on our way to this evening's campsite.

We are camped at Wes Cooksey Park ($20, power, water, adjustable showers and the best free wi-fi that we have found so far).   The park is run by Uvalde County, and while it has been around for a while, it is in good shape.  We are a bit amazed that on a Friday there are very few campsites full (aside from the long term residents), but part of that is because Allstays shows this as a private campground.  And the campground doesn't take reservations, and it only accepts checks and cash.

Of all the campsites we've had in the past fourteen months, this is one of the better ones that we've encountered, in terms of both ambiance and price.

I had offered a lot of solutions to Alea on how to facilitate learning Spanish.  But she doesn't like DuoLingo because it doesn't give you the answers in advance (but if you don't know the answers, it provides them to you and gives you a second chance to answer the same questions at the end of each session).  She also got frustrated when we attempted to play a simple, non-competitive version of Spanish Scrabble (an effort to see how many Spanish words, including proper names, that we could make from the tiles we drew), where we don't keep score.  In hindsight, a Spanish version of Scrabble probably has a much different mix of tiles than in the U.S. version, so it was more difficult to make that work than I had imagined.  

So the day has ended on a sour note, and I have no idea how things will go from here.  I only know that I am incredibly frustrated. 

Day 187: Lost Maples Natural Area, TX

We looked ahead at the elevation profiles along our route and decided we needed to swap days, in order to give Alea's knee a break from some of the longest hills that we've seen since New England.  Alea had ridden on Wednesday, and it was supposed to be my turn to ride on Thursday (Day 187).  Instead, we opted to split Thursday's riding: I rode the first 22 miles and Alea rode the final 28 miles.

Cowboy boots cap a row of fence posts near Hunt, TX.

The irony of our decision was that the steepest hill of the day was just beyond the point where Alea took over.  But after that, the hills were short and the grades were much less intimidating.

We were once again on quiet Ranch Roads for much of the day, giving Lana and I the chance to pass the time playing ball while waiting for Alea to come riding along.

"Hurry up and take the picture - I can't hold this pose forever!"

Much of the day's ride was on very rough chip seal, which slowed our progress considerably.  At one point, I was waiting for Alea when I heard an odd rattling sound coming down the road.  It was her bike that was making all the noise!

We camped at Lost Maples Natural Area ($20, power, water, covered picnic table and adjustable showers), which is part of the Texas State Park system.  In addition to the picnic shelter, we had shade from some small trees, so we were quite comfortable with the high temperature in the upper 80s.  Things have cooled down enough the past few days that we no longer need to run the air conditioner at night.  Without the AC noise it is much easier to get a good night's sleep.

Sunrise at Lost Maples.

We didn't get the full story of why there are "lost maples" here, but we suspect it is similar to the story of the lost pines at Bastrop State Park.  Those pines were once connected to the pines in Louisiana, but as the climate and terrain changed they became isolated by considerable distance.

We have been seeing cactus for days now, and figured
we needed to include the obligatory cactus picture...

A preview of coming attractions:  I can only imagine looking up and seeing a live one of these strolling through camp some day soon...

Una tarántula muerta.

Day 186: Kerrville, TX

We are loving the cooler and drier weather.  We now need to linger at the campsite in the morning, allowing enough time for the sun to warm things up to a comfortable temperature before hitting the road.  That leaves us time for one or two cups of coffee, and no need to rush in order to head out at first light.  We even have time to do a little bike maintenance before we set out for the day.

Las Vacas negras (the black cows).

Alea had a short 30 mile ride today.  The road mostly flattened out a bit, but she had a few steep, short climbs to contend with, which were on a very rural backroad.  We saw herds of black sheep and herds of black cattle as we wound our way through ranch country.  This is an area of the country where we wouldn't mind hanging out for a while at some point in the future.  The towns are big enough to have some amenities, it is very scenic and yet it is rural enough to have lots of options for safe riding in the surrounding hills.

Una araña grande.  (A BIG spider.)

We've found a Texas substitute for Aldi: H-E-B, which appears to only have stores in Texas and Mexico.  They have some really great low prices on the basics that we need, they stock a lot of stuff that we have trouble finding at Walmart, and they have an awesome deli with far more choices than we've seen anywhere else.  And they make some fresh guacamole that is better that most of what you find in Mexican restaurants: It's not cheap, but way cheaper than restaurant prices.  It turns out that H-E-B started out here in Kerrville, which probably in part explains the prosperity of this little town.

Las avejas negras.  (The black sheep.)

We are staying at Kerrville-Shreiner Park Campground ($23, power, water, adjustable showers).  It's a great park, with tons of different deer just about everywhere you look.  And since it is sunny once again, it is nice that there are also plenty of small trees shading our campsite.  All-in-all, it is a nice contrast to where we stayed last night, though there we were basically paying to be close to all the things going on in and around Fredericksburg.

The roads were quiet enough that Lana and I could play ball on them...

Alea and I are beginning to learn some Spanish, and hope to start building some conversation skills once we have a basic vocabulary built up.  I'm really liking DuoLingo - it seems like a much better way to learn than my experiences in college and in junior high school in Belgium.  We may never get fluent, but I suspect that we will have better conversational skills than when we traveled in Europe in the early 90s.

Day 185: Ladybird Johnson Municipal Park, Fredericksburg, TX

It was another great day for cycling today.  I had plenty of smooth asphalt early in the day, and it was around 70 degrees when I finally hit the road.  It didn't warm up appreciably and was cloudy all day.  As a result, the 50 miles of hills today were very enjoyable.  I was no wear near as fatigued as I had been getting while riding in the flats with 90+ degree weather and high humidity.

Our first longhorn sighting...

It was another day of great scenery and mostly very low traffic volumes.  It's easy to see why Lance Armstrong used this area as a training ground - it would be possible to cycle around here for quite a long while without getting bored.

We ended up just west of Fredericksburg at Ladybird Johnson Municipal Park ($35, power, water, adjustable showers, free cable and free wi-fi).  We managed to get in just before the rate increases to $40 per night.  In hindsight, we should have opted for a $10 tent site, as it is comfortable enough that we won't need to run either the air conditioner or the fan.

A great sunset...

There is a ton to do in Fredericksburg, it being a major tourist destination and an area that a lot of snowbirders flock to in the winter (the campsites for larger rigs are booked a year in advance).  It certainly looks to have been an area that received its share of Congressional pork, probably thanks to LBJ's years in office.  For a city its size, it seems to have far more amenities than one would expect to find.

Day 184: Pedernales Falls State Park, TX

Yesterday marked 6 straight months for us camping on the road (at least for this trip).  So we've passed a milestone that I set for myself in 1985 and 1986, when I had lived on the road both years for one week short of a full six months.

Alea did the honors in leading us out of Austin.  We abandoned the Adventure Cycling route, which would have taken us through downtown Austin.  We opted instead to create our own route based upon cycling maps created by the City of Austin.  For the most part our escape from this heavily urbanized area was easy and stress free, but once we had reached the outskirts Alea had five different obnoxious "Bubba Trucks" fishtail their pickups beside her.  (It is so reassuring to know that there is no shortage of imbeciles on the planet.  It is no wonder that one of them is running for president.)

We were on roads that often would warn of low crossings that could flood.  All were culverted, except the one in the pictures below.  It is probably unusual that water is flowing over it, which is due to the fairly heavy rains in the area over the weekend.

Water spills over the ford.

Taken from the ford, looking downstream.

The deeper we got into Hill Country, the lighter the traffic became on the Texas State Ranch Roads that make up the bulk of our route, and the more scenic and relaxing it became.  It helped tremendously that the high temperature dropped below 80 degrees for the first time in about three months, giving us nearly ideal cycling weather, despite having off-and-on light rain.  Alea had many more hills than we've experienced since leaving Tennessee, but she made it the 44 miles to our day's destination with plenty of energy, even though she didn't stop riding until mid-afternoon (we got a late start, opting to wait for the morning commute to end).

We camped at Pedernales Falls State Park ($20, power, water, adjustable showers), opting to hike down to the falls before setting up camp.  It is a very interesting and scenic area, where the main channel of the river has cut a channel through a layer of limestone over the centuries.

Pedernales Falls.

We actually got some TV reception there, so we watched the Clinton/Trump debate.  The new fact of the day that Donald taught me was that Hillary Clinton has failed to stop ISIS for the last three decades.  But I guess that is understandable, since ISIS hasn't been around nearly that long (it is hard to stop what doesn't exist).  (I had thought perhaps Donald was above using hyperbole, but maybe I'm wrong?)  It was refreshing to learn that Donald has the temperament to be our president, though I really wish he had demonstrated that for us, but I suppose he is saving that for the next debate.

The armadillos are much larger in West Texas...

Days 182 & 183: McKinney Falls State Park

Since we are attempting to learn a little Spanish before we venture into Mexico some time in November, Paula turned us on to DuoLingo, a free app for learning languages.  It's pretty awesome, providing an interesting mix of tools for learning, which combine writing, listening and speaking exercises.  We are still trying to figure out exactly how it will fit into our learning plans, but we are thinking that as we progress through the app we will keep a notebook of the verbs that we learn, along with their conjugations.  The hope is that this will give us a compact source of common verbs to use for creating our own phrases, and a quick means for verifying that we are using the correct conjugations when we are practicing between ourselves.  We only hope that we'll have sufficient internet coverage to make full use of the app.

We got together with Robert and Paula late in the morning and found lunch at a Greek diner, and then returned to the park for a closer look at the falls, and to spend some time getting caught up on recent events in their lives.  It rained (at times rather hard) off and on throughout the afternoon, but we managed to stay dry with the help of our beach umbrellas.  (We would have used our new awning, but picnic tables are anchored to the ground in Texas state parks.)

Robert and Paula (they are amused because I finally got my finger out of the way).

We returned to their hotel in late afternoon, so that Robert could soak in the pool in order to dry out his skin rashes (which were aggravated by the hot, humid weather).  We were joined there in the evening by my niece Stephanie, her husband, Derek Arredondo, and their son Gage.  Driving up separately with them was her daughter Katrina Moreno, and Trina's boyfriend Razz.

Lana is fascinated by Gage and the pool water.

We sat around the pool for quite a while, where Lana was very bemused by Gage's antics swimming underwater, and by the leaves floating in the pool.  She was highly entertained by everything and was fun to watch.

With a total of nine of us, it took a while to reach a consensus on where to dine, but we eventually opted to try Polvos Mexican Restaurant.  It was packed, so it was late when we finally got seated, but the food was good, as were the margaritas, and Alea and I had a great time being able to hang out with everyone.  We celebrated Stephanie's birthday (which had taken place earlier in the week) and had a chance to chat with Trina and Razz about their studies, and their new puppy, Theodore.  

Theodore, crashed on Gage's lap.

We regrouped on Sunday morning for brunch, which took place at Picnik, a "paleo"/organic restaurant that Paula had found for us.  Alea and I shared the Harvest Hash: it was pretty awesome, and the poached egg that it came with was amazing - a dark orange yolk and the tastiest egg white that I've ever experienced.  I may just switch to eating organic eggs, if they are all like that one...

Afterwards, we all returned to the campsite, so that Stephanie's clan could see our camper and the falls.  It rained lightly off and on, but that didn't stop Alea from teaching everyone our personal flavor of the card game Spite and Malice.  It wasn't long before we were all sharing memories of Stephanie and Paula's dad, Jim Emory.  He had a penchant for finding, let's say, unique ways of winning at cards (which some folks might call cheating, though it was always done in a very light-hearted and fun manner).  It was a fun time, and brought back many memories of playing cards with Jim and my sister Cheryl during the time when they were dating.  It was fun times then, and fun times now.

Robert (in the far distance) tries to get Steffie's attention while Paula waves at him.

Paula, Trina, Steffie, Gage, Razz, Alea and Robert, wheeling and dealing.

Gage, Steffie, Trina, Razz and Alea: Learning Spite and Malice.

The weather cooperated with us, with the heavy rains holding off until late afternoon.  With the storms closing in, everyone headed for home.  I dropped Alea off at a local laundromat, while I grocery shopped and found cheap gas so that we would be ready to continue on in the morning.

Day 181: McKinney Falls State Park, TX

It is now Day 184 (Monday), so I've got some blogging to get caught up on.

Upper McKinney Falls.

On Thursday evening, one of our fellow campers at Bastrop State Park brought her chair and a few beers to our campsite, so that we could get acquainted.  Her name was Melissa (who like me is a melanoma survivor), and she is a retired Austin police officer who downsized from a 3,000 square foot house to a Bluebird diesel pusher motorhome (probably a bit over 300 square feet).  We had a great time learning a bit about her and her new job, and sharing some health tips.  Of course darkness (and bugs) closed in on us much too soon, as we would have enjoyed spending even more time with her.

Alea had the honor of encountering our first scorpion.

It was my turn to ride, and I had a far easier day than Alea's last day in the saddle.  My route trended downhill, with only a few low rollers to contend with.  And a good chunk was on roads paved with the easy rolling Texas white asphalt that we love riding on.  

The plan was for me to ride from the campsite, but after Alea had gone to the comfort station I discovered that my rear flashing light wouldn't come on.  It should have been charged, and we've had this happen before where if we keep trying the "on" button it eventually works.  I decided that I would give it a quick charge via USB cable while I, too, visited the comfort station.  Once I had it plugged in, I piled the bike in the van for safe keeping and locked up before heading there.

When I came out, I discovered that Alea had left with the van, obviously thinking I had started pedaling down the road.  We were fortunate in this instance that we had good cell coverage, as I could think of many places where we have been where it might have taken quite a while for her to figure out what had become of me.  So I called her and asked whether she had noticed my bike in the back of the van (an obviously rhetorical question)?  Luckily, she had not gone far and it wasn't long before she could return and I was on my way.

I made it the 34 miles to McKinney Falls State Park ($24, power, water, adjustable showers) in a couple of hours (we paid $24 for a 50 amp site, as all the $20 per night 30 amps sites were taken).  We had almost finished setting up when I got a call from my niece, Paula Everett.  Of course my clothes were completely soaked in sweat and my hands were sweaty, so I wasn't able to unlock my phone to answer her call.  But I quickly dried everything off and called her back, so that we could arrange a rendezvous.

I drove over to her hotel to pick her up, where she was waiting with some mail and merchandise that had sent to her house for us.  One of those items was our new ARB awning, which I knew would be bulky, but was a bit shocked to see just how big the thing was.

Tight squeeze.

For a moment I thought that the only way we would get it back to the campsite would be to install it right there on the spot, as it was longer than the van's cargo box, and the van was crammed to the gills with our gear.  But amazingly, with a little ingenuity we managed to squeeze it in diagonally between our two bicycles and were quickly on our way.

Of course on seeing the size of the awning package, I was feeling very sorry for having imposed the burden of delivery upon them.  Fortunately for me, she and her husband Robert are awesome people and they simply took it in stride.  They figured out how to transport it for the 5 hour drive from Lewisville, TX and then dragged into their hotel room for safe keeping.

Once Paula and I had returned to the campsite (Robert was working in Austin), and after briefly getting caught up with each other's lives, she, Alea and I set to work on installing the awning.  With the awning in hand, I finally knew what size of holes to drill in our T6 aluminum angle brackets, so that was the first item of business.  I drilled the topmost holes and then mounted the brackets to the roof.  Next, we temporarily installed the awning so that I could precisely locate where to drill the bottom-most holes.  With that done, we loosely mounted the awning, adjusted the position fore and aft, and then tightened down the bolts.  In total, the whole process probably took less than an hour.

The install was definitely a three person job, at least given the fact that we had no stepladders to facilitate the work.  So we are very grateful that we had Paula to help out, as it saved us a lot of extra time, effort and frustration.

We did a quick set up, to see if the claimed 30 second set up time was accurate.  Even our first attempt only took a minute or two, so we suspect with practice 30 seconds is very doable.

Alea and Paula head for the shade. 

Paula and Alea admiring out accomplishment.

We didn't have much chance to use the awning this weekend, as there weren't enough chairs for people to sit under it, so we had to deploy our beach umbrellas at the picnic table for that purpose.

Once Robert finished work, we got together to plan where to eat, and to hear of their travails from a few weeks ago in getting their house in Nashville on the market.  The worst part of that was that Robert got covered in poison oak/ivy while cleaning up the yard, yet didn't realize it because he didn't break out in welts until they had returned to Lewisville.  He's still recovering from that, so we can appreciate just how bad it had been initially.

He also managed to rupture an eardrum while participating in the annual Tough Mudder, with a whole epic of misadventures related to that.  It had been a tough month for him, so we admire his ability to maintain high spirits, despite his suffering outside with us for hours in the heat and humidity.  He is a class act, and we wish we could hang out with him more often.

Days 179 & 180: Bastrop State Park, TX

It was another early day on the road on Wednesday, as we attempted once again to try to get the riding done before the heat overtook us.  It was looking as though Alea would finish her 49 miles before the thermometer hit 90 degrees, but the hills between Buescher State Park and Bastrop State Park made that impossible.  She still finished before noon, but it was hotter and more humid than either of us liked by the time she was done.

Alea rides between Buescher and Bastrop State Parks.  In the background beyond
the mirror are the outlines of hundreds of burned out trees.

That road between the two state parks is deceptive.  The hills are steep, and just long enough that it is very hard to maintain momentum to the top of the next hill.  As a result, a couple of times Alea had to get off and walk her bike, as attempting a standing climb out of the saddle put too much pressure on her bad knee.  Needless to say, we are hoping that the gradients will be gentler for the bulk of our remaining months on the road for this year.

That is Alea pushing her bike up the steepest part of the hill.

Bastrop State Park suffered considerable damage from a fire five years ago, and crews are still culling burnt trees that could be blown over onto the park roadways.  To add to the park's problems, they also had a dam burst that washed out part of the loop road.  And it seems flash flooding has been an issue with the loss of so much tree canopy.  But it looks as though the park is starting to recover from the recent devastation.

We camped at Copperas Campground ($20, power, water, air-conditioned showers with adjustable controls) for two nights (currently it is the only campground at Bastrop State Park that is open), as this was the one part of the park that was spared from the fires.  The shower house here is fairly new and it could easily be the nicest such facility that we've used in the past 14 months.

We spent our second day here getting things ready for the installation of our new ARB awning, which my niece Paula should deliver to us on Friday.  The task today was to mount a piece of 2"x2" pine to the roof of the van.  That will in turn be the anchor point for some angle aluminum brackets.  The awning will then be anchored to the brackets.

Of course trying to do this without proper tools has presented a challenge.  It was easy enough getting the plastic bolt hole caps off of the roof (these cover up where a factory rack can be attached to the roof).  Next, I had to remove some panel retaining clips that attached some black soundproofing foam to the ceiling around the track of the sliding door.  It was evident that my limited tool set was inadequate for the task, so off I went to the local auto parts store to get a pry bar, which worked well without causing any damage to the foam or the clips.

Of course with those removed it was obvious that a couple of the remaining bolt holes could only be accessed with a nut driver or socket wrench.  I was hoping to find one of the former, but ended up having to buy a small socket set instead.

With the proper tools in hand, and with Alea's help, I went about drilling holes in the wood.  I started by anchoring one end with a stainless steel lag bolt.  With that one installed (and with the wood fairly level, despite my butchering it with a 3/4" chisel in an attempt to approximate the slope of the van's roof), I proceeded to the far end.  Of course while attempting to tighten that lag bolt the 1/2" socket fell off the ratchet and was trapped behind some sheet metal.  Fifteen contorted, sweat-filled minutes later, it seemed I was about to retrieve it, when it fell down the door pillar (where only specialized tools and a lot of luck might have retrieved it).  

It was easier to return to town to buy a replacement 1/2" socket.  I taped the new socket to the ratchet's extension, so that it would not succumb to the same fate as the first.  Of course, by this time we had lost most of our shade, meaning that it would be a lot hotter than we had planned while we finished the job. 

With the proper tools once again in hand, I drilled the two remaining holes, and then disassembled everything.  I cleaned the roof with an alcohol wipe, and then dried it.  Next I applied a very generous amount of high grade silicone to the roof and realigned the wood with the bolt holes.  With Alea's help, I bolted the wood to the roof and, once that was done, sealed up all the 2x2 edges with silicone.  The result was a very solid, water tight installation, with just a slight slope toward the outside of the van (meaning it will drain well in the rain).  Now all we need is the awning...

One of the stainless steel lag bolts on the ceiling of the van.

Day 178: Oak Thicket Campground, Lake Fayette, TX

It was 90 degrees at 11 pm last night, and was near 80 this morning when we left to rejoin our route.  The humidity remained high, with fog in the river valleys this morning.  It was going to be yet another hot, humid day.

More sweat, with a side order of gnats...

We did make more of an effort to take some pictures, realizing that we haven't been doing much of that lately.  Partly that is because we have been traveling though nice areas, but nothing really catches our eye.  And a big factore is that the heat has us focused on cranking out the miles in a hurry, before things really start to heat up.

The self-proclaimed world's smallest Catholic church, near Round Top, TX.

A good chunk of our day was spent on Texas Farm Road 327, which is lined with "antique" stores (some antiques and a lot of pseudo-antiques).  For miles there are old barns, pole buildings and giant white vinyl tents crammed with stuff.  And, amazingly, there were a lot of people out shopping today.  I'm glad the heat was here to keep at least some folks at home, or it would have been a very unpleasant ride...

A store selling huge "antique" gasoline signs.

I rode 55 miles through mostly moderate hills, exclusively on (often rough) chip sealed roads, a part of which were on fairly busy roads with only intermittent shoulders.  And I managed to finish the day with a rear flat tire (caused by a piece of glass).

Both of our rear bike tires are starting to wear down, but we'll see if we can't get a few hundred more miles out of them before replacing them.  That should give us tires that will be adequate enough to make it to the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula (the front tires don't wear nearly as quickly as the rear ones do, so they are in better shape).  We'll be sure to restock our two spare bike tires before heading south of the border in November.

We are camped at Oak Thicket Campground on Lake Fayette ($32, power, water, adjustable showers).  [The camping fee is only $22, but we also had to pay $5 each per day to enter the park.]  We like it here, as the oak thicket provides plenty of shade.  So despite it being as hot as it was yesterday, we don't feel the heat quite as much.

Our campsite in the oak thicket.

It looks as though we are finally leaving gator territory.  We are currently crossing through areas where gators are found infrequently and are very dispersed.  So we let Lana play in the (hot!) water, something she has sorely missed these past few weeks since we were in Jackson, MS.  

Four buzzards keep an eye on Lana as she plays in Lake Fayette.

Day 177: College Station, TX

This may have been our hottest day yet.  It never really cooled off all that much last night, and the humidity remained high.  Alea rode 38 miles to our planned campsite southwest of Navasota, TX, only to find it full.  We could have switched off and I could have ridden on to our next destination, but since it was already 93 degrees out we opted not to do so.

We searched for nearby campgrounds, and the only options were toward College Station, north of our route.  Allstays showed that the closest one to us was the least expensive of the bunch, so we went there:  University RV Park ($50, power, water, adjustable showers).  There is free cable, but our TV can't figure out how to pull the channels in.  And there is supposed to be free wi-fi, but we think we are out of range, being the next to farthest campsite from the office.  It does have a nice air conditioned laundry, so we got caught up on that.  And the air conditioned showers are some of the nicest that we've seen.

It's hot enough out that even in the shade it is too hot to be outside for very long.  So we've passed the time in the cabin by reading, playing cards, working puzzles and now and again venturing outside to give Lana a short walk.  It looks as though it may remain hot and humid through Friday, when a cool front is predicted to pass through.

Day 176: Cagle Recreation Area, TX

The love bugs seem to be gone, but the humidity has increased.  I was dripping sweat almost from the instant I got on my bike.  I only rode 33 miles, but after we stopped and I sat down briefly on the comforter in our cabin I left a very wet butt print behind.  My clothes were soaked through with sweat.

It may be hard to see, but sweat is beading up all over me...

We camped at Cagle Recreation Area ($27, power, water, push button showers), mainly for its proximity to Conroe, TX.  That happens to be the location of the last Aldi store along our route until we reach the Imperial Valley in California in about 7 weeks time.  So we loaded up on some smaller items that save us a significant amount over Walmart prices.

On our return to the campground, at one point our car thermometer showed that it was 99 degrees out.  It was a bit cooler at the campground, but not a sole was outside.  Everyone was inside, hunkered down by the air conditioner, so we did likewise.  

I commented earlier about some super smooth asphalt that we've encountered here in Texas.  The stuff is awesome, though we only encounter it perhaps 15% of the time.  It seems to be composed of a very fine aggregate and is very light gray in color - we've come to refer to it as white asphalt.  You could ride on this stuff all day long and not get tired or sore.

"White Asphalt"

Days 174 & 175: Wolf Creek Park, TX

We had 70 miles to cover today, and Alea chose to split the ride into three segments: she rode 26 miles, I rode 25 and she finished off with the final 19 miles.

We saw our first cyclist since Cleveland, OH that was actually heading our way (actually a guy in Kentucky was headed our way, but for less than 10 miles).  We also saw two guys heading east, so it is encouraging to once again be seeing fellow cyclists on our route.  We are looking forward to once again finding some fellow cyclists at one of the campgrounds that we stop at along the way.

We did stop and chat with the guy heading west (we didn't get his name).  He was on his first bicycle tour, having started in Lake Wales, Florida a couple of weeks ago (he was doing a fair number of miles every day, which is why he was already in Texas).  The irony is that we had talked about how great the roads in Texas have been, especially the ample shoulders.  Wouldn't you know it?  The shoulders disappeared less than a mile father down the road... (they did reappear later.)

There wasn't much needed to describe the terrain for our first 50 miles today - it was flat.  Or more precisely, it was flat and there were a lot of chip-sealed roads.  At least there were a few hills the last 20 miles, but we also turned mostly due north, which meant that Alea also had a headwind to contend with.

At least once we arrived at Wolf Creek Park ($21, power, water, non-adjustable push button showers) there was a cool breeze coming in off of Lake Livingston.

The park is run by the Trinity River Authority, which we suppose is a regional water authority.  We got one of the funkier campsites here.  When we first pulled up we couldn't figure out where the vehicle pad was supposed to be, it having been washed away in some prior rain storm.  Eventually we found a scrap of land where the camper could be level fore and aft, and side to side.  I think some of our fellow campers were a bit surprised that there was any way to make a decent campsite out of our little piece of chaos, but we did.  But it meant setting up in a spot where our water hose can't reach the spigot, so we topped off our tank before setting up for the evening.

It was another hot, humid day, but fortunately for us there was a Mexican restaurant in town that served margaritas.  It was decent food, and very inexpensive, somewhat reminding us of Florida.  Our theory there is that there are so many retirees on fixed incomes that few restaurants can survive without keeping prices fairly low.  At least not in many of the older, more established neighborhoods.

We once again opted to stay put and extend our stay to Saturday night.  Trying to find a campsite on a Saturday is a lot like playing Musical Chairs.  If you don't have a campsite when the music stops playing, you are out of luck.  Staying put relieves the stress of wondering when the music will stop.

We used some of our spare time to get a better idea of where we will be as we head across the southwest.  The current plan is to be in El Paso, TX around the 11th of October and in Phoenix, AZ around the 27th of October.  We'll likely be in Tecate, CA a little more than a week later, and hopefully we will be heading down the Baja Peninsula shortly thereafter.

I've perfected my technique for dealing with showers that lack air conditioning and don't allow us to alter the water temperature.  The technique is "waist down, then waist up."  While completely wet, I start by putting away my soap, etc, including drying my ears with a Q-tip.  The first clothing to don after a shower is my shorts, so I dry below the waist to accomplish that.  Then I dry my feet, so that I can put on my sandals.  Then I dry my torso, then my arms and finally I dry my head (where it is still hard to tell if that moisture I am feeling is the shower water or sweat...).  Then I quickly slip on my t-shirt, which I have draped over the shower door, reading for that specific purpose.  At that point I gather up my stuff and get moving as quickly as possible, as the air movement offsets the sweat that I am generating.  From there I either head for our garage fan to have the air flow cool me down, or I climb inside the cabin of our camper so that the air conditioning will do likewise (only much more quickly).

Days 172 & 173: Village Creek State Park, TX

We finally made it to Texas!  We could have been here a month or more ago, but it was important to wait for things to cool down, or we would have been crossing New Mexico and Arizona in some really hot, nasty weather.  Hopefully we are back on track to get through the Southwest at a good time of year.

We decided to skip a private campground that we had thought of staying at in Bon Weir, TX, opting instead to ride as far as Silsbee, TX.  That made it a 96 mile day for us, with highs that reached into the mid-90s, with enough humidity to make it somewhat unpleasant.

To deal with the heat, we split the ride into five shifts: two long shifts early, and three short shifts once things had heated up.  I rode a total of 55 miles, while the remaining 41 miles were Alea's. We stopped for each other about every seven miles, making it easy to stay adequately hydrated on a hot, sunny day.

After some medium rollers at the beginning of the day, the terrain transitioned to low rollers and then pretty much became as flat as a pancake.  We lucked out, catching a favorable tailwind for the last few hours of the day, as our route shifted southwesterly and westerly.  That made it possible for me to maintain about a 23 mph pace for quite a few miles, especially when the pavement was smooth (there is something about Texas asphalt - it seems to have less rolling resistance than most asphalt that we've encountered).  We were done riding by 1 pm, having expected to be on the road until around 3 pm.

We found a car wash once we got to Lumberton, TX, and pressure washed all the love bugs off our van and the radiator.  We imagined masses of love bugs clogging up the radiator and blocking air flow (which could cause the radiator to overheat), but we found they wasn't nearly as bad there as what was splattered across our windshield.

We got our $70 Texas Park Pass, which is good until the end of September next year.  That means we don't have to pay park entry fees (typically $5 per person, per day), and we get four coupons good for half off our second nights stay at the same park.  There are also a few other minor perks, but avoiding those daily entry fees is the main reason for getting the card.  We will have broken even on the card by the time we leave Austin in a week and a half.  So anything after that will be money saved.

We are camped at Village Creek State Park ($15, power, water, adjustable showers).  The shower house isn't air conditioned, but at least they have good air flow going through it.  It looks as though there should be free wi-fi, but it doesn't seem to be working.  We suspect that is because a big chunk of the park is closed due to flood damage.

We spent Thursday doing chores and getting our ducks in line for a planned weekend in Austin.  We are really looking forward to getting there, spending time with family and then riding off into the arid sunset.  We will be so glad to have some time to hang out with my nieces and their family, to finally leave the high humidity behind us and to be back in the mountains once again!  Life will be soooo good very soon!