Sun, May 1, 2011

Sunday, May 01, 2011

A road trip is an opportunity to change your mind and enjoy the consequences. – Donna Downey

We all enjoyed a good night’s sleep at the Best Western in Alpine, TX.  Our plan was to enjoy the continental breakfast and then hit Highway 90 West to I-10 and then get thru El Paso in the light Sunday morning traffic.  Reality… the continental breakfast went without a hitch and was pretty good.  Then we got on the road and that’s where we soon went astray.  We never saw I-10 but instead after a short stop in Marfa, TX soon found ourselves taking a side trip into the Ft Davis Mountains. 

Alpine is, I believe about 4,000 ft in elevation and the temperatures were cool and the sky was crystal clear so we were lulled into staying in the area. There have been some huge fires in the Ft Davis Mtns so we thought we would take a short side trip to see how it looked.  Note:  Short in Texas is anything less  than 150 miles.  Luckily most of the scenic drive that makes a loop thru the mountains was not highly impacted by the fire.  Most of it was just a beautiful as ever with the majority of the fire to the north side of the scenic drive and on the eastern and southern side of Ft. Davis itself.  In some areas just the grasses and undergrowth had burned leaving the cedars and larger trees.  In other areas that did not have tree cover pretty much everything was burned up.  We did see a few houses in the edge of town that had burned.

After making the loop we decided to head on down to Big Bend and see how the park was faring in the drought.  It was unusually dry but beautiful almost having a winter instead of spring appearance and we couldn’t find anything blooming.  The Rio Grande river was lower than we can remember seeing it but was still beautiful flowing thru Santa Elena Canyon.

We made our usual stop to admire Gilberto Luna’s Jacal (a small, low, house made from slim  poles, tied together and filled with mud, clay and grasses).  Mr Luna lived his entire life there in Big Bend farming with water diverted from nearby Alamo creek. The usually dry creek was the path used by raiding Comanches to attack Mexican villages and settlements.  Gilberto managed to maintain peaceful relations with the Comanches and his fellow Mexicans. He raised a large family, and died in 1947 at the age of 108! We always stop, reread his story and admire the hardiness of the early settlers of the Big Bend.   

The temperatures of the early morning and higher elevations around Alpine and Ft Davis gave way to heat once we were in Big Bend.  We have not taken the drive up into the Chisos Basin in many years so we drove up to the lodge and got ice for the cooler.  The drought seemed more intense in the higher elevations of the basin with the trees looking very dry and stressed.

As we left the basin headed out of the park the wind picked up and we were in sort of a dust storm with visibility very limited.  Not the type that would deter driving but we could just barely make out the mountains in the distance. 

We successfully made another Texas sized loop and have ended up back in Alpine for another night.  Although it might sound from the journal today that it was a dreary day, actually it was not.  It was great to see the Ft Davis scenic drive area had not been significantly impacted by the wildfires and Big Bend is always beautiful even though the spring blooms were nowhere to be found.  In Alpine it is back to the mid sixties and there is the nicest cool breeze coming in our motel room window. 

Our plan, well we know our plans are subject to change, but we intend to enjoy a quiet evening of reading and relaxing and then head out early in the morning… hoping to be thru El Paso before the snarl of the morning rush hour.  Whatever comes to reality… well we will still be enjoying another day on the road.

We are well tonight and hope you all are too!

Peace, Hope & Love,

Donna, Charles, Paris & Dodger

Sat, Apr 30, 2011

Saturday, April 30, 2011

A day on the road is always a good day (and thus induces happy sleep). – Donna Downey

The drought in Texas is bad! The areas of Texas we came thru Friday looked ok but you could tell it was dry.  Llano, however and points in every direction are scorched.  What a difference a year can make.  Last April they had a record crop of wild flowers after very good winter rains.  There were so many bluebonnets you couldn’t walk away from the road for walking thru a blanket of flowers.  It was truly heavenly.  This year it looks more like hell than heaven.  They have not had any measurable rain around Llano since last September and the only thing blooming anywhere was the prickly pear cactus. Add to that some record heat today with temperatures reaching 105 and it was time to move on. 

As I said earlier, we don’t like interstates on our road trips.  The other thing we don’t like is heat.  On one spring trip we were driving down the coast of Oregon and enjoying sixty degree temperatures.  Soon after crossing into northern California the temperature started to rise and in a short time it was in the upper nineties.  First we shed our jackets then swapped out the long sleeve shirts for t-shirts and  then we drove about five more miles and pulled over… looked at each other and said almost simultaneously… let’s go back north and get back into those cool temps!  Just one of the advantages of having no plan and no reservations… we can change our mind any time and as long as we are happy then everything is fine.  So today, after lunch, we had one of those let’s look for a better place to be moments! 

We had a good morning, however, before it warmed up.  We chose a route that would take us by two of our favorite spots… the Llano river and the James river.  Although the water level in both rivers was very low, it was still perfect for Dodger and Paris to enjoy a cooling swim and it enabled us to take a nice walk down a dry portion of the Llano river. Even in the middle of a drought a river is still a beautiful respite… probably even more so the cool clear water is in such contrast to everything around it. By lunch time the pups were glad to have a chance to catch a snooze while we ate mesquite smoked brisket and pork tenderloin at Cooper’s BBQ in Mason, TX.  After lunch as we headed out to take a second playtime at the James river the temperature had climbed from 85 to 101.  After the pups’ swim the temperature reached 105 and even though it was comfortable with the nice dry breeze… we knew it was time to move on.

So we “hit the trail” and plotted a route that would carry us across a good portion of west Texas.  Just west of Junction, TX we saw several helicopters carrying water to a nearby wildfire.  A few more miles down the road as we crossed over a large mesa… we saw the huge fire they were fighting.  Even though we were many miles from the fire it remained in our sight for most of the afternoon.  As we neared our destination for the night, Alpine, TX, there was a huge fire that had burned thousands of acres and had actually burned into the edge of the city.  I’m sure this was a very scary time for the local folks and one of great relief when it was finally extinguished. 

After a good night’s sleep I was able to be a more interesting passenger today.  At one point, however Charles pointed out that I had taken a couple of quick naps.  I protested saying I did not think I had been sleeping… he did the smart husband thing and agreed.  Then he just waited until I dozed off again and took my picture.  I included that lovely shot just to show what a good sport I am… right!

It was a good day and an interesting day.  Along the way we saw a deer, turkeys, a variety of birds, fox squirrels, a javelina… and a few zebras as well. We saw a wildfire in action and what remains when a wildfire has swept the landscape as far as the eye can see.  During lunch we saw more coverage on the tornadoes in our part of the country and we know we are blessed to have been spared and to be on our road trip.  Still, we keep those affected by these disasters in our prayers. 

Tomorrow we will head toward cooler temperatures and greener pastures.  After a picnic in the room tonight of leftover brisket and goodies from our cooler we are ready for some more of that road induced “happy sleep”.  And I’m still not totally convinced that Charles didn’t just catch me blinking in that picture… ya think?

We are well tonight and hope that you all are too.

Peace, Hope & Love,

Donna, Charles, Paris & Dodger  



Fri, Apr 29, 2011

Friday, April 29, 2011

A good day on the road brings happy sleep. – Donna Downey

A carrot… that is what I use to entice myself to work.  Not a literal carrot but some type of reward that I promise myself if I will “bear down” and just “git er done” then I can have it.  When I was studying for the CPA exam I had two pictures taped to my computer monitor.  One was a gray horse and the other was a motorcycle. After months of nothing but work and study I slapped those three capital letters behind my name, pulled the pictures from my monitor and dropped them in the trash.  They had done their duty and it was time to move on.  Sometimes I do actually allow myself whatever small incentive I have come up with.  Sometimes it is just a cup of coffee and a break… but to get myself thru a typical tax season requires the promise of a road trip, a long road trip and it must come to pass.  No dropping pictures in the trash and going back to work!

This tax season was particularly difficult.  Mother Nature and the IRS would make sure of it. This would be the first tax season we would be required to efile all our returns. This meant more fees to the IRS of course and a long application to get approval to be an efiler.  It also added additional steps to our very fine tuned process.  Due to the very late passing of additional tax laws the IRS delayed the “start date” that we could begin to submit returns.  While we were steadily getting the kinks worked out, Mother Nature thru the crud at us.  Renee got it first and being the trooper she is, she fought thru it and worked every day but it was hard on her and us.  Then Jean got it and it took her down.  She fought it but soon it had settled in and along with wearing her out it took her voice as well.  We tried everything… trips to the doctor, home remedies, but she just couldn’t kick it.  She worked as much as she could and sometimes Renee and I would take turns translating her whispers to the client.  It was not a pretty picture.

Luckily, I guess, I made it without meeting Mr. Crud.  So, I was able to work 61 straight days, 7 days a week, from 7:00 am to 7:00 pm. about 750 hours… but not without that carrot!  At the end of this ghastly schedule would be a nice long relaxing road trip… a road trip filled with rest, walks, beautiful sights, photography and time to enjoy my spouse and our pups… and so it begins.

Yesterday was my last day at work.  Having done my packing before leaving for the office, Charles would gather everything else and take care of all the things that need doing before we can leave two businesses and a farm behind while we ramble the western US.  I finished up at 6:00 pm (an early day for me) and headed home.  Charles had the Jeep ready and after a quick snack we headed to the Riley Center (with the pups in the back seat) to catch the Bruce Hornsby concert.  We made it to the Gallery level just as they cut the lights and after fumbling out way to our seats, enjoyed an incredible concert. It was worth staying in town to hear but it was one of the longest concerts thus far at the Riley Center so we left Meridian headed West about 10:30 pm. 

We don’t like interstate travel so driving after dark via interstate is no problem.  We’re just trying to get to a good jumping off point. We made it to Vicksburg and decided it would be safer to stop and found a nice clean room at the Jameson Inn.  Actually it cost more to fill up the Jeep this morning than it did for the motel room. That was a little unnerving.

It was a beautiful day that started out cool and crisp.  Beautiful blue skies lay in front of us looking down the Interstate and we made the decision to drive on to Texas before getting off the big slab.  A perfect breakfast at the Cracker Barrel in West Monroe, LA gave way soon enough to a good BBQ sandwich for lunch at Bodacious BBQ in Kilgore, TX.  Then it was on to the smaller two lane roads… windows down… solving the world problems and saying a prayer for those who were so terribly devastated by the tornadoes of Wednesday.  We were spared by just a few short miles between us and the killer tornado that tore thru northern Clarke County. 

I know I was tired after so many days of work but poor Charles didn’t have much of a talking partner today.  As soon as we put the windows down and I felt that warm dry breeze I was snoozing.  I would wake up for brief periods of conversation and even drove a couple of times but as soon as I got back in the passenger seat and got comfortable… well it was off to dream land again.  

We made a nice stop at a playground in the small community of Clifton, Texas to enjoy the warm breezes and let the pups play for a while.  So that was the extent of my picture taking for today.

We made it to Llano, TX in time to watch the sunset over the Llano river and will probably stay another night here.  Although normally the hill country would be blanketed with wild flowers, Texas is suffering from an extreme drought and there are more wildfires than wild flowers this year.  Still, we enjoy the area and will probably spend tomorrow in search of whatever flowers we can find and hopefully a running body of water for the pups to play in. 

I have to remind my wonderful friends, family and acquaintances this journal is not meant to be a great literary work but simply a place to jot down my thoughts about all the things we experience on a good road trip.  If you read this far in today’s entry, you may have had enough already!  If not, please join us when you can and I hope to provide you with something of interest somewhere along the way.  One of the great things about your family and your dearest friends is they act like they enjoy all of this and even encourage it!  Got to love them.

Hope you all are well as we begin.

Peace, Hope & Love,

Donna, Charles, Paris & Dodger