Laguna Park – January through April, 2009

We spent some of the winter months staying in Laguna Park, Texas with our friends Rusty and Pat.  Laguna Park is between Dallas and Waco near Lake Whitney.  Lake Whitney is formed by the Whitney Dam on the Brazos River.

While in Laguna Park, we worked on finishing the remodel of the interior of our motorhome.  Bob worked hard on the cupboards.  K.C. helped with applying the finish to the woodwork.

Bob changed out the kitchen faucets.

We really enjoyed staying with Pat and Rusty.  We visited with them daily, went out to dinner now and then, and even shared the worst case of flu we’ve had in decades!  Pat and K.C. went into Clifton to listen to a presentation by a well-known author, and we all went to Meridian to join in one of the infamous, tax day, “Tea Parties.” 

We drove to Dallas to a delicious bar-b-que cooked up by Mark.  Mark and Bobbie went with us to the King Tut exhibit.

While we were in Dallas, we drove past the sight of President Kenney’s assassination.

Book Depository

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grassy Knoll

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our kids surprised us with a dog for our birthdays.  Her name is Itty Bitty Patty and she makes us laugh every day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s a hard knocks life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of our hobbies is geocaching.  If you are not familiar with geocaching, go to www.geocaching.com to learn about a fun new hobby.  We did some geocaching while we were in Texas.  It’s a good way to learn an area.  We notice that many geocaches are found in cemetaries.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An old school bell is on display in the cemetary.

 We had a lot of fun in Texas with Pat and Rusty, but at the end of April it was time to head north to Oklahoma.  Thanks Pat and Rusty.  Thanks Bobbie and Mark.  We’ll see you again one of these days.

Goodbye for now, Texas.

 

 Monday, January 12, 2009

We left Abilene and headed on.  We went south off of I 20 on Texas Highway 108 through Stephenville, Meridian and on into the Thousand Trails Park at Lake Whitney.  It was good to get here.

We will be staying in Laguna Park at our friend Rusty and Pat’s house for the next couple of months while Bob finishes the remodel on the motorhome.  Laguna Park is a small little town on the west bank of Lake Whitney.  While out exploring one day, we did find that it has an airport though!

Here’s the runway.  We noticed that the local dog thinks its his playground.

We finished up the month celebrating Bob’s 77th birthday.  Happy Birthday, Bob! 

Sunday, January 11, 2009

We left the rest area early and drove east on I 20.  We stopped for a late breakfast at a little Mom and Pop cafe in Colorado City.  It was great food.  Our goal for this day was to make it to Sweetwater, Texas to tour the WASP WWII Museum at Avenger Field.  As you know, I am interested in early women pilots because Bob’s Mom worked as a civilian trainer of fighter pilots.  She also transported goods during the war.  The WASP program was a military-based program for training women to be transport pilots during the war.

You would think that since this was actually the airport where the women were trained that it would be a well supported museum.  Nope.  It is totally based on donations and they don’t even have an airplane.  They have a lot of pictures and one old car.  It’s too bad given the immense service that these women provided our country during the war.

When the women arrived on base, they were bussed to their barracks.

The women were expected to train as soldiers yet they weren’t even given uniforms.  They bought similar clothing themselves so that they could look uniform.  Once they completed the program, they were given wing pins, however.

Once trained, these women transported goods, planes and soldiers all over the world.  When the war ended, the WASP program was disbanded.  They were dismissed and sent home without even a plane ticket.  The girls had to find their own flights home.  The records were stored away in the basement and the women were forgotten and given no credit for the service that they provided until decades later when they were finally given veteran’s status.  There are still a lot of these women alive and flying.  They had a fly-in to this museum a couple of years ago and more than 40 women flew in.  Our thanks go out to them for their service to our country.

We left the WASP Museum and drove to a rest area on the east side of Abilene for the night.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

After a night in a nice rest area just west of Las Cruces, we said goodbye to the roadrunner and hit the road.

The view as you head into Las Cruces is breathtaking.

At Las Cruces we turned and headed south into Texas.

We stopped for lunch at a Flying J in El Paso.

When we fired up the motorhome after lunch, Bob noticed that the alternator wasn’t charging.  Lucky for us, there was a Fleetwood service shop just behind the Flying J.  We drove up there, and they were open on Saturday!  One thing about the Kram-A-Lott Inn.  When it decides to give us trouble, it makes it as convenient as possible.  The Fleetwood people said that they would try to work us in before the end of the work day.  While we were sitting in their lot waiting, Bob remembered that he had had this problem before.  He took the engine housing cover off and reset the field wire.  Sure enough, the alternator started charging again.  We thanked the Fleetwood people who told us that they would have found that because it is the first thing they look for, but they would have had to charge us $130 just to look at it.  Good job, Bob! 

We headed on south and had gone only a few miles when the alternator quit charging again.  Bob pulled over on the side of the freeway and took the housing cover off again.  He discovered that the field wire was actually broke, so he did some roadside mechanic work and put a new faston terminal on the field wire.  We were off again with the alternator charging away.  I might add that the trucks and other traffic were really good about getting over a lane when they saw us parked there beside the freeway.

As you may know, when you drive through El Paso on I 10 you look directly across the Rio Grande into Mexico.  This is Mexico.

I checked for the infamous border fence, and there it was.

As we traveled through Texas we enjoyed the West Texas landscape,

began to see oil pumps,

cotton fields,

and the ubiquitous wind turbines.  Wait!  Is that the wind turbine that has been stalking us?!!

We met up with our friends Gene and Dolores in Pecos, Texas and had dinner together.  We spent the night in a rest area just east of Pyote, Texas.