Halloween on Eagle Street

When we got up this morning and looked out, we saw a geyser of water erupting from a trailer in the row behind us. I put on my raincoat and went to see if a hose had blown. I couldn't get very close, but it appeared that the pipe to the water faucet had broken, so I called the owner. He's home from the hospital, but still bedridden, and he sounded pretty discouraged and like he really didn't know what to do, but he did mention shutting off the water to that section.

We decided to add more water to our fresh water tank, just in case. A little later we saw a repair truck at the trailer and the leak was stopped. The repair truck left and came back twice, so we figure the guy needed parts. When I talked with him about the cause of the problem, he said he really didn't know, but someone had suggested that a wild hog might have broken the pipe--as good a theory as any, I guess.

After lunch we went over to Dick and Carol's for a final visit. Debbie dropped Robby off on her way to pick up Christine from school, asking Carol to feed him. Carol had just the thing, a small bowl pack of Chef Boyardee ravioli, which Robby loves. He ate that and ran outside to play.

When he came back in he asked for an umbrella and proceeded to explore and explain various imaginative ways to use an umbrella and also announced that it was a nonagon. We counted the sides and the points--only eight, so I declared it an octagon. He still liked nonagon better! He said that I was nice and that Ken was nice. I asked if he was thirsty for his milk, which Carol had put in the fridge. When he said he was, I said I'd bring it to him. "See," he said. "That's how I know you're nice!" What a character!

Debbie stopped by with Christine. She said that Sam was running a bit of a temp, so Robby was going to trick or treat with a friend. She and Christine were going to stay home and hand out candy. I hugged them goodbye until next April.

This afternoon we were getting ready to head out for a walk when Carol decided to snap our picture by her front door, decorated to welcome this evening's trick or treaters. We wore our Halloween alien shirts, which we only get to wear once a year. Ken suggested that they'd be good to wear out hiking during hunting season.

Carol's neighbor down the street really goes all out with the decorating. It was hard to get photos of the lights in the dark, but I did get one shot of this ghost and cat. The guy was using a mike and scary voice to invite kids up to his door to get their candy. After I'd taken several photos, he came up to me and handed me a grape Tootsie Roll Pop, saying that next year if I wanted candy I'd have to come to the door! Just for nostalgia's sake, I ate the pop. When I was a kid, it was one of my very favorites.

The neighbors across the street had their haunted tent open for trick or treaters, and flocks of them came to go through the spooky tent. Loud spooky music emanated from it, along with flashing colored lights and the screams of kids. I went though it, just for fun. It was definitely an assault on the senses, but I got a treat at the end.

Lots of kids came to Dick and Carol's door. Many were fascinated by the revolving colored light ball she had lit on a table inside the door. It gave something like the effect of a mirror ball. We saw lots of cute little kids in costume, some babies in arms. There were also lots of older kids, and even one mother with her own treat bag.

Carol ran out of candy just in time--she was ready for bed. We said our goodbyes and headed home.

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Christie Meets CSI

That's how the program describes the adapted version of Agatha Christie's play, "The Unexpected Guest." Carol took us to the Tyler Civic Theatre Center to see it today. We've never been to this theater before. We got there quite a bit early, so it was easy to park, and we spent a very pleasant time walking around the adjacent Tyler Rose Garden. A surprising number and variety of roses are in bloom.

No flash photography was permitted during the performance, but we got this shot of the set while the audience was gathering. As you can see, it's a cozy theater in the round. Like all Christie stories, this one provides an abundance of suspects and plenty of misdirection, keeping the audience guessing until the end.

I especially enjoyed the performance of Tom Young as one of the detectives. He's a physics and astronomy teacher at a local high school, and Carol knows him from church. He plays a somewhat distracted and comical character very effectively.

At the intermission we stepped out on the balcony overlooking the Rose Garden.

Before the show, we went to Luby's Cafeteria for lunch. Most of the crowd surrounding us were dressed up in their Sunday best, having arrived after church services. We anticipated a long line, but it all moved quite smoothly, and our food was delicious.

One of Dick and Carol's neighbors was constructing an elaborate tent when we arrived today. Later on our evening walk we took pics of the "Nightmare on Eagle Street," a haunted tent.

After a light supper, we all sat down to watch "60 Minutes."

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Boo at the Zoo!

Carol and I started early and visited lots of garage sales. We had fun and found some good bargains. I got a very nice queen sheet set for $2. When Ken saw the gray and white striped sheets, he asked what convict I'd gotten them from . . . .

After lunch, Carol and Ken and I met Debbie and Robert and the kids at the zoo. As we were walking to the entrance, Chris called to offer me a Compact OED complete with magnifying glass in its little drawer....available for $5 at the Friends of the Library book sale. He and Annie were volunteering at the sale for the day. One of my prize possessions used to be a Compact OED, just like the one Chris had spotted.

Now, of course, the OED is available as an app for your phone, no magnifying glass needed, constant updates, and it weighs nothing! It just doesn't have the same physical appeal as the bound volumes with their magnifying glass. I actually still have the magnifying glass, though I donated the dictionary to the local library when we moved into our home on wheels.

Debbie was dressed as a black cat (no surprise there!), Christine as a tiger, Robby as a cat (takes after Mom), Sam as a giraffe, and Robert as ???. We saw lots of cute kids in cute costumes.

The Caldwell Zoo is a great little zoo, and it went all out to entertain the kids at Boo at the Zoo. There were lots of clever Halloween decorations, including one display of a group of flying witches, with a sign that said, "Don't text and fly!" There were game and activity tables spotted around the exhibits. Everyone got little prizes and treats.

Christine and Robby emerging from the haunted house.


Of course we saw lots of intriguing animals, like this macaw.

This young giraffe appeared to be teething on the bars!

This bird caught my eye, looking like a partygoer in formal dress.

We were lucky to find the lion awake, though the lioness was napping in the background.

The zoo's new black bears, brother and sister, were cute and playful.

Several displays closed for maintenance, so we missed the white tigers, but there was plenty else to see.

One interesting display was the Wild Bird Walkabout, populated by flocks of colorful parakeets and cockatiels. Seed sticks were available for purchase, and the parakeets would come nibble the seeds off the sticks held out to them.

After the trip to the zoo, Debbie and Robert and family went on to a "Trunk or Treat" event at their church and to visit relatives.

Dick and Carol and Ken and I went to the Ghengis Grill for dinner. They had been once before and recommended it. It's a growing chain, and it's easy to see why. Guests are invited to "build their own bowls" from a wide variety of ingredients (proteins, spices, veggies, sauces, and starches). The filled bowls are taken over to the grill for the "Master Grillers" to prepare, and the finished meals are delivered to your table.

In case the choices are too overwhelming, the restaurant has little cards printed with the ingredients lists for some "signature bowls." You could eat here often and never have the same meal. Our dinners were filling and delicious.
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Godspell!

This morning we went over to visit Carol and Dick. Carol had fixed some great salmon for lunch, and we had hugs and lots of good sharing, As usual, Carol had saved several things for me to read, including a newspaper clip of old friends from Nacogdoches, Zeno and Irene Boehmer. They were at the cathedral to receive the Herzig award, named in honor of the first bishop of the diocese.

Debbie and family came by for a visit and for a spinach lasagna supper (one of Carol's recipes that the kids all like). Robby came in saying hi to me and "Where is Ken?" Before they arrived, Carol went around Sam proofing the house, which includes turning the coffee table upside down as well as moving the omnipresent puzzle from the puzzle table to Carol's bedroom.

We visited and played Boggle (Carol, Debbie, Christine, Dick, and Ken). We had lots of fun as always.

Afterwards we went to Godspell at TJC (Tyler Junior College) with Carol and Debbie and Christine, while Robert took the boys home. I remembered seeing the show at SFA many years ago, but this version was updated and condensed, a whole different experience.

The musical was unexpectedly good. It was very entertaining, with lots of very athletic choreography, great comic acting, and updated cultural references (including an adlib "Go Rangers!). We were all quite impressed.

 Jesus and Judas stand in the front together in this scene

After the show, Ken went home, but I spent the night with Carol to go garage saling in the morning. We got to bed early. Carol always does, and I needed to get to sleep so I could get up early to go to the garage sales opening in the morning dark.
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On to Tyler

While we were eating breakfast, the Montana that we saw pulling in last night pulled out. Our departure leaves one unit in the Bright Star area, and that's the one that the people only show up at night. We took our final walk through the largely deserted park, enjoying the birds chirping and flying overhead. We saw a pair of cardinals. It's been a pleasant, relaxing stay, and we'll definitely stay again if we're in the area (like the next time we go to TEXPACC).

We were the only ones at the dump station, which was good, because we took a long time. We had a drip from one of the fittings on our Pivot-EZ sewer hose holder. Since we had to take it apart to try to fix it, we wanted to get the tank and hoses especially clean. Yukky job, and we think we probably still have a slight drip, which we'll need to tackle again. Fortunately the park we moved to in Tyler, Spring Creek, has full hookups.

Today was definitely cold. The cold front arrived on schedule. However, the predicted rain managed to miss us. We had some very brief light drizzles on the road, but no rain while breaking or setting up camp. We were glad to get set up and turn on the electric heater to warm the place up. This evening we heard a light shower on the roof, but it didn't last long.
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Cold Front

The weather forecast says there's a cold front coming in tonight, with rain tonight and tomorrow. So far we haven't seen any evidence of that. We had a warm sunny day today, and it's still 78 degrees at 7:30 p.m. But we went ahead and put things up outside, including the bikes, after we went for a bike ride.

We don't ride our bikes often enough to stay in shape, and our legs sure let us know it. There's no level ground around here, and even though the hills aren't too steep, they're too steep for our our of shape bodies!

We were beginning to think that we'd be leaving our camping area pretty much deserted when we leave in the morning, but this evening we got a new neighbor. A Montana pulled into site #13, two down from us.

Our big job for the day was Gel Glossing the front cap. We got out early enough this morning to get it done before the sun had a chance to heat it up too much. I did the upper part, balanced on the ladder set in the truck bed. Ken did the lower part. We were cleaning up and feeling pretty good about our accomplishment when I ducked under the front overhang and managed to very solidly bang the top of my head against it. Ouch!!! That left me with a headache and a sick feeling for the next few hours, and my head still aches tonight. Darn, I guess I need to wear my bike helmet when I'm working around the rig. Or just stop ducking under the overhang?

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Private Campground

Well, we know we are in a state park, but it almost seems like our private estate. There are only two other occupied campsites (besides the two host sites), and we haven't seen any other campers out and about.

We were intrigued by this interesting vehicle at one host site. It's a Vantage Truck All, made by Vantage Vehicle International, Inc., a Corona, California-based manufacturer of mini-vehicles. One advantage is that it's narrow, so it can fit in trails and such. This one is a gas vehicle, but the company also makes all-electric utility vehicles.

We're impressed by how busy the park staff is. Keeping a park looking attractive and functioning well takes a lot of maintenance work.

This afternoon we spotted a hawk. It swooped past us and perched at the top of a snag, but not long enough to get its photo taken. We did manage to take some photos of this wild plum tree along our path.

Tonight we heard a chorus of coyotes howling. Most of the wildlife we've seen here has been armadillos, deer, and butterflies.
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Busy Day

On our walk this morning we spotted lots of spider webs sparkling with dew. This one was particularly striking in its symmetry and design. This spider must have been busy last night.

We had a busy day ourselves. We spent some more time cleaning the rig. I cleaned the roof with Tide. One thing that has been a problem for us is cleaning the roof area under our solar panels. We finally realized that the panels are movable--we had them installed so that they can be tilted. So today I tilted two of the panels up to clean underneath. They are surprisingly heavy. I decided to wait until another day to tackle the other two panels.

Ken cleaned the front and rear end caps, including using Gel Gloss on part of the rear. We still have to finish doing that on the rest of the rear cap and all of the front cap, but it was getting too hot and sunny to continue today, so we'll do some more tomorrow morning.

Ken also used the Hide Bracer to clean and condition our Stressless chairs. We're planning to take very good care of them in hopes they'll continue to look good and serve us well for years to come. We also adjusted the personal tables. Ken's had slid down a bit where it is clamped on to the frame. The chairs came with a special tool to use on the bolts that hold them together. It looks like a large Allen wrench.

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More Birds

When we returned from our morning walk, Ken noticed that the migrating birds were back, only this time they were strung out sitting on the water. We walked down to the shore, which was not as easy as before. The rain last night left everything muddy, and the mud accumulated on our shoes. We braved the mud to try to get some photos of the flock. Using the highest zoom on the PowerShot SX110IS, we got some fuzzy shots, but clear enough to identify at least some of the birds.

A heron happened to be fishing along the shore as a bonus. The white birds appear to be American White Pelicans and the smaller dark birds are Double Crested Cormorants. The size of the flocks we have seen is quite amazing.

This flock was strung out for a long way. After a while, individual birds started flying towards the front of the line and then landing. Perhaps they felt safer staying with the group. More and more birds did this, looking kind of like a relay, until finally the whole flock was in flight and disappeared from sight.

We watched this morning as the groups of Indian Princesses and their dads packed up to leave. One dad I talked to said that his daughter still had plenty of energy, but he was pretty tired! By this afternoon, we were all alone on our loop again. Peace and quiet have returned and are welcome, but we enjoyed the entertainment of watching all the activity and the tribal displays of carved pumpkins. Read more!

Hiking Coyote Run Nature Trail

We decided that this would be a good day to hike the only hiking trail in the park, the Coyote Run Nature Trail. We had a flyer with a rough map of the trail. It was described as a 5 mile trail, 2 1/2 miles in and 2 1/2 miles out. We drove to the trailhead in the Heron Harbor Parking Area. The trail is wide, well marked, and for the most part, easy walking.

We didn't run into any downed trees across the trail or steep slopes, though part of the trail was a bit washed out or had roots across it, and there were some mild up and down hills. On a side trail near the halfway point is a composting toilet, similar to ones we saw at Walden Pond. The composting mechanism is in the lower part, which is the reason for the steps.

Most of the walk was through the woods, without much variation in terrain or plants, except for some deep creek beds that showed evidence of serious erosion. We didn't see any wildlife at all except for plenty of butterflies. They refused to pose, so we haven't got any photos. We did see one novel plant: a cactus, and we heard the telltale rustling in the leaves that told us an armadillo was foraging nearby.

The trail map doesn't show it, but my GPS indicated that this cross trail is actually a county road. It clearly doesn't get too much vehicular traffic!

We saw several signs with arrows pointing to "AVA," but were puzzled because we never came to anything marked AVA. Google led us to the answer to the mystery: AVA stands for American Volkssport Association. This hike is an official event for participants in the organized walking program.

We ate our picnic lunch at a table overlooking the lake. It was in what is usually the beach area.

Here's what the beach area is supposed to look like:

Here's what it actually looks like now:

Later in the day we walked over to the Deer Haven area to check out what the Y group was up to. Along the way we took photos of the various tribes' displays. Some of the pumpkin carving is quite creative. We suspect the dads were involved.

When we got to the Deer Haven area, we realized that the gathering was in the Buggy Whip area. We were too late to watch the program. Everyone was heading back to their campsites. Many of the girls were wearing their vests, and some of the dads were wearing headdresses--presumably the leaders of each tribe.

On the way home we heard this critter rustling around before we saw it. About the time I snapped this shot, the armadillo had just realized that we were nearby. It acted a bit startled and moved off, but not too far. By the time we'd walked ten more steps, it was back eating.

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We Can Tell the Weekend Is Starting

Our only neighbor in the Bright Star camping area moved out this morning, leaving us alone. But not anymore. This weekend, a YMCA Father/Child (Princesses) group from Arlington has almost the entire campground reserved. Our loop is full of tents and little girls and dads. The shrieking is mostly coming from the little girls....

We talked with a park police officer this morning who told us the group will have a haunted trail operating tomorrow evening in the Oak Grove tent camping area, and everyone in the park is welcome to attend. We'll go check it out.

Today we drove in to Sulphur Springs, a 15-mile trip from our campground. We picked up our mail at general delivery. Not much there, but we did get a postcard from Michelle Obama, with a family photo and a request for a donation. We got our new credit cards, but most of the rest wasn't worth paying to have forwarded. We haven't been able to convince the Elks not to send us their magazine. We have third class mail discarded by the Escapees mail service, but some ads and appeals are sent first class, so there's no way to avoid them.

Then we went to Scrubbies Wash to do some laundry. Finally we did our grocery shopping and headed home. When we got back, our loop was nearly full, with kids everywhere.

When we took our walk this evening, we were greeted by the smell of burgers cooking everywhere. We haven't seen many animals today, but we did hear the armadillos rustling in the leaves.

Here's one of the amazing trees we've seen in the campground. Doesn't it look like a fun tree to climb?

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Walking Along the Lake

Just after breakfast, Ken was looking out at the lake when he saw a very large number of birds all flying the same direction along the lake near the shore. Most were medium size dark colored birds, but some were larger, with white undersides. A couple of the larger ones were sitting in the water a while. We could see them pretty well through the binoculars, but they were too far away for our cameras.

We decided to take our morning walk along the lake to see if we could spot them again. On the way down to the water, our path took us through the tall weeds. Ken got a shot of this deer looking at us. We've seen several deer, and they all seem to be rather small.

We have seen lots of different kinds of butterflies. This tiny one posed for me. It was only about half an inch across.

We walked eastward through the mudflats, which are mostly dried out now. We spotted lots of tracks, including deer and raccoon (probably) and birds and one human. Pretty much the only birds we saw were killdeer running along the shore. Here's Ken checking out the stump and root structure of a tree that was previously submerged.

We did finally see more birds--lots of them. The incredibly large group of birds we had seen earlier, or another similar group, was flying along the far shore. The flock extended as far as we could see, again strung out along the shore. They just kept coming and coming. Wow!

We also saw some other birds, like these black vultures. We saw three herons feeding along the shore, and one solitary little shore bird in the water.

Sadly, we also saw another bird. It was splashing, and at first Ken thought it was bathing. Then it became clear that it was struggling to free itself. Evidently it had gotten snared by something underwater at this stump. Unfortunately it was too far from shore to reach. Ken called the park and reported it, but most likely it was doomed.

When we got back home, the GPS indicated that we walked for a bit over an hour and we were stopped (birdwatching and photographing) for just over an hour too. Ken has been congested for a couple of days, and we thought it might be allergies, but this afternoon he started feeling worse and became more congested, so he spent the rest of the day resting.


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Windy Weather

Today dawned chilly and windy as predicted, but the day was lovely, sunny with blue skies and a high around 60, so it was good weather for our walks. We walked around the Buggy Whip Equestrian Camping Area. No horses or riders were present, though we could see traces of their earlier passing. The trailhead for the equestrian trail caught our eye. It's much more decorative than most government signs, so it was probably designed by some equestrian friends of the park.

We've been seeing these round pebbly surfaced fruits on the ground but haven't been able to figure out where they were coming from. Today we spotted several trees. Evidently they are called Osage Orange or Bois D'Arc or Hedge Apple among other names. The fruits, which look like oversize tennis balls, are not edible, but squirrels love the seeds.

We have seen these large birds several times, wheeling around and gliding through the air, buoyed up by thermals over the lake. Last evening the undersides of the wings were painted orange by the setting sun. They are not colored like vultures. The closest picture we could find was of Swainson's Hawk, but they apparently are usually found farther west than this. In August to October, they migrate to South America.

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Cold Front

The cold front that moved in last night dropped the temperature quite a bit. The high today was 64 degrees, more than 20 degrees colder than yesterday. We took our "morning walk" after noon. By that time it was sunny and a pleasant 60 degrees. Looking back at the rig, we could see little white caps on the lake still, though it wasn't nearly as windy as last night.

This must be great armadillo habitat. We saw three today. They don't pay much attention to us as we walk by and photograph them, but this one looked up. They're actually kind of cute.

We walked around the park checking things out. At the Honey Creek Day Use Area, we found this fishing pier and nearby fish cleaning station. You'd have to catch weed fish, we guess, because it's nowhere near the water.

The boat ramp is closed, for obvious reasons.

We walked along the .2 mile nature trail that extends from the parking lot at the day use area. Most of what we saw was mud underfoot that stuck to our shoes. We did see some deer tracks in the mud.

In addition to the Bright Star Camping Area that we are camped in, the campground includes an equestrian loop, the Deer Haven Camping Area (30 amp service) and the Oak Grove Camping Area (walk in tent camping). Many of the tent sites are actually on the water. Only this one was occupied today.

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