Exploring San Antonio

Tonight we are reporting to you from Fort Stockton, Texas.

Yesterday we took in some of the culture of San Antonio. It's a very large city, and 60% of the inhabitants are Mexican in origin, giving the place a distinctively Hispanic nature. Our first stop was Mission San Jose, one of 5 missions here. San Jose was built in the 1750's and it is remarkably well preserved, and serves as an active church today. We had to hurry our interior tour because mid-morning mass was about to begin. It is interesting how the Spanish missionaries built these places and brought the local Indians into the European way of life, even if they served as the labor to grow crops, build things, and everything else. The Indians gave up a hard life, with plenty of leisure time, for a life of even harder work and obedience to the priests, in order to have a stable supply of food.

After touring the mission we went downtown to the Riverwalk, a series of miles of lovely winding paths along the San Antonio river, lined with shops, restaurants and bars. It is a lively place, and a great way to showcase the river which is such an important part of the city. We walked for miles, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, but we decided to forgo a meal in any of the restaurants due to the high prices.

After walking til we had blisters, we went back to the Walmart and shopped for some fresh meat and veggies for dinner. Then we took Ben and went to visit Mission Conception, the second of the missions. Also an active church today, it is not quite as impressive as San Jose, but still remarkable in the way it still stands. Ben enjoyed a stroll around the grounds, then we took a drive by the Alamo, another mission and famed for the routing of the Texans by the Mexican army that took place there. We didn't stop, because there is not much left to see there, and parking is atrociously priced. We returned to the motorhome and made a fine supper of country style pork ribs, corn on the cob and baked potatoes, all accompanied by a nice Shiraz wine. It was yummy, but I ate too much! Still, it cost only about $12, far from the $60 to $80 we would have spent in a restaurant.

After our active day, we were tired out, so we loaded the van on the trailer and went to bed early. The drive went well today, even though it rained most of the way, there was little wind. The rain stopped about an hour before we arrived here this afternoon, and we enjoyed some desert sunshine and warmth for the first time in a while. We secured a parking spot in an empty lot next to the little Walmart here. The store being a small one, and the lot full of 12 or more RV's, we thought it prudent to sit out the night somewhere other than the crowded parking lot.

Tomorrow we head for Las Cruces, New Mexico, where we've stayed before. It is a hilly drive, and we'll take our time getting there. Stay tuned...

Go West, Young Folks

Well, we're not so young, but we're headed west. On Monday we went to downtown Mobile to see a historic house. It was closed due to parades, so we went to another Mardi Gras parade instead! Had a great time, collected about 50 pounds of beads and enough Moon Pies to keep us alive for months. This parade was for Joe Caine Day, to celebrate the man who revived Mardi Gras in Mobile. Notice in the picture above how Marlene is dressed in parka and toque. The temperature was 58 and the humidity high. Some people were wearing shorts and tank tops. We have truly become woosie Southerners!

After the parade we went to a local landmark restaurant, Wintzell's Oyster House, where we dined on a plate of fried green tomatoes smothered in crawfish sauce, followed by the house fried fish plate. What you can see me devouring in the picture above is a platter of fried oysters, shrimps, fish, crab claws, stuffed crab, coleslaw, hush puppies, and sweet potato fries. And that's a local amber beer you see in my glass. As you can also see from the picture, things were already a blurr!

On Tuesday we took one last trip over the HIGH bridge to Dauphin Island and the beach. Hadn't seen this many people here before. Check the pictures of the bridge and the beach scene.

On Wednesday we said a somewhat sad goodbye to our RV park in Mobile. This was a nice, relaxing and fun month. We filled up with propane, said our goodbyes, and hit the road for the 60 mile drive to Biloxi, Mississippi. We wanted to see how the place had recovered from hurricane Katrina, so we pulled into the truck parking at the IP Casino, set up our rig, and caught the casino hopper bus to the Beau Rivage hotel and casino, where we had stayed some years ago. The hotels have been rebuilt to their former glory, and the main roads have been rebuilt too, but the residential areas show the signs of the storm in the empty lots everywhere.

At the Beau Rivage we found that the Wednesday lunch buffet was half price for seniors, and we qualify being over 50 years old. Not sure we like being seniors, but we did enjoy our lunch! Marlene took Ben for a walk around the area of our rig, and he led her to a tiny cemetery in the middle of the residential area. This was the oldest Jewish cemetery in Biloxi, started in 1855. There was only one visible grave marker, but if we looked closely we could see the remains of several others. Check out the pics above. After a night interrupted by the sounds of multiple trains passing on the nearby tracks we packed up and headed west.

We arrived in Lake Charles, Louisiana after fighting 40 mph cross winds all the way, and found our way to the Walmart SuperCenter. We snagged a good spot and settled in. Unfortunately this Walmart is close to the Interstate highway and the noise annoyed us all night. We also were rocked by howling winds all night. Friday morning we woke to extreme wind warnings on the TV, so we decided to stay put for the day. The Walmart was too noisy for another night, but with some online research we found that we could overnight in the parking lot at L'Auberge Casino. This is a really nice casino on the waterfront, but has very high prices in the restaurants and the blackjack tables have a minimum bets of $25. No playing for me here!

By this morning the wind had died down to only 10 mph, and we hit the road after taking advantage of the casino's free RV dump station. We battled rough roads across 1/3 of Texas as we passed through Houston, and such places as La Grange (the ZZ Top song of the same name being a favourite of ours). We arrived at a Walmart in San Antonio around 4 pm, and set up for the night. We hope to stay here a couple of nights so we can explore the sights here. Stay tuned....

Sightseeing around Mobile

Hi everyone! In the past 10 days we've seen more of the Mobile sights. We toured the USS Alabama, a de-commisioned WWII battleship. It was a really cool self guided 3 hour tour. Amazing what those sailors accomplished with such primitive technology. Included in the tour was a second tour of the USS Drum, a submarine from the same period, as well as a static display of war planes. My favorite was the SR71 Blackhawk spy plane. This huge black bird cruised at 2200 miles an hour at 70,000 feet while taking pictures of the old USSR and China.

Another interesting tour we took was of Fort Gaines, a civil war fort on Dauphin Island. This well preserved place was one of two forts defending Mobile Bay during the civil war. The Union navy attacked the fort in the war, in an attempt to close the bay to Confederate shipping. This battle of Mobile Bay was where Union Admiral Farregut is supposed to have uttered those immortal words: "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead" after one of his ships sunk following a hit from a Confederate torpedo. One of the saddest exhibits was the series of handwritten letters between a 19 year old soldier and his family, and a later letter from his commanding officer informing the family of his death in battle.

Notice in the pictures above a shot of me sitting in the latrine. At high tide each day the water would rush under the latrine and wash it out to the bay. We've also included pictures of various parts of the fort, as well as some of the recovered pieces of sunken Union ships. Marlene can be seen standing in front of the ovens in the fort bakery.

We've also visited the big flea market in Mobile, which we found to be a lot better than the last one we went to in Florida. After the flea market we had lunch at a highly rated little restaurant called the Jerusalem Cafe. We enjoyed lentil soup, lamb and beef gyros with rice, and the required Alabama sweet tea. Total cost: $17.34.

We had a dinner out at the Golden Corral buffet. We've been to one of these in Arizona, and they are a remarkable value. Just $10 gets you a huge selection of food including fish, shrimp, steaks, pork chops, ribs, pot roast, salads, pastas, and on and on. Only problem: now we're more mature we just can't eat as much as we used to!

For Valentine's day we cooked up some delicious rib eye steaks and a couple of lobster tails, accompanied by rice, portabella mushrooms and a salad. For desert Marlene baked a triple chocolate cake (see pic). It was a great meal, and a nice way to celebrate the day together.

Yesterday we took Ben for a walk on the south side of Dauphin Island, below the fort. The wind was whipping pretty good, and the bay was all grey whitecaps, so after a walk there we moved on to the Audubon Bird Sanctuary. We didn't see a single bird, but we did have a nice stroll through the sanctuary to the small lake in the middle. After the bird sanctuary we went to visit the Shell Mound Park, where in the 12th to 15 centuries the local native inhabitants would come to live seasonally, cooking up oysters and fishing in the bay. We thought we'd see the actual mounds, but they've been covered up by dirt and growth over the centuries. Check the picture of me and Ben standing below a great old tree festooned with Spanish moss.

Check out the tall thin houses we saw on Dauphin Island. Maybe intended for tall, skinny people?

The Mardi Gras season is building to its finale on Fat Tuesday, and we hope to take in a Mardi Gras party before we leave here next Wednesday.

Mardi Gras Time

We've had a nice time the past week, despite the rainy weather we've been experiencing. We did go to the beach, and had nice time there, even though it was breezy, we got some sun. It was good being able to take Ben with us. We enjoyed a picnic lunch, while marveling at how close ashore the oil rigs working the Gulf are. (See pic above).

Monday we went into Mobile to the Cummins Onan distributor to pick up parts for the generator. The rain just poured, reducing visibility to a few feet. We saw the results of two traffic accidents. The rain continued overnight and into the next day.

We've explored the area a bit more this past week, seeing a really nice park on the ocean, and a fishing town called Bayou La Batre, where the inspiration for Forest Gump's partner, Bubba the shrimper came from.

On Friday Marlene made a wonderful stuffed roast chicken dinner with all the trimmin's. The five pound bird only cost us $3.38 complete with giblets!

February 21 is Mardi Gras here, as always on Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday. For the whole month leading up to the day, the many "parading societies" put on their big parades, usually on Fridays and Saturdays. We went to the afternoon parade on Saturday, in downtown Mobile. It was great fun... here the participants on the floats throw strings of beads, candies, stuffed toys and best of all Moon Pies (much like little Wagon Wheels to us Canadians). We caught our fair share (several pounds) of loot. After the parade we drove back to Theodore, where we ate a nice lunch of BBQ at a famous local eatery, Dick Russell's BBQ. We tried the the sampler plate which had nice portions of beef, pork, baby back ribs and local sausage, all smoked over their own pit. Accompanying the meat were coleslaw and BBQ beans, as well as homemade sweet tea. Total cost: $25. It was very good, and a different kind of BBQ from St. Louis.

Last night Marlene created a concoction of veggies, cream, and fresh caught gulf shrimp. It was fantastic.

Driving around the Mobile area we have noticed a glaring difference between Alabama and Florida: in Alabama there is plenty of open access to the water, and it is not all built up and commercialized. Alabama is really in its natural, unspoiled state, and we like it a lot. We enjoy the wide diversity of housing here, everything from antebellum mansions to tar paper shacks. Near the water the houses are built on stilts to protect them in the storms and hurricanes. It's easy to see why this area is popular as the "Redneck Riviera".

We're not the only snowbirds here right now. As you can see in the pics above, a couple of Canada geese have dropped in to visit the local resident white goose. They hang out together and honk at the ducks.

Stay tuned for more, y'all.

Life in the South

Our trusty old Dodge van was running a bit rough, and getting reduced gas mileage, so it was time for a tune-up. Picked up some spark plugs, and decided to devote an afternoon to improving its performance. Cleaning out the throttle body was a simple task, but replacing the spark plugs turned out to be a real chore. I'd like to meet the auto engineers who decided it is OK to mount the motor so close to the firewall that you can't see the rear spark plugs from on top or underneath. You have to work by feel, and that is hard when you have to contort your arms to fit in the small space available. And who's idea was it to mount the alternator over top of one of the rear plugs? AAARRRGGGHHH! Oh well, after leaving a pound of flesh on the sharp underhood parts, the job was done, and the van runs nicely now.

On Wednesday we found a great little produce market with lots of fresh veggies and fruit at reasonable prices. Got a HUGE bunch of collard greens for just $1.99 (check the picture to see how much we got). This was a far cry from the tiny bunches available in the stores in Florida for the same price. We've also found that here we CAN buy fish fresh off the boats. Looking forward to that. We took a drive south to Dauphin Island, where we checked out the lovely beach. It's a pleasure to see a nice place that has not been over commercialized. We also like the fact that Ben can go to Alabama beaches.

On Thursday we woke to pouring rain and high winds, and the TV news was telling us every 3 minutes that we were under a tornado watch. As the intensity of the storms picked up the watch was changed to a warning, and the sirens started blaring in nearby Theodore, AL. With no basement or other safe place to retreat to in an RV, we mixed a drink and watched the storm roar through. Luckily no tornado! We cooked up the collards, freezing half for the future and serving the other half with large hamburger steaks that I had to cook indoors due to the inclement weather. Marlene also baked a couple of loaves of nice fresh bread.

Friday we went out looking for spark plugs for our generator. It too needs a bit of a tune-up. No luck with the parts, but we met some really nice people in the parts stores who have directed us to the local Cummins Onan dealer for the parts. We then picked up some nice big Gulf shrimps and some flounder too from the wife of a local fisherman. For Friday night Shabbat dinner we enjoyed 1/3 of the shrimp (marinated and then cooked quickly on the grill) along with rice and beans and a mix of tomatoes onions and green peppers, and a cucumber salad. All accompanied by Marlene's great bread and a nice bottle of Spanish wine (a splurge at $3.97 for the bottle).

Yesterday we went out for lunch to Mary's Place, the oldest operating restaurant in Alabama. It's a fish shack not far from where we are staying. We enjoyed the fresh catfish and oysters, fried quickly and served with fantastic home made fries and cole slaw. We also enjoyed some of their famous home made sweet iced tea. A real bargain for $23, and the interesting artifacts throughout the restaurant made it really cool.

Local Mardi Gras celebrations are now starting. We hope to go into Mobile to experience some of the parades and food. There are also parades by various groups at the weekend on Dauphin Island.

We are liking it here in Alabama. Although the temperatures are a few degrees cooler, the scenery is fantastic and the people are REALLY friendly. You must leave extra time to accomplish things here, because everyone likes to yak... asked about spark plugs in one place and got a 15 minute explanation of the area in Mobile that we should stay away from (Pritchard, as Miss Ruth at RV Parts Warehouse told me, is full of thugs, and after 1 pm they all get up and go out "thugging").

When I asked the manager in the RV park office why there was a mysterious $5 charge on our bill, I got pulled into a wonderful discussion about the crooks at the Yankee banks! I really like these people!

Marlene said good morning to one of the residents here, and got into a ten minute discussion about the geese coming into the duck pond and terrorizing the ducks. At least, that's what Marlene thinks they were discussing... sometimes its hard to tell with the heavy accents around here! They might just as easily been discussing presidential politics!

Anyway, today we're taking it easy, and hope to go to the beach tomorrow. Bye for now Y'all!

Sweet Home Alabama

We left Bradenton on Saturday, and drove north to Ocala, where we visited the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing. Now, any of you reading this with an interest in drag racing will appreciate this: the museum contains 50 years of drag racing history. A huge collection of not only Don Garlits' cars, but those of other famous racers. These were the people I looked up to as a boy of 13. Check it out at www.garlits.com .

After touring the museum, plus the added extra of Garlit's personal car collection, too huge to fit in the building, we headed up the road about 40 miles to Gainesville, where we stayed in a nice spot at the Walmart Supercenter. I made pasta with a 4 cheese oyster and clam sauce. Yummy. A surprisingly quiet night passed, and we left for our next port of call in De Funiak Springs, Florida. Another nice spot in a pretty good Walmart.

We could smell Chinese food cooking, and Marlene found a little take out place in the strip center next door. After a while the smells drove us a little crazy, and we called an ordered some food. Ten minutes later I watched the chefs put our food directly from the woks into the containers which I rushed back to the rig to eat. We had curried chicken, beef and chinese vegetables, house special lo mein, steamed rice, spring rolls, and a freebie they threw in: deep fried won ton stuffed with lobster and cream cheese, and of course, fortune cookies. There was enough food for three meals, and that is what we'll do with it! Oh yes, only $23 including tax.

This morning we left De Funiak listening to the tornado news on the radio, as we battled fierce crosswinds on our way to Mobile, Alabama. At one point it rained so hard even the semi-trailers were slowing down to 30 mph. Wipers couldn't keep up!! We soldiered on, and eventually cleared the storm and got to our campground in Theodore, part of metro Mobile. On arrival there was no one in the office. A phone call brought a friendly but un-helpful fellow who pointed out a spot to us... right next to a trailer filled with barking dogs. We got out to inspect our site, and found mounds of dog doo everywhere. Marlene was quite perturbed, so we got the van off the trailer and drove 1/2 a mile down the road to another park. Much better, with a nice duck pond and our pick of beautiful sites. It cost us an extra $50, and no cable or swimming pool, but who cares, we're happy.

Pictures above are from the car museum, and our chinese feast.