The Panhandle

April 1, 2021

Our last day in Lubbock we were able to get in to the ‘Manhattan 9’ speak easy.  It is only open Thursday thru Sunday.  It is located inside of Stella’s Italian Restaurant and is named for the owner’s family as they grew up in Manhattan and there were 9 children.  This is such a fun place.  The bartenders and waitresses are dressed in flapper style dresses and the doorman (who was not in attendance this night) wears pinstriped suits and is apparently very serious about his job.  I noticed on line that there was a password to get in, ‘Monte Carlo,’ so we were prepared, even though we did not need it.  I decided, after a couple of drinks, to start asking everyone who came through the door for the password and I was surprised how many knew it!  They had a solo guitarist hired to play - they have live music every night they are open.  But this guy had a friend show up and accompany him on the trumpet.  What a treat.  This place has a whiskey flights of some very high dollar whiskey.  I almost tried that. Great music, fun staff and I highly recommend you check it out.

 

The menu hidden in old Time Magazines - It was Prohibition era stuff

 

The door you are supposed to whisper the password through and our bartender.

We got there 4 minutes after they opened, so I went in saying, “Sorry we are late!”

We wanted to include Palo Duro State Park before we left Texas.  So we found a pretty awesome RV Park in Amarillo, Texas, Big Texan RV Park.  The RV Park was once a mobile home park, so the slips are really long and they stagger adjacent slips front and back of the drive.  So you never really have anyone up in your space. They offer free limo rides to the Big Texan Steak House, home of the 72oz steak challenge. This challenge was featured on Food Network’s Man vs Food. Three young men were trying it while we were there.  Nobody finished.  Such an incredible restaurant! It is also a brewery, bonus - we get a safe ride home from the bar.

 

These guys are on a raised stage trying to eat a 72oz steak, baked potato, 

dinner salad, 3 shrimp and a dinner roll

Palo Duro Canyon is an amazing place.  Sunday, we took the CCC “Civilian Conservation Corp” Trail and the scenic loop. It was only about 3 miles and not a real challenging hike, but it has some spectacular views.  This trail is primarily above the rim looking down.  We even found some super nice air conditioned tents when we went out onto the Upper Comanche Trail. Next we did the Lighthouse Trail which was simply too crowded on Sunday to even find a parking space. That trail was a very pleasant 6 mile trek. This trail in primarily at the bottom of the canyon until the end when you scale the side of the mountain like a billy goat hanging on for dear life.  We later discovered a much easier path but by then we had already climbed up and back down and I just wasn’t gonna do it again. Dennis and I discussed which park we liked the best, Palo Duro Canyon or Big Bend.  We decided they were just too different to compare.  Both are pretty amazing.

 

 

The pictures above are from the CCC Trail

The glamming tents

I can’t believe this is the river that dug out this canyon

Beautiful rock formations along the trails

Our first sighting of the Lighthouse

We made it up that cliff!

We took a drive down to Groom, Texas to see their huge cross and statues depicting the stages of the cross.  It was only 40 minutes away and I am really glad we went. The cross stands 19 stories tall and is really pretty spectacular. Driving down I-40 in this flat terrain you can see if forever before you get to it.

  

I gotta say, I have seen more of Texas since January this year than I have in my whole life and I am a born and raised Texan.  It is amazing how many climates you go through cris-crossing this state. It truly is the Great State of Texas.

West Texas

March 11, 2021 - We started in Fort Davis and I have really heard some great things about this place, but we had a sand storm from you know where!  Every time we walked outside we had sand in our eyes and mouth.  Winds only got up to about 50 MPH and we have had worse in the RV but, without the dog gone sand.  

We tried to eat at The Drug Store - you may have seen this on the Texas Country Reporter - and it was packed, so we hit one of the many Mexican joints in the area.  The next day we hit it right and were able to eat there.  It was really worth the effort.   Highly recommend the place.  

We also found a winery, Chateau Wright, and food truck, Too Hot for TABC, on the scenic route around the Fort Davis area.  The wine was okay, but the food was fantastic and all made in this old Airstream.  Good day over all - had it not been for the wind and sand.

We took a drive to Balmoorhea when the winds died down a bit.  Rumor has it that this place has an awesome State Park with a spring fed swimming pool.  Well, it does appear to be an awesome place, but it was closed for remodeling, so I cannot say much more than what we saw from the road.  The pool is amazing and I would maybe go back if the sand would not be an issue. But you never know, right?

Next stop was the Midland Odessa area.   We stayed at the Palms of Paradise RV Park in Gardendale, which was pretty nice by West Texas standards.  The roads were a bit too narrow and the slips were as well, but they were paved and level.  So they get a thumbs up from us.

The college, UTPB - University of Texas Permian Basin, has a replica of Stonehenge here.  Since I will be going there next year, I though I would get a preview.  It is really cool, but for the wind and sand.

 

Next stop, we found a brewery, Tall City Brewing Co. It was St. Patrick’s Day after all, we had to find one.  This is one of the coolest breweries we have stopped at, and there have been a few on our travels.  They were serving the traditional green beer, but since Dennis is really more of a stout man and it is truly Irish on its own, that is what he had and it was beautiful in the glass.  I thought I would hold down the tradition of the green drink with a green glass of Chardonnay.  It was a really nice glass.  We got there early in the day, say around 3PM and by 5PM it was really getting crowded.  So we headed out to meet an old friend of mine.

 

 

We met my high school buddy, Lissa Joanis and her husband Marvin, and had dinner at the Cork and Pig - great place if you ever have a chance to go there.  I never even thought to pull out the camera for a picture though.  This place has a great outdoor seating area as well as a nice inside seating.  The food was so good that I finished off my entire 14 oz ribeye.  I was so full.

One thing I have to say about the area is that there was trash blowing everywhere.  I know that the wind is a problem here, but why do they not control their garbage. It seemed like as far as the eye can see there are grocery store bags snagged on every bush and fence post.   It was pretty upsetting.  Do you remember the old commercial with the Indian crying about trash.  I felt like that Indian.

Next stop, Lubbock area.  We grabbed a bite to eat when we landed in Lubbock - we are actually staying in Wolfforth - and we saw a sign about a Farmers Market.  We haven’t seen one of those since Nacogdoches.  So we got up early the next morning to check it out.  It was huge and amazing!  The weather was perfect for it and they even had live music.  We had about $70-75 in cash between us, so we were good.  Who could have imagined us spending every dime and then some. They had pickles, grass feed beef, a Tamale Lady, and some of the best salsa I have ever eaten in my life. Anyway, we can go to an ATM for more money, right?

 

 

Anyway, next stop Lubbock.  We had a bit less trash, but not less wind.  We did get a chance to do the Buddy Holly tour, which was really pretty fun. I did not remember that he was only married a minute (6 months to be more accurate) before his left his bride a widow.  Really sad.  His career only lasted 18 months, but he left such an impact on the industry.  We saw his glasses, his statue, his grave.  All pretty neat. 

Unexpectedly, we discovered that there was a Silent Wings Museum in Lubbock.  What does that mean, you ask? Silent wings refer to gliders.  They were instrumental in our invasion of Normandy and were used in many other operations in WWII.  How did I not know this?  No, I am not a big war buff, but it was an amazingly interesting discovery on our part.  These gliders could carry an infantry of 13 fully outfitted paratroopers and even tanks and Jeeps and the like. What??? I know!!!

See how the whole nose opens up to remove the cargo.

See how long those wings are.  

Think of them silently going behind enemy lines with equipment and soldiers ready to go.  Amazing.

Imagine this full of 13 fully outfitted paratroopers.

While in Lubbock we had 2 hail storms and a Haboob, which is a sand storm. I am not sure I want to spend much time in West Texas in the future.  Once we are able to see Palo Dura Canyon, I may be done with this area.  This grit is making me cranky.

Here comes the Haboob.

This is the second of the hail storms - it looked like it snowed.  The first one was hitting our back window and when the hail hit it turned into slush.  Dennis said it was his first slush storm ever.

We will be having the RV washed  the day before we pull out of this place and hope it stays a whole lot cleaner that it has these last couple of months.  We are praying for better weather in Palo Dura Canyon!  

Until we meet again - Happy Trails.

Big Bend and Terlingua

March 1-4, 2021 - Sanderson, Tx.

The drive from Uvalde to Sanderson was uneventful.  We arrive at the Canyons RV Park and park in our little space of gravel for the next few days.  It is directly in front of the busiest train track I have ever seen. The trains ran all night and all day long.  There are 10 Border Patrol agents living in this park right now.  They park in the RV slip next to their RVs which severely limitted our site selection.  The first spot we pulled into had 3 breakers and none were 50 amp, but we can make do with 30 in these milder temperatures.  But when Dennis opened the breaker box they had replaced a 30 amp breaker with a 20 amp.  So, of course we had to move.  When we pulled over to another spot one of the agents asked if we wanted him to move his truck.  We had another space so we told him not to worry about it, but at least he asked.  He is the one that said there were ten living there.  I felt pretty safe.  Sanderson had also gone through some freezing temperatures so their showers and laundry were not open due to plumbing issues.  They also had this cool building that looked like it was probably a lodge of some sort.  I had hoped it was a lounge for the RV park so I called the RV Park phone number and a lady said any amenities that were not unlocked were unavailable at this time.  I am not real sure she had ever seen this park, because she really had no idea what I was talking about.  This building had some doors with regular locks and some with those combination locks (all locked) and even had another building behind it that had 'The Bunk House' on it with a fire pit and same seating between the two.  Pretty cool looking place.  I got my book and sat back there one day reading and enjoying the sunshine. It was very peaceful and pleasant - well when the train wasn't coming by.

Sanderson has a large store with all of these metal yard decorations outside, so I left Dennis at home and just went to explore that and the rest of the town. Turns out that store is a huge and very well stocked hardware store.  It is quite a maze in there though.  This is a very small town.  They don't even have a grocery store.  You have to drive an hour to get groceries.  There is a sign that says Big Bend Information at the Chamber of Commerce Building, but it was closed the entire time we were there.  I looked in the windows and they had tons of information, but I couldn't get to it.  I saw a sign for a museum and thought I would go check that out, but - you guessed it - it was also closed.  So there is not much I can say about Sanderson, Texas.

 

The day we were pulling out a gentleman put a No Trespassing sign on that cool building I was telling you about.  Oops, maybe it wasn't part of the RV Park.

March 4-11, 2021 - Next stop - Big Bend

We took off for the two and a half hour trip to Terlingua.  We were about an hour away on the curvy State Highway 118 when Dennis realized he could see a kayak in his rear view mirror.  This is not normal, folks.  So we slowed down until we finally found a place we could pull over and two other cars pulled over with us.  Apparently they had been trying to flag us down, but couldn't get around us or even wave their arms out of their windows for us to see them before we were around another bend and they were out of site.  We were dragging the bicycles and Dennis' kayak for some 10-15 minutes.  The straps were all that was holding these things to the back of the RV. They said sparks were flying and they were wondering if we had caught fire.  

 

We thanked them for trying and Dennis and I got about the work of taking everything off the back. The rack had broken right at the hitch on the RV, not any where near the prior welding job we had done in Colorado.  A fellow RVing couple (Dave and Teri Mejia) pulled up to give us a hand. Come to find out they were also at Canyon RV Park in Sanderson and were heading to Big Bend Resort and Adventures in Terlingua - so were we!!!  They were very helpful and even transported one of the dismembered bicycles to our destination for us since we were unable to transport everything.  We exchanged telephone numbers and they were following behind to make sure our precarious new kayak hauling system did not fail us on the last leg of this journey.  It wasn't until we were on the road that we realized neither of us had phone service.  When we arrived at the park they had even assigned us neighboring RV slips. 

 

We took the bike apart and the maintenance guy helped us haul them and Dennis' kayak to a roll off dumpster they had in the back of the park.  I wish I had gotten a picture of the nose of his kayak.  It looked like a shark bit the end off completely.  Mine was not damaged, but we no longer had a system to carry it.  So we lost all of our toys on this journey.  It really broke my heart at first, but as the week went on, we both came to terms with it and realized we had not pulled the kayaks down for months and the last few parks we have been to were way to hilly to enjoy riding our bikes. I gave my kayak to another neighbor at the park.

So what can I say about Big Bend.  For those of you that know the area, every where you look is post card worthy! I finally had to stop myself from taking all these scenery photos.  It is the most beautiful area in Texas, in my humble opinion.  I have actually been here once before as a child - DURING THE SUMMER BREAK - we stayed about 2 hours and packed up and left.  There was no getting the RV cool in those August temperatures.  I vowed never to return.  My little brother Rex has no memory of that first trip and he loves it here so I just had to give it another try.  I am so very glad I did.

First, let me start by telling you that Teri and Dave Mejia are some of the coolest people we know.  They are mirror images of us and we had such a great time with them.  You can find their blog at Oceans-to-mountains.com to see what I mean.

So - I have thought about how to tell you about the things we did in Big Bend and I don't want to go into too much detail and make this a super long post.  Suffice it to say that we hiked many a mile in the national park, rode ATVs in the Terlingua Ranch (formerly owned by Carroll Shelby - yes, the Shelby Mustang Shelby), canoed down the Rio Grande in the state park, drove a beautiful scenic drive, had a great meal at a really cool restaurant, and hung out with some super nice people I really hope to see again soon.

Balanced Rock at the end of the Grapvine Hills Trail

2.2 mile round trip hike with 240 foot elevation gain 

(all of this gain at the end of the trail - we were rock climbing)

We went down to the water at Rio Grand Village and found some trinkets for sale and even think we found were Dennis camped with the Boy Scouts in 1991

 

The Window, with our new friends, at the end of the Chisos Basin Trailhead.  

5.6 miles round trip with an elevation of 1,489 ft. - that one had me winded.

Santa Elena Canyon trail 1.6 miles round trip and 80 ft elevation. The canyon walls rise 1500 feet above the water. The temperature dropped like crazy inside the canyon and the water was ice cold.

Mule Ears off the Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive.  3.8 Mile round trip hike with 20 foot elevation.  

We did not finish this one - the elevation listed was very deceptive. You went up and down so much it equated to only 20 feet elevation overall - accumulative would have been a million feet or so.

ATV trip with Teri and Dave to Christmas Mountain on Terlingua Ranch

Our guide, Terry

Canoeing on the Rio Grand and even had a snack in Mexico.

 

Dinner with Teri and Dave at Starlight Theater and Saloon.

They even had live music back there

I am leaving a lot out of this post, but just suffice it to say we should all spend at least one week in Big Bend.  There is something for everyone here.  Terlingua is a town where people really live rough.  It is desert and there are not many nice homesteads around and some have incorporated the ruins of the ghost town into their homes - many folks live completely off grid and even have their water trucked in.  Lajitas is 30 minutes away and they are living the good life in their beautiful adobe homes.  Everything is asthetically pleasing in that town complete with spas and golf resorts.

Big Bend, I will be back! Maybe not next year, but soon.

In the mean time, you guys start planning your trip, just make it in the Spring or Fall, never in the Summer.