Spring Branch / San Antonio, TX

Monday, Oct. 8th – Thursday, Oct. 11th

Monday morning we said our goodbyes to Andy & Linda. Linda had suggested we take State Highway 281 South all the way down to Guadalupe River State Park in Spring Branch. Turned out to be a great scenic ride through Texas Hill Country with not too much traffic. We passed by elaborate gates leading to ranches, small towns, and cattle grazing. I was texting Meigs & Paul with updates re: our arrival time. They are the dearest of friends and were our neighbors for over 30 years. M&P have been Winter Texans and park hosts at GRSP for over a decade. They met us at the gate. Paul helped us navigate through the Park’s narrow entry gate. We all got out of vehicles and gave hugs. Then M&P brought us down to our site…. a full hook-up, which is a rarity in the park, and they wouldn’t let us pay for it… plus Paul gave us a Texas Parks Pass. They are too generous! They left us to back-in to our site. Then the plan was for us to all head off for lunch, then head over to Kissing Tree and see their new home under construction, and for Gary & I to hang-out in their rec center while they attended a presentation on the exciting topic of Trash, or more specifically Recycling. A rather important topic since they are moving into their new home in a few short weeks. 

In the world of best laid plans…. we back-in to our site, which we did pretty easily except Gary wanted to be “over” more so we had to then pull up and back again to move the rig over, but we managed. We’re getting better at this back-in thing. Then Gary starts to unhitch us and….. drum roll please…. the left front landing gear is stuck and won’t go down. Just shoot me. He messes with that for a bit, and it won’t budge. I call M&P and let them know there’s going to be a delay. They zip down in their car. Paul gets out to help Gary, and I hang out in the car chatting with Meigs. Just then, of course, it starts to pour. Not a problem for Meigsy and me but a bit of a problem for the boys who are out in the elements. Gary ends up using manual bottle jacks to get Miss Bessy (5th wheel) off the truck. After all that happy hurrah and Gary changes clothes and wipes himself down from the rain, we head off for lunch (Schlotzsky’s… great sandwiches and great bread… thank you guys) then on to Kissing Tree to see M&P’s beautiful new home. The entrance to Kissing Tree is rather grand. Gary says “I feel like I’m entering Disney World” but tastefully done with lots of stone, greenery and large archways. Their home is absolutely gorgeous! Spacious rooms, warm colors on the floor and walls, a master bath to die for, and a kitchen that’s a cook’s dream. The house isn’t quite done yet, but will be in a matter of weeks. 

While M&P attended their Recycling talk, we hung out in The Mix, which is the community’s beautiful rec center/entertainment area. They had wifi and we had brought the laptop and other devices so that Gary could do some research and figure out what’s wrong (again!) with the landing gear. We called Chad, our repair guy from Illinois, who thought it might be the controller. He suggested trying a few things, which matched up with what Gary was thinking. When M&P were finished, they gave us a driving tour of Kissing Tree. KT is unique in that the homes all look quite different from one another… no cookie cutter look here. After the tour, we drove back to GRSP making a few stops along the way so Gary could pick up the supplies that he needed to attempt repairs in the morning. We said goodnight to M&P since it had been a long day. 

Tuesday Gary headed outside to attempt to do a few repairs to the landing gear/control panel. Turns out it wasn’t the control panel after all. Since the campground does not have a good cell signal, we stopped at M&P’s to tell them where we were going then headed off to get a good signal and call LCI, maker of this wonderful landing gear. After being on hold listening to boring music for 15 minutes, I said to Gary “is there another option?” He then found two “Authorized Dealers” about 35 minutes away on Canyon Lake so we headed in that direction. Pretty ride… at least that was one good thing. We get to the marine repair place that was one of the Authorized Dealers and make our way through the garage to the other side where boats are being worked on. The owner was super nice and tested out the jack and it was in fact going up and down. Something it wouldn’t do for Gary. The hypothesis being that somehow the jack lying in the back of the truck had gotten jostled enough that it shook something loose. That’s about as good a reason as anything else. We head back to the campground and Gary is able to re-install the jack. Plus we ordered a $2.50 bolt that we needed to crank the jack manually if we got stuck again. But, we had to order the bolt online (because nobody had it locally) and get it shipped overnight so the cost was $60. Paul said “all we need is the $1,000 wrench and it’ll be like we’re gov’t contractors.” We’re functioning for the most part. By now it’s later in the afternoon. We head off for dinner with M&P to a wonderful restaurant called BJ’s Restaurant & Brewhouse. Great atmosphere, great food and fabulous company. We had a leisurely dinner, and once again, Paul stopped so Gary could pick up a few additional supplies to do a repair. Then we said our goodnights. 

Wednesday Gary realized he wasn’t able to get everything he needed the night before so headed off to Home Depot before breakfast to pick up the final supplies. He came back, made repairs which included installing a secondary set of switches for the “new” landing gear we got installed in Illinois, bypassing the existing system. Now we have two controls… one manual control for the front landing gear, and one automatic control for the back landing gear.  With this hodge podge system, the middle landing gear doesn’t work. Not the end of the world but it means that we have a little more movement when the trailer is parked. This landing gear has been giving us trouble from the get-go. Gary is fed up. But we are at least back to functioning again. Now he wants to have the whole mess taken out and have a hydraulic system put in! A discussion for another day. By now, it’s close to noon and time to head off with M&P and do something fun. 

We stop for ice cream for lunch. The lunch of champions. Then make our way to Johnson City/Fredericksburg, home of Wildseed Farms, the nation’s largest working wildflower farm with over 200 acres. Amazing place! There’s a beautiful store to purchase seeds, clothing and gift items. Meigs was a great instigator and I bought a cool top with her encouragement. Then we meandered along the walking trail. Beautiful flowers in bloom with a backdrop of vineyards.  

After that we headed off to visit the LBJ State Park & Historic Site, home of LBJ’s Ranch. We stopped at the Visitor’s Center first and were directed to drive to the LBJ Ranch. We got back in the car and after driving about 15 minutes finally reached “the ranch.” You wind your way through ranch lands, past LBJ’s reconstructed boyhood home, and the cemetery where he and his wife are buried and finally land at the ranch. It’s huge. The National Park Service maintains more than 1,500 acres as a working ranch, including a herd of cattle descended from Johnson’s original Hereford breed.  

During Johnson’s administration, the LBJ Ranch was known as the “Texas White House” because the President spent approx. 20% of his time in office there, which was more time than any other previous President had spent away from the White House. There is a 250+ year old Live Oak tree in the yard of the Texas White House. Under the branches of that magnificent tree was a popular spot for the President to hold meetings with his cabinet staff. 

While you can’t go inside the home because it’s structurally unsound, you can tour the exterior and outlying buildings including the garage where some of their cars are housed including the golf cart he used to ride guests around the ranch. Plus there’s a vehicle that was both land/water worthy… apparently he had great fun scaring his guests by launching into a lake with them on board and forgetting to mention that they wouldn’t drown. 🙂  There’s also the communications area that housed the Secret Service. Ladybird has the distinction of being the longest Secret Service protected First Lady in history until her death in 2007.  

One cool thing the Johnson’s did was incorporate “Friendship Stones” into their paths and walkways. They had more than 300 visitors etch their name and date of their visit into 12” blocks of wet concrete and used those as pavers. We saw signed stones from Eddy Arnold, John Kennedy, John Glenn, Billy Graham, and Jerry Ford to name a few. 

There’s also a smaller plane at the property that served as Air Force One Half, which shuttled LBJ home to his ranch. 

To round out the day we headed to Chuy’s for dinner. Great Tex-mex restaurant with a funky cool vibe! We’ve heard M&P talking about Chuy’s for years!  It was fun to be able to finally see it for ourselves!

After that we headed back to the campground and said goodnight. It was a beautiful night so Gary & I sat outside and enjoyed music and a campfire. We have a propane campfire so it lights with the push of a button. The stars were so beautiful that we killed the campfire and just stared up at the stars until we had our fill. 

Thursday morning began with Paul taking us for a tour around GRSP which included seeing the interpretive center, Rust House (historic home), and enjoying an awesome walking trail to see the Guadalupe River up close and personal. Just beautiful!!  Really, really enjoyed that!  Then we all headed off to San Antonio and to see River Walk. Gary and I have been there years ago, so I was excited to see it again and see how it’s grown and changed. River Walk is a 15 mile network of walkways along the banks of the San Antonio River. It’s one story beneath street level. It’s just so unique! I can’t think of anything else like it!  It winds and loops under bridges. You can access restaurants, shopping, the San Antonio Museum of Art, hotels, even the Alamo and five Spanish Colonial Missions!  We headed to Rivercenter… the shopping area. We had lunch looking out over the River Walk, did a little shopping and then took a boat tour. A perfect day which all too quickly came to an end! We so enjoyed our time here visiting M&P. It was very special. It’s hard to believe that they will soon be Texas homeowners. We still miss them in Nottingham. We’ll look forward to coming back again and seeing their new home once they’re all settled in it.  

Tomorrow we move on to the Gulf Coast of TX and visiting still more family. We’re feeling very blessed.