Texas, San Antonio - Friday, April 26, 2019 - Walk Along the San Antonio River

One of the reasons we like this RV Park is the easy access to the San Antonio River Walk.

As you enter the River Walk, if you look through the fence you can see us.

This section of the River Walk is definitely different than the downtown section.  Areas along the sidewalk and around the picnic areas are mowed but other than that it is left in its native state.

This area is along the migratory route to Mexico for the Monarch butterflies and several species of birds who feed on the grass seeds and flowers.

Lots of nice rest areas are provided along the walk.

Not much wildlife today other than the black ducks we always see.  We heard a large splash from something as we passed a small rocky area in the river but we weren’t quick enough to see what caused it.

The stairway caught my attention.  Me: “Want to see what is up there”?  Greg: “I’ll wait for you here”.  It was only a parking lot for people who are taking canoes or kayaks down the river.

This bridge is as far as we are going today.  We get lots of inclines on this walk that we don’t get when we walk in Arizona. 

Texas, San Antonio - Monday, October 24, 2016 - Travelers World RV Park

Since we left Bonita Springs, MS about a week ago we’ve had some enjoyable travels.  We were headed west through Mississippi when we saw the exit coming up for Vicksburg and started talking about how good the fried green tomatoes were the last time we were through Vicksburg so we decided on an unscheduled stop.

We booked three days at the Ameristar Casino RV Park.

Just after we arrived this place filled up with an RV caravan, it was a good thing we got here when we did.

The first night here we took the free shuttle over to the casino and played for quite a while and felt lucky we just lost $20.

The next morning we walked down to the casino area and took some pictures of the bridge and river.  The flag flying in the breeze always brings a smile to my face.

The tug boats were out working.

Rusty’s Riverfront Grill was our destination on our last day there.  The sun wasn’t shining on the front of the building so the picture isn’t the best one.

These tomatoes are amazing!!  They are supposed to be appetizers and the last time here we split a plate and each had a shrimp po’boy sandwich.  This time we knew better – we each ordered a plate and considered it our entrée.  There is nothing at all healthy about eating these, the tomatoes are deep fried, topped with lump crab meat and a cheese sauce.  Not something you want to eat every day, but once every couple of years it’s a real treat.

From Vicksburg we decided to head south to take I-10 on west.  When we got down to I-10 which was just inside Louisiana we remembered a casino campground that was just a ways back into Mississippi on I-10 so we headed that way for the night.  We stayed one night in Bay Saint Louis, MS.  We decided we were having a real hard time getting out of Mississippi.  I'm usually so intrigued by just looking at the Mississippi I forget to take a picture, did get one decent one this time.

As we were coming into Louisiana they were burning the sugar cane fields.  This is a picture out of my side window.  We could see the smoke from the fires in several areas.  As I understand it it is illegal to burn the cane fields now but the fines are so low the farmers feel it is worth the fine to get rid of the leaves from the cane so it is easier to harvest.

We stopped at one of the few rest areas along I-10 in Louisiana to have lunch.  From where we were parked I could walk underneath I-10 for some pictures.  This is looking back east.

This is looking west.

Not too far down the road from where I was taking pictures underneath I-10 there is water under the road.  I think this stretch of road is called the bridge over the basin, most of it is through water.

I love this bridge, it looks like you are just going to drop off the other side.

I-10 through Louisiana is a really rough road, not so much from potholes, but it is made of concrete and just beats on you.

Before we made our way through Houston we decided to stop about an hour and a half away in Vidor.  Greg had picked the Boomtown USA RV Resort as our stop based upon the information he saw on the Good Sam website.  Good Sam needs to update their pictures and description.

This is a picture of the office.  This is the only picture worth taking.  Our site had full hook ups and it was off the highway (barely) that's all I can think of to say nice about it.  I-10 runs right by it and traffic runs on that road all night long at 75+ miles per hour.  We won’t be making a return trip.

Welcome to Houston.

The Houston skyline is awesome.

Tonight we are staying at Travelers World in San Antonio, TX.  The office looks pretty plain Jane but this is a really nice park.  It is right next to an extension of the River Walk that is downtown so you can go walking, jogging or bike riding along a very nice paved trail.  We are only here for one night this time (we were here for two weeks in 2013).  We decided to take the city bus into town to have dinner on the River Walk.  The bus stop is just across the street from the RV Park.  We managed to figure out where we needed to get off and found our bus to bring us back home when we were done.

The River Walk is just an amazing place.

This was our view on the patio of the Original Mexican Restaurant.

Once again we were saying “we should have split a meal”, we brought home lots of leftovers for later.

Texas, San Antonio - Monday, October 21, 2013 - Last Day in San Antonio

We didn’t do a lot over the weekend – mostly watched baseball and football.  Then there was an NCIS marathon on TV so that kept us pretty busy.  The weather was overcast and dreary so it all worked together perfectly.  I had done some cooking ahead so I didn’t even have to get off the couch to cook.

So today we hit the River Walk again to get the blood flowing.

 

We saw some of the same strange black ducks we saw in Sioux Falls (the one we thought was drowning).

Today they demonstrated a little more odd behavior.  This one stood like this for several minutes.  The best we could figure was that he was drying out his feathers.

 

 

Although the weather was still overcast, it got into the high 70’s, the humidity was just a little high but not bad for walking.

 

 

This is another one of the shelters along the trail.

There is a golf course that has ground on both sides of the river so they have a special golf cart road that runs alongside the regular road on the bridge that crosses the river.

Once again lots of turtles were out sunning.

But we spooked a couple of them.  Uh, guys?

 

When we were walking back home we spotted this haunted RV as part of someone’s Halloween decorations.

I got to thinking today about our oldest grandson Tyler.  He turned 20 last month and I forgot to make special mention of that.  He’s grown up into a great young man.  He’s a dad now and has more responsibility.  I was thinking about our last big outing – a trip to Dubuque, Iowa in November of 2008 to the big farm toy show they have out there.  What a great time.  He was fifteen at the time and I remember him telling me that “next year when he got his license he could drive down and visit me all the time”.  I remember thinking that would be nice, but I knew that once he got his license, visiting grandma would be far from the top of his list, but that was ok.  Things change with time, but those special memories never fade.  I’m proud of him.

We’ll be headed to Houston tomorrow.  We couldn’t get into the campground we had originally picked.  But, the one we are headed to is new, so I’m anxious to see what it is like.  We’ll be there a week before heading to Louisiana.

Texas, San Antonio - Friday, October 18, 2013 - River Walk

We walked on the River Walk again today.  I wish I had known that this was here when we first got to the campground.  We walked a mile today.  We really should have taken pictures of the sidewalk markers that indicated mileage because I know there are some of you who won’t believe we walked that far.  We need to bump it up, I know.  It’s rare that we have someplace with so many nice views to walk.

We walked in the opposite direction today.  The landscape wasn’t quite as manicured, but still had a lot of places to stop and sit or have a picnic.

 

There were more informational areas on this section.  At one I found out that these white birds are great egrets.

 

 

 

Now, I need to find out what this bird is, there was some bright orange under his wing when he took off.

 

 

I liked the coloring on this duck.

 

Wildflowers were also more abundant here.  I thought it was strange that there weren’t more butterflies.  We did see a lot of dragonflies in one area, but I have to tell you that the dragonflies here are pretty puny next to the ones in Kansas.  I swear the Kansas dragonflies were the size of hummingbirds or bigger!

 

 

 

More turtles were out sunning.

 

Sometimes there just aren’t enough rocks in the river.

 

One thing we didn’t take advantage of was the ability to rent a bike.  I think this is a really neat idea.  They have these stands all over downtown also so you can rent a bike and ride anywhere on the River Walk or anywhere else I guess.  You just drop it back off at a bike stand when you are done.