Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Heading North

We spent a few weeks in San Antonio visiting with John & Erica and taking care of some doctor’s visits.  Rod did a sleep study to take care of his apnea but after calling the doctor every single day for a week and not getting anywhere we decided to leave.  He called every day to try and get the results to see if he had to go  back to be fitted for a CPAP machine.  The office never called back so he would call again the next day.  He finally told them we were leaving and they could send their report and we’d take care of it when we get to Salt Lake City.  What a joke.

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A few weeks ago we went to the Poteet Strawberry Festival.  I know I said I’d never go to another festival but, come on, it’s STRAWBERRIES!!!  I LOVE strawberries!  Erica had to work but knowing how much she loves them too we decided to wait until she got off and then meet her and John there since it was south of San Antonio and  a lot closer to their house.  It seemed like we were ALL starving when we got there so the first thing we had to do was find some food!

Rod was very happy with his smoked turkey leg “binky”

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John got Beef on a Stick (I had it too and it was YUMMY)

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After everybody was finished with “dinner” we decided we needed to get strawberry something, anything!  Erica settled on a strawberry margarita

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And then a strawberry ice cream cone

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John, Rod and I HAD to get some strawberry shortcake

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It was a great night and I’m glad we went.  The next time we go I think we’ll forgo the $10 entry fee and just go to all the vendors who were selling stuff outside the gates.  There was way more food choices there and that’s really the only reason we went.  LOL.

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We left San Antonio on a rainy Saturday morning.  We were hoping the rain would hold off until later in the afternoon but we woke up to the pitter patter on the roof.  Oh well.  Some people don’t like to travel on the weekends but we kinda like it.  Traffic is a lot lighter and the road construction sites are shut down.

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When we finally got out of the rain we got to see all the wildflowers growing on the side of the highway.  Texas is the only state that we’ve traveled through where the wildflowers are so abundant.  They are so pretty.  I wanted some of the bluebonnets (Texas state flower) but was told it’s illegal to pick them so I’ll just have to admire them in pictures.

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We ended up in Abilene for the night.  Nothing exciting there and we moved on in the morning.

Next stop was Lubbock.  Again, nothing exciting and we moved on again in the morning.   LOL

We weren’t sure where we were going after leaving Lubbock but my friend Dortha asked if we’d ever been to Palo Duro Canyon.  We had never been there before and she told us it was called the Grand Canyon of Texas.  Hmmm, sounded interesting so we decided that’s where we were going.  I called to see if we needed a reservation and was told there were plenty of sites available.  Mark had warned us that we wanted a site in the upper loop because there are a few roads that you have to cross in the lower loops that have water over them.  Well, we know that it’s been raining in the area for awhile so we found a spot in the upper one.

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We absolutely LOVE this place.  This is definitely a place that we will return to.  The road getting in is quite steep (hello, it’s a canyon!) but we made it just fine.  See the white dots in the middle on the left?  That’s our RV park.

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The canyon is gorgeous!

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Some of the roads had water over them but it wasn’t too bad.  I’m glad we didn’t bring the RV down to this part though

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Lots of wild turkeys around

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I just LOVE our site here

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Since we had driven through the entire park yesterday and it was still too cold to do any hiking we decided to go into Amarillo for lunch/dinner.  We’ve driven through Amarillo many, many times and never have stopped at The Big Texan.  It’s a steak house that’s  famous for it’s FREE 72 ounce steak!!  Now, it’s only free if you can eat it all plus all the sides which include a salad, a baked potato, 3 fried shrimp, and a roll.  AND you have to do it in one hour.  We weren’t going to try for the free steak but we’re always up for a good smaller steak.

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So that catches you up on where we are and where we’ve been.  We plan on leaving here tomorrow for who knows where.  LOL, we might even stay for another day.  As I’m writing this there was a tornado that touched down just west of Amarillo and another one just west of Canyon.  We are to the southeast of Amarillo and directly east of Canyon.  Hmmmm, could be an interesting night.  Stay tuned to Facebook and I’ll update there if I can.

4 comments:

Tumbleweed Dee said...

I'm so glad you guys are ok. Thanks for the post it's on our list of places to go.

Mark and Dortha said...

Great Blog. The Strawberry Festivals is one my favorites. I could just taste that shortcake!

I am glad you enjoyed the canyon, but sorry you had to endure that West Texas weather.

Travel safe and KEEP UP THE BLOG!!

Hugs to you both.

Speedy said...

Sherri and I were at the canyon years ago and loved it. Jason our oldest son got sick and we had to leave before we got to explore the park. We will be going back some day. Love your journal and look forward to your next entry.

Debbie Goode said...

Hey! I remember that steak place. We ate there...I think it was last April. We were stuck in an rv park waiting on repairs...that place actually sent a Limo over for us (to and from the steak house, free of charge) We really enjoyed that evening! Stay safe!!