The Shed & Camp Journey's End, March 21, 2009

Next door to our RV Park (Camp Journey's End) is The Shed, an amazing collection of junk that serves the most incredible Bar-B-Que! When a student at Ole Miss, the owner of The Shed began collecting junk from dumpsters and other places where he could find junk. Spent years collecting the stuff and used it years later to build The Shed. Inside The Shed is an amazing collection of any kind of junk you can think of, with the ceilings plastered with thousands of $1 bills. Last night there was more than a 1000 people there for dinner and blues music. Today there were hundreds of motocycles there. Here's some photos of The Shed and our RV park.

Back in Bayou Country, March 20, 2009

Thursday evening we arrived at Camp Journey's End in Ocean Springs, MS (actually we are in Gautier.) Today, we drove over to Moss Point and visited our former homeplace located just a few yards from the bayou. First, photos of the boarded up home, Mom's studio, my dad's workshop, the beautiful lawn and the dark waters of the bayou. (Remember, Katrina hit their home in full fury!).
Then we visited the place where I was reared, a block from the bayou home. Here's the huge live oak I climbed as a child, where I constructed a tree house and where I hid when I was in trouble.
Dad's store, which he sold when he retired, became a gym, but I found it closed. It's main street windows were ones I had to clean from time to time. Sad, huh?
Here's the Escatawpa River on which we fished and raced boats.
We visited our son Lance's grave in Griffin Cemetery.
Here's what Honey thought of the whole day!

Lafayette, LA

Yesterday, St. Paddy's Day, we spent a lot of time at the RV Center, getting the new rear jacks installed, getting the truck and RV inspected (state law) and getting a tire repaired.

Today, Wednesday, we pulled Molly II to Lafayette, LA, where we are parked now at Bayou Wilderness RV Park in Cajun country. Moss again, ahhh.


Tomorrow we drive to Ocean Springs where we will stay in an RV park there through the weekend while we visit friends and family in Moss Point, visit the family cemetery and old haunts.

Then Monday it's on to Jackson.

Today Will Be Better...Hopefully!

Yesterday we woke to a steady, dreary rain, and a second flat tire in two days! I inflated the tire as best I could, then we pulled Texas Molly II to Livingston, TX where our official home address is (though it's not a physical address, but an Escapees RV Park). It took us 45 miles to find an air pump. At one attemmpt I backed up a slight gravel hill and broke both rear jacks...dang! When we finally got to Livingston, we could not get Molly II into a site -- all too small. We moved to a pull-through site and all was fine...EXCEPT I could not get the hitch to release the 5th wheel trailer! Dang again! So, rain, broken jacks, flat tire and a uncooperating hitch! So our day went. This morning, after reading suggestions on the RV forum site re stuck hitches, I was able to get the hitch to release and free the truck. Tomorrow we take Molly II to a local RV service center (RV hospital) to get two new rear hitches and get her inspected per TX law, and get the tire fixed. Oh, the hard life of a full-time RVer! But as Rusty reminded me months ago, "Every day for you, preach, is Saturday." So it is.

It's been nine months since we were at this Escapees park in Livingston. It felt like we were coming home when we pulled into the park.

Wednesday we head east to Mississippi.

LATER...6 pm same day:

It's been a gorgeous day...right not at 6 pm it's 93, clear and mild.

Rain & River Crossing Golf club

We woke today to a steady, badly needed rain (first in TX in months!) The rain prevented a day of golf at River Crossing Golf Club, ranked the second finest course in Texas. In spite of rain and wind (felt like 35 degrees!), we drove around the course a bit and I took a couple pics.
My friend Floyd and son Brian at lunch at River Crossing. Brian is the Director of Development for the corporation's many sub-division developments.

Cookouts, Worship, Sightseeing, March 7-10, 09

Last Friday our great niece, Carolyne Wood, from Dallas, visited and stayed with us in Texas Molly II until Sunday afternoon. We had a great time with her. That Friday evening we prepared 'low country boil' for our friends Rubye and Floyd. Then, Saturday evening we went with them to their son and daughter-in-law's home (Brian and Trisha)for a wonderful cookout (brisket & fixings). Sunday we worshiped with our friends at Spring Branch Baptist Church, a new, small congregation with about 50 in worship. Our worship experience proved again that the Holy Spirit doesn't pay attention to denominational labels. Their pastor, Rick, is bi-vocational, meaning he has a fulltime 'other' job and works without pay for SBBC. I admired the passion he exercised in his delivery and sermon content. It was a really good worship experience.

Monday was a day of chores for all of us, but today we headed out, first to Fredericksburg, then to Luckenbach. Fredericksburg is a beautiful old Texas city that has been wonderfully preserved. It is the home of Admiral Nimitz who commanded the 7th Fleet during WWII, the largest fleet ever assembled. Here is a photo of his home:
More Fredericksburg photos:

Luckenbach is a town (very, very small town!) made famous by Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings in their song "Luckenback, Texas", written by Hondo Crouch, the founder of the tiny village of Luckenbach. Here are some photos:

Our friend Floyd before P.O.
In the post office was a line on the floor. When you entered and did not cross the line you were in the post office. When you stepped over the line you were in the bar.See line below.
Here's the bar and a few more Luckenbach photos:

Alpine to Spring Branch, TX

In Alpine we attended worship with Donna and Manning at their UMC Church. Helen and Donna drove into Alpine and took some photos of cacti. Flat tire in Segovia, TX, just south of Junction where we stayed Monday night. Arrived in Spring Branch, TX, RV Resort yesterday about 2 pm to be with our friends, Rubye & Floyd. Photos follow:






Got to go to Walmart today (25 miles away) for supplies, RV parts, etc.
This is a great RV park we're in now for the next week or 10 days before we go to Livingston, TX, to register our vehicles as good Texas residents. Here's our site in this Spring Branch, TX, resort. Floyd and Rubye's motor coach seen in photo.