Friends in Texas

After visiting Escapees in Livingston, we wanted to visit our friend Frank Drew who lives in Waco and the new Presidential Library in Dallas.  We looked at the map and saw a Thousand Trails park that looked like it was pretty close to Waco and just a little further to Dallas.  Turned out to be double the distance it appeared (everything’s bigger in Texas!), but it still worked out great.  We always enjoy staying at a Thousand Trails park, and this one didn’t disappoint.  It’s a huge park and you’re really camping in the woods – yet they have a great hot tub and we took advantage.

 

The hot tub at Lake Whitney Thousand Trails park

Visiting Frank, was an unqualified joy!  He happened to be flying in to Dallas from a convention in Las Vegas, so we arranged to pick him up at Love Field, after our visit to the Presidential museum.  We drove him to his home in Waco.  That gave us some real quality time to catch up on the 4 years since we’ve seen him.  We spent a lot of time with Frank in our first few years on the road.  He owned Coach Connect, a company that installed Wi-Fi in RV parks.  Jim worked as customer support for the company.  The company went under, but the friendship remained.  He’s one of those friends where you pick up right where you left off even though it’s been years since you’ve talked!  We were especially happy to be able to visit now because he and his delightful wife, Beth, just had a baby girl.

Hello Claire!

Proud Daddy, happy baby

Frank and Beth are brave souls to trust their baby to be held by these two!

I don't know who is more afraid?

 

Do you blame her?

 

We were also thrilled that we got to visit with Frank Sr. at his new home in Waco.  Sorry we missed Frank’s mom, Carol – she’s visiting family in Idaho.  Next time Carol!

Presidents in Texas

We are huge fans of Presidential museums.  We have made it a point to stop at them all over the country, and have managed to visit all 12 official Presidential museums.  See this past post for a list. There are also a few presidential historic sites we’ve visited that are not part of the official system of Libraries … Teddy Roosevelt Nat’l Park in N Dakota, Lincoln museum in Illinois, Whitehouse museum in Washington, D.C.  Whenever I write a blog post about any of these, I add a label for Presidential Libraries.  Clicking on that link will show all of those posts together.

The 13th official Presidential Museum

So, when we learned that the 13th official library had just opened, and it was on our route, we had to visit the George W Bush Presidential Museum in Dallas.  This is our third Presidential museum in Texas – Lyndon Johnson in Austin, George H.W. Bush in college station and now George W in Dallas!

George W Bush Presidential Library and Museum

It was very strange to see ‘History’ displayed on events we have lived through – recently – and have our own recollections and opinions. 

A centerpiece of the Bush library was this twisted steel remnant of the World Trade Center from 9-11

I usually really like seeing history summarized.  My brain is too full as it is and can’t hold much more, so just give me the soundbites!  But, when you see the decision to invade Iraq simplified to 3 choices (1.another UN resolution, 2.Lead an invasion 3.Do nothing) you know that history isn’t that simple, there was so much more going on.  More than anything, this experience makes me question everything I’ve learned about history – the facts are always as seen thru the eyes of the presenter, and the presenter with the biggest stage wins. 

This Iraq scenario was one of the presentations in the ‘Decision Points Theatre.’ I loved the technology in the presentation, there were at least a dozen stations where the audience gets to vote on the decision, and the results are displayed on the big screen.  Then President Bush appears on the screen and explains his decision.

George W Bush tells the audience about the decision he made

In addition to a Presidential record, we have come to expect these libraries to present a slice of life in America during that president’s term.  Although it was appropriate that the terror attacks of 9/11 were portrayed as the dominant events of his term, I was disappointed that I didn’t see any presentations of the technology that emerged during this time.  Yes, we’re geeks, but I think everyone can agree that GPS, smartphones, and growing access to Internet has changed our world during these years as much or more than those terror attacks, and I think they deserve a place in the museum.

It was odd to come away from a Presidential Library visit with more negative feelings than positive.  Although it’s true that we were not fans of George W Bush, we are ardent fans of Presidential museums, it is one of our very favorite things to do on the road.  This one just felt more like a commercial for the man than a museum of his life and times.  Maybe the other ones were too and I just didn’t notice?

Lots of people had their picture taken with Bush and Bush Sr.

Escapees CARE

We are Escapees.  No, that doesn’t mean we’ve run away from the asylum!  It means we belong to the RV Club called Escapees.  Although membership is open to anyone who is interested, a large number of members are like us – those who have adopted the fulltime RV Lifestyle.

Think about this: if your fulltime home is your RV, what do you do when the time comes that you can’t manage the mobile lifestyle?  Either for temporary reasons, like some broken bones, or permanent reasons like the debilitating diseases of Alzheimer's or Parkinson's?

The Escapees club has thought about that and they established the CARE center over 20 years ago! Continued Assistance for Retired Escapees.

The CARE facility is located at the Escapees national headquarters property in Livingston Texas.  Since our route took us right by there, we decided to stay a night at the Escapee’s Rainbow’s End RV park.  As Geeks on Tour was recently endorsed by Escapees, we were especially interested in stopping by and shaking hands!

Escapees Headquarters, Livingston Texas

We also hoped to get a glimpse of the CARE facility we had heard so much about.  Our timing was good.  Both Tom Courville and Russ Johnson, who manage and promote the facility were on site and gave us a nice tour. 

Notice the RVs in the background of this next picture … that’s where the residents live, in their own RVs.  Then they can just walk across the street for 3 meals a day, nursing care, assisted showers, and activities.  The only requirement is that you be able to transfer your own weight – and you be an Escapee!

Tom explains how the CARE center works. Residents live in their RVs

This next picture shows Russ inside the CARE facility.  A very comfortable lounge area with TVs, computers, books etc.  And even a small stage area where they have frequent musical performances.  We were especially interested to hear Russ speak of his plans to promote the facility and possibly open more of them around the country.  He told us that he is using Photo Story 3 – which he is learning from Geeks on Tour videos! – to put together short promotional movies.

Russ is working hard to promote the CARE facility, and maybe open more of them around the country

Probably most of the residents here are couples where one needs fulltime care and the other is a caregiver.  With this arrangement, the one needing care can spend the day in the center while the caregiver gets a break. CARE is a licensed Adult Day Care facility.

Besides being unique in allowing you to live in your RV, it’s also unique in the price.  We know how much it costs for assisted living, since we’ve dealt with that for both of our parents, at $849/mo for one person and $424 for an additional person, CARE is a fraction of the norm!

How do they do it?!  First of all, they are a 501C3 charitable organization and accept many types of donations.  Here is their new transportation bus that they purchased with funds raised completely by donations:

Their new transportation bus, purchased with Donations to CARE

Secondly, they operate with the help of many, many volunteers.  We’ve met lots of folks over the years that tell us of their rewarding stay in Livingston while volunteering at the CARE center.  Volunteers are provided an RV site during their stay.

If you’re interested in more information for the possibility of being a future resident, volunteer or donor – you’ll find everything you want to know on their website at http://www.escapeescare.org

Bellingrath Gardens

We’ve driven by here several times and never visited the gardens.  For quite a few Google Earth Seminars we used this location as an example by using Google Earth to view photos of the gardens, and street view of the parking area to see if we could park the RV there.  We had a lot of fun showing how to visit the place with Google Earth, so we felt like we had been there and didn’t need to really go in person and pay the entrance fee!  I swear, every time we did this seminar several people in the audience chastised us – they said they visited Bellingrath Gardens and loved it … we had to go!  Another incident along our cosmic path this year is that I found an old letter from my Grandmother to my Mother … she was writing about the cross-country trip she and my grandfather made in a VW Bus in 1978.  This letter told of the wonderful time they had at ….

you guessed it!  Bellingrath Gardens!

So, this time across I-10 we HAD to stop!  Bellingrath Gardens is just a little ways off of I-10 on the west side of Mobile.

 

Apparently we missed the spectacular display of Azaleas that peaks sometime in March, but the roses were out in full force!

 

Roses at Bellingrath Gardens

Roses at Bellingrath Gardens

 

The flowers at Bellingrath Gardens.

 

The trees rivaled the flowers for most stunning

 

Smile!

Jim gets a unique perspective on the gardens

Bellingrath Gardens

 

We took advantage of their boat tour of the estuary.

Bellingrath Gardens boat tour of the estuary

Bellingrath Gardens - boat tour of the estuary

 

Bellingrath Gardens

 

We had a delicious lunch at the cafe , decided we would live without any purchases from the gift shop, and got back on the road.

The first time we’ve crossed over west of the Mississippi in quite a while.  This is the crossing at Baton Rouge, Louisianna.

Baton Rouge - crossing the Mississippi

 

The Atchafalaya stretch of I-10 is definitely one of the most interesting highways in the country.  It’s two bridges, one in each direction, that carry you over beautiful swamp, or is this called Bayou?

Atchafalaya

 

Crossing the Atchafalaya river

Floods?  Or normal high water?

Atchafalaya

 

After about 250 miles, it’s time to stop.  We found a Passport America park called Frog City – how can we resist?  Nice gravel pull-thru sites.  Good Wi-Fi and cable.  Next to a casino where we’ll go to breakfast, and right off the highway … Passport rate = $20.  Cookies included!

Today the plan is to get into Texas and stay at the Escapees home park at Livingston.

Laissez le Bons Temps Roulez!

Florida Caverns State Park

We also recorded an episode of our audio “Gabbing with the Geeks.”  To listen to it, go to Gabbing with the Geeks from Florida Caverns State Park and click the play icon on the audio file. 

When we looked at our Streets and Trips map with State Parks pushpin set showing, Florida Caverns popped out at us as a likely place to stay our second night.  We’d heard about this place long ago from our friends Diane and Andy and we’re delighted to get to visit at last.

The stretch of I-10 which goes by Talahassee is always pretty because of the lush, thick forest all around.  But in springtime it’s even more beautiful because of the flowers.

We pulled into the park about 3pm and told the lady at the gate that we planned to take the cave tour the next day.  She said, well y’know you could easily make the 4:30 tour today.  We do have 200 schoolchildren scheduled on the tours tomorrow.  Hey!  4:30 sounds good!

Even though we only had 10 people on our tour, there was a family of 5 that included twin 2-year olds that didn’t stop running and talking.  We may have been better off with the school group!  Anyway – it was still an amazing sight.

We’ve been to Carlsbad, Mammoth, and Luray caverns.  Although this one is on the small side, it rivaled them all for the beautiful formations. 

Here’s our site in the beautiful forest with singing birds.

Happiness is being able to open the window shade on the rear bedroom window!

After a quiet night, we took advantage of the nature trail in the morning.

Next, we’ll be off to another ‘Must See’ that we’ve passed by many times … Belingrath Gardens near Mobile, Alabama.