Visiting South Carolina...

We made a visit to South Carolina to see Morgan Ali and kids. It was a good to see them and we got in a variety of activities. First there was the driving route there using our hybrid Toyoda which eats up the highway miles compared to the plodding camper tow we have been used to on many trips, there was a couple of different routes used so max sightseeing, we fished, we hiked, we grilled and ate home cooking, we watch the kid's soccer practice and sampled local restaurants.  

The grandkids are getting so big and so responsible. Nobody fell in the lake making this photo, not even Pop-Pop. 

This is an old CCC bridge built of local materials. Paris Mountain State Park is part of the Appalachian deciduous rain forest.

Me and Morgan fished Lake Hartwell which is just minutes from their house. I caught two very good sized Kentucky spotted bass and Morgan lost a couple that shook off at the boat so I count this as an almost fish dinner.  

Always a good feeling to fish with your son (or daughters) and score on an unfamiliar lake. 

One thing I see watching kids spots is that most of the time they are figuring out what to do. Sometimes watching pro sports I see guys doing the same thing. One of my specialties I have come to realize is taking a photo then cropping it up to make kid sports action look fierce. 

It was a very smooth trip and with gas prices slightly over $4 in some places along the way I was proud to be driving a Hybrid and hitting 47.9 miles per gallon. I think in the past I have achieved 51mpg but maybe I drove faster or need sparkplugs or something but the 31.2 gallon of gas used for 1831.3 miles to cross half the country and back is maybe just a little more than what the truck pulling camper uses for a beach trip. 

Traveling is great. 

  

 

A Quick Travel Blog and Then Off Again...

We have been traveling and I am writing a quick blog to answer all your questions like where did you go and who is that woman in the closed beach area and so on. 

We have traveled to Kentucky for my cousin Carolyn and husband Doug's 65 wedding anniversary. It was a great party with great testimonies from their kids (cousins I'd never met) to their love, good food, music and fun. 

Along the way we camped in addition to our stay in Kentucky, Tennessee and Arkansas. The total trip was a little over 1500 miles.  

All the parks we stayed were familiar places to us being we camped there before and in Kentucky at Lake Malone State Park we always see sister Margret and Kevin at their lake house which is right across from the state park swimming area. You can see the house and dock in the trees behind Cathy. I guess since we area back in Texas maybe Kentucky laws concerning the use of closed swimming areas no longer apply. 

We are not home long and depart for the beach shortly where the swimming areas are always open. 

This is a month for travel because with Mary off from work with the baby we have have some free time. More blogs soon. 

A Road Trip...

 We are back from an 1800 mile round trip to Danville, Ky to see the Great American Brass Band Festival. It was a fun time at the festival, we stopped to visit family and along the way stayed in nice campgrounds in Arkansas and Kentucky in our camper. I'd highly recommend Jacksonport State Park.   

There was a very good little museum in the park headquarters telling the story of the area. It's the usual thing where big rivers and steam boats make markets and other places accessible, slave labor and fertile ground produce riches for those that have them but then there are floods, war and eventually the railroad bypasses the place and makes the steamboat obsolete and judging from the population stats the area has been in steady decline. You can see it in some of the houses and yards we passed on the way in the park. There were run down properties with old boats, cars and lawn mowers abandoned in the yard. 

You see the same thing in our East Texas area or maybe in our volunteer work for Saint Vincent de Paul we see it more. When we go homes to see how the charity can best assist people it literally looks like something has blown up there from the debris scattered about. Even in my neighborhood there are places close by with this junk car/trashed out chic look and I don't think the people there are particularly poor. 

In contrast Kentucky, where visit to see family and have found a couple of music festivals to like, seems like an unusually clean and orderly place and I can't quite put my finger on why. There is lots of agriculture work which can be difficult to make a living from but I rarely saw a disorderly property and it sure looks like they like to keep the yards mowed. 

For reference I'll post this photo of "The Lawn" where spectators sat on the Center College Campus where the brass band festival was hosted. It's very well kept and much of the surrounding area is like that.

I don't know if it's the influence of people working the land, the Amish community near by or the local  Shaker Village history that contributes to this neatness but it's certainty a notable thing. Some might even use the word, "picturesque." 

Whatever it is we could use some of it around here. I don't know enough about the history of the area to be aware of any boom and bust times as seen in the Jasksonport area that have had generational impacts on recovery. Makes me wonder, not to say anything good about data centers, they seem universality opposed by the general population locally and in Kentucky but if they pass us by will it be like the decline of steamboat usefulness and the next thing you know we can't keep our yards mowed? 

The Kentucky countryside outside of Danville was dotted with these signs. I did not see any signs in favor.  

I'll keep thinking on this and welcome any comments on ideas readers may have. Upcoming blogs will run down the music and bands seen at the festival, something I know about. 

 

  

     

Over and Over...

More proof I just keep doing the same old thing over and over. 

I loaded the canoe in the truck last night just so I wouldn't get lazy today and not go fishing. When I got up this morning I checked the fishing log and sure enough this day in 2020  I had about 20 big bream from the canoe trail area at Martin Dies Jr, State Park. I had decided on an afternoon trip so I played the tuba a bit, worked out at the water aerobics class and headed out.  

Fishing was not great today but I had fun. I caught several black bass too small for keepers, a beautiful too small crappie and a handful of bream. I think that mixed catch should count for some kind of Texas Grand Slam. 

Most of the fish were caught a trout magnet. I had picked up a thrift store tackle box for $5 that had one of these kits with jig heads, corks and tails all complete. One bass, a couple of inches shy of a keeper took an earthworm under a cork. I don't think I have caught a bass on an earth worm since childhood. 

The worms I gathered from the leaf mulch piles at home were not crowd pleasers. I caught a couple of fish on them but I did better with a yellow trout magnet fished under a cork. The lake at the State Park, B.A. Steinhagen, or what we used to call "Dam B" is a shallow body of water with lots of hydrilla, water hyacinths and giant salvina. Some of the floating mats get moved around by the wind covering favorite fishing areas and with warming water the weeds reach for the surface making it hard to fish ultra light jigs. You can paddle around tossing your bait in the holes in the vegetation but a throw an inch too far that hangs up can spook a spot where you are getting bites. 

I fished four hours and stopped for a standing break on the bank once. Back at the launch a young man paddled up in a short flat bottom boat from the opposite direction I had gone and I inquired about his luck. He said he caught 15 bass fishing since 10am but claimed he almost got too hot during those hours. I handled the heat pretty well but I note not being able to sit as long in the canoe and that will shorten my paddling career more than anything.  

There is not a size restriction on bream. In Texas you catch a bucket full and fry them up whole. They say Mississippi bluesman Howlin' Wolf could eat 50 bream at a sitting. I threw these fish back after the photo op because my baby would be all mad if she did not have 50 crunchy fried bream. 

I noted the Island trail, a good short walk for the grand kids is open but the other trail going the other direction is closed for work. I also saw plenty of the smaller green herons. I might hit Ratcliff for the next canoe adventure since it's getting hotter and the swimming area there is very handy. I've done that lake plenty of times and look forward to again.   

     

 

   

 

Rainy Day Finding Fun...

 Everyone has been craving a lake day since the great success and exhilaration of last week's tube trip (I want fried catfish!) but those pesky afternoon thunderstorms while bring much needed rain are cramping our style. This made us look around for land based fun so we visited Caddo Mounds and Mission Tejas State Park. 

This was the first time we had re visited the mounds, still sacred to the Caddo People and dating back 1,500 years since the reconstruction of the new visitors center and grass hut since a big storm wrecked the area a few years ago. I mentioned to the park ranger our visit to Poverty Point Mounds in Louisiana and he said I might have been your tour guide as I retired from there. The Poverty Point Mounds are much older and he told us that the Caddo mounds were sort of accidental as they kept building and having burials in the same spots and it elevated the terrain and the Poverty Point mounds, whose purpose is lost to prehistory were made by hunter gatherers for an unknown purpose.  

The Grass hut gives you and idea of how they lived. 

Good value for seniors and kids as we spent about $8 on admission but blew that savings in the gift shop as we bought a couple of books and kid fun items. 

Next stop, Mission Tejas just down the road had a ranger program called back yard bass. We occasionally visit here for hiking, to soak up the history of the Spanish Missions in Texas and I enjoy cane poling the small creek bass in the San Pedro. The ranger program the kids took part in was well done and you would have thought they were really catching fish. 

It was pretty close as to who the best casters were, the rangers or the kids. 

There is a pond in the park but it's pretty choked with weeds and if there was a swim area to cool off I'd probably come here for camping since the sites are recently redone but it's still a nice quiet place with a deep history. 

Ok, now the hard decisions, Mexican or Cajun tonight? 

It occurred to me as added the links about our previous trips to these spots is that I kind of keep doing the same old things over and over again. Maybe it's a quest to enjoy the spirituality of these places and the knowledge of long lost times. Might be something we need to know. 

   

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The Latest Road Trip...

We are back home after 1641.3 miles and 33 hours of driving that saw us, along with Cathy's brother Matt visit Evansville, Indiana and see their sister Margret, husband Kevin and daughters Grayson, graduating from high school and Addison who had a birthday. We stayed in campgrounds in Tennessee, Indiana and Arkansas. You can check the truck dashboard photo for the full statistics.  

Here's Cathy and Matt at T.O. Fuller State Park in Tennessee. All equipment performed flawlessly. I'll probably do a run down of my campground reviews later.  

Cathy, Margret and Matt. 

Margret, Addison and Kevin celebrate Grayson's graduation from Signature School in Evansville, Indiana. She will be headed off to Georgia Tech to major in bio-medical engineering. Georgia Tech is a good place to be for that degree.  

 

In the lower right of this photo made from the balcony Grayson accepts her diploma and gets a hug from her grandfather, Bob, who is the President of the Board of Directors of the school. The 80 odd graduates on stage represent 24 million dollars worth of scholarships to top colleges around the nation. Signature is a very good high school.   

Since Georgia Tech is in Atlanta and we must drive right through there to visit Morgan, Ali and the grandkids is South Carolina we might see more of Grayson in the future.  

It was a good trip and I am sure I'll write a bit more later but in the mean time I need to get ready for the next one. 

Beachfront Camping Report...

Once, in another life, I was parked beachfront in my truck just sitting on the tail gate enjoying the sun. Three girls came walking by and said hi. I was at a loss for words but quick thinking led me to ask them if they wanted to toss a frisbee. I did not have any idea what girls wanted to do but I was giving it my best shot. One of them said, "Nah man, I could never throw one of those things," and they continued on down the beach. I've never asked a girl if they wanted throw a frisbee again. I've never even asked my wife if she would throw a frisbee. She'd probably say,  "Nah man, I could never throw one of those things."

We made of first beachfront camping trip of the summer this week at our secret spot on the Brazoria County Free Beach. If you are a regular reader here you will know it's where we camp free on the beach. No hook ups but bring water, run solar on the camper and a generator as needed. It's a sweet deal. We stayed Monday till Wednesday morning, avoiding the weekend crowd and pretty much had it to ourselves. The fish left us to ourselves as well with a rough surf and wind making conditions less than ideal for the surf. By Wednesday morning the wind had subsided, the surf lay flat and the sea weed rolling ashore had diminished and green water is expected with a couple of tide changes. 

In fact browsing the fishing reports looks like they caught them off the jetty yesterday and the surf was good this morning. I had netted a few live baits and tried lures since I did not feel the percentages were going to be high for me but I'll be ready with some shrimp for bait next time. 

Water looks pretty in this photo and even though no bites I wouldn't say I had a bad time. Some one once asked Cathy if Carl had to catch fish. She said, "I don't think so. He looks at stuff, makes pictures." I like the beach and I'm glad my wife is a beach girl. 

Water looks pretty in this reflected photo off the camper glass. 

On those windy days the fire felt good sitting on the beach at night as the air cooled when the sun went down. We never used the air conditioner but on the morning we left it was warming, the wind had dropped and made it easier for the biting horse flies to torment you. If the fish are biting I have enough repellant to make that tolerable.   

If ever on Surfside beach and you see a guy that looks like he wants to throw a Frisbee by all means, stop. 

 

 

Over a Half Million Blog Visits...

One of my biggest blog fans was my late father in Law Bill Cooney. He urged me to monetize the blog with ads so I could make money off of it. Bill was a retired school teacher and I was honored he thought the writing was that good and apparently other people think so too because this year my blog has surpassed a half million visits.   

When Bill suggested this I was all pure and everything and at the time the internet was a different place but now after 3257 posts and seeing online influencers make obscene amounts of money in a month I almost think, Why Not Me?

This blog app does offer placing ads and with the clicks of readers the traffic will pay money. My wife says don't do it, you don't need to. Maybe after I'm gone the kids will do it and the legacy money will pay my great grandchildren's college expenses. Of course I'm assuming that college as we know it will still exist and not be free. 

Maybe no one will click the ads, whatever they might be, because the online world has moved on past blogs to TicTok, Substack and other things I don't know about or even use. 

What do you think? Give me the clicks, man!  

 

 

You Don't Need a Time Machine...

 We like to tour old houses, plantations and other historical sites when on vacation. On this last trip to Charleston South Carolina we took a look at the McLeod Plantation on James Island. 

The plantation is a recognized as an important Gullah Culture site, important because the isolation of the imported people on the Sea Island region stretching from North Carolina in to Florida  kept much of their African culture intact. You can easily see this today as the traditional sweet grass baskets are still woven by hand and sold in roadside booths. I'm interested in this because my ancestors were and probably still are in North Carolina and may well have some tie to the Gullah culture which I hope to uncover some day. Hopefully that tie will not be too embarrassing. 

My grandkids Parker and Cullen with the house in the background. They are very well behaved tour takers and hopefully the will retain some of the history heard here. This house is from 1858 though the site is first recorded on maps in 1678. It's not furnished but you can look around inside. 

Barn on the property. There are many beautiful oak trees and what's left of an oak ally along the original driveway. Usually I take photos of the oak allys I visit but with a modern highway in the back ground I passed on this one.  

Can you spot the fingerprints of the brick maker? These bricks were made from the local clay, shaped by human hands and then dried and fired to harden them and you can also see prints like this at nearby Fort Sumter. They have figured that these were probably from a child and the clearness of raised fingerprint ridges may have indicated some illness.   

This big live oak is estimated to be 700 to 900 years old. 

An interesting story told by our tour guide is that in the years following the end of the civil war despite the efforts of Jim Crow to keep the people oppressed without free labor the economy of the Charleston area declined. By the 1930s it was clear tourist were going to be an important income stream. Note the bell in the tree. 

Where tours of the 1930s were given by McLeod descendants they told the story of how the bell was rang so that the slaves returned from the fields and lunched under the tree while the McLeods dined on the porch as one big family group. Nothing was farther from the truth. Growing the crops of the plantation, cotton, Indigo and rice was brutal work. Later someone climbed the tree and from an inscription on the bell it was easily dated to the 1920s. It had not been rang while enslaved people lived on the plantation. The story was just a way to advance the untruths of the mythic, noble south. As the tour guide said you won't need a time machine to still find those attitudes around Charleston today. 

These slave houses are in their original location and were built when there was an influx of French planters and the slaves that came to American at the start of the Haitian Revolution in 1791. The descendants of the McCleod slaves were still living here in 1990 when the last living McLeod passed away. They were afraid to move because they mistakenly thought that occupancy guaranteed some monetary inheritance or burial rights on the property.       

It did not. One out of four imported people came through the docks at Charleston. 90% of African Americans can trace one ancestor to Charleston. As Faulkner said, "History is never dead, it's not even past."  

 

    

 

Seven Days on the Road and We Made it Home Last Night...

This has been the season of the great spring break celebration. First we camped at Beaver's Bend with our grandchildren Warren and Coraline and the Zamora family and this week we completed a tour that included a flight to see the Tulloch family in Chicago and a flight to see the Wallace family in South Carolina. It was nice that everyone had different spring breaks because if it was all at once the grandkids would have ganged up and been busy with each other but here we were able to spend time with each family not to mention the cooler late winter climate of Chicago, the costal spring of Charleston where we met the Wallaces as well as a good dose of government shutdown TSA screening line delays in Houston.   

The Tullochs downtown in Maggie Daly Park. 

With the Wallace family in Charleston.

It was a seven day, three flight trip with lots of good eating. Since Katie and Peter live so close to Chinatown the Asian food is great. 

In Charleston the southern seafood cooking is top notch. They have a saying, "eat till you are tired and wake up hungry." I had shrimp and grits for breakfast three days in a row. 

Some people had a dip in the Atlantic Ocean.

Some people were busy babysitting a friend's big lizard. 

We all had fun and the TSA lines were much easier in Chicago and Charleston for what ever reason.  This vacation was so good I'm ready for another. We don't have a big camper trip scheduled till mid May but a campsite by the water somewhere is calling me.