The Home Stretch

Lois and I left Alpine, Texas on Wednesday morning and drove East through some desolate areas of West Texas. The vegetation was sparse, but the rains had made it green and beautiful. We made one stop at Langtry, Texas, at the small but well-done Judge Roy Bean Visitor Center. Judge Bean was the famous hanging judge who dispensed "law west of the Pecos." More impressive than the buildings at the center was the cactus garden.

We had lunch West of Del Rio at a roadside park overlooking the Pecos River at its confluence with the Rio Grande. This was one of those unexpected sights that we've had so many of on our trip.

After driving through Uvalde (home town of Cactus Jack Garner, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and Vice President under Franklin Roosevelt), we stopped in the small town of Castroville, on the western fringe of San Antonio. We spent a pleasant evening at a city RV park listening to the reports of Tropical Storm and then Hurricane Humberto, which was predicted to hit Houston that same night. We were making plans to bypass Houston, but were surprised the next morning when we woke up and heard that Humberto had made a right turn and produced only light rain in Houston.

Thursday morning, after a stop at an Alsatian bakery in Castroville, we bypassed San Antonio and drove to Houston on U.S. Highway 90A. We had made a reservation at an RV Park just South of downtown Houston, and we trusted Niles to lead us to the spot. He did a good job in getting us there, even though he had us entering and exiting about a half dozen freeways and tollways in the process. We arrived mid-afternoon and contacted Lois' sister Barbara, who had planned to take off work when we got there. Barbara drove over to the RV park, and we had a nice visit before we all went to our friends Weir and Candy Kyle's for dinner. Barbara asked me how long I had known Weir, and I said that I really didn't know that there was a time that I didn't know him. We grew up together in Mississippi and have been close friends since the first grade if not before.

We had a marvelous visit with Weir and Candy and enjoyed a gourmet meal of cedar plank grilled salmon with all the trimmings. At the end of the evening, Barbara drove back to her condo and Weir and Candy drove Lois and me back to our motor home. What a lovely evening we had. Good friends, good food, and lots of laughter.

Friday morning, we abandoned our "no interstates" rule, and drove East out of Houston on I-10. We stayed on 10 across southern Louisiana to Baton Rouge, where we got on I-12 to I-59, where we turned to the Northeast through Hattiesburg to Meridian, MS. We had planned to stay in Hattiesburg, but decided to drive on to Meridian, since we were making good time and it would mean an earlier arrival at home on Saturday.

Saturday morning, we continued to Tuscaloosa and Birmingham on I-20/59 and then turned East toward home on I-20. We arrived at home around 2:30 and spent the rest of the afternoon unloading the motor home and unpacking. It's amazing how much gear we had packed in the motor home three months ago when we left home and how much stuff we had accumulated on the way. We were exhausted when we got unloaded and had most of the stuff put away.

Today was a busy day with church at Midway in the morning, lunch with our friends Jim and Patti, and a three hour ordeal of washing the motor home this afternoon.

I'm still thinking about how the trip has affected me. I know that it was everything that I had expected and more. I also know that it won't be long before I'm ready to go again. In a few days, however, I want to add one more post to my journal after I've processed more of the impressions.

More later