Lazy Day at San Angelo State Park

Saturday Nov 7; High 77; low 53

My Molly morning jog had taken me to the buffalo and longhorn pens, but there were no animals around. But later, Ed and I took a drive to check out the campground and the "North Unit" and we arrived at the stock pens just after feeding time--

Then we drove around the various little roads in the park. We ended up taking a road that was a road no more--the pavement fizzled out and we were driving on flat patches of concrete mixed with short scrubs of grass. In our new Jeep, this wasn't a worry at all!

But that road ended at a low iron fence and we had to turn back. No off-roading for the Jeep this trip.

On our drive up to the North Camping Unit, we passed a dead animal by the side of the road. It was a little larger than a racoon and we wandered what it might be. But we went on, and found that the camping area was closed off by heavy iron gates with locks--hmmm. Turning back to return, we passed the animal again. When we got back to our own camping area, at the gate we asked the ranger about the gates. She informed us that we simply needed to use the gate code to open them.  We had the whole afternoon to kill, so we went back.

This area was set up for horse camping. It was nice, though, and had beautiful trees along a creek called the North Concho River. Interesting--the Concho River flows through San Angelo and into the Colorado River at the O. H. Ivie Lake, about 50 miles east of where we were.  So, in a single year of camping in Texas, we have camped close to the headwaters of the Colorado and at its end, where it flows into the ocean. But I don't really feel I "know" the river, like I would if I'd swam in it or canoed over it.

After our drive around, all that was left of the day was dishes and a dog walk at evening. Molly and I went down to the lake and were going to walk to the end of the boat ramp which no longer meets the water, but a bevy of kids on bicycles were out there. So we veered toward the dam and waded through the weeds to water's edge, which was a great idea!  There were all kinds of interesting animal footprints in the mud there. Wish I'd taken pictures.

We walked back up the hill with the setting sun in our eyes and a falcon watching for dinner. I never saw him move.  Kestrel:

Mammoth Moves to San Angelo State Park

Friday November 6; High 83; low 57

Friday was travel day. Our new destination was site 13 in the Red Arroyo Loop at San Angelo State Park.

Contrary to our usual habit--get up and go--we dawdled a little, taking a short farewell hike with our friends over to the campsite nearest the end of our loop, then an easy amble down to the river. I don't know why no one is camped at that site--it looks perfect. Note: if coming here again, try for sites 358, 360, or 364. The sun had started coming out of the haze as we packed up the RV, so by the time we were ready for the hike it was beautiful--but not so much as it had been the previous evening.

As we left the park and headed north, I busied myself trying to photograph the gorgeous scenery and the plum=colored (or is it coral colored?) sumac at the side of road. Here's the best I could do:

The terrain was hilly for a long time, then eventually evened out into plain old west Texas--which is great by me!  The visibility is near infinity, with layers on layers of long, far-away hills on the horizon. It's not flat like the Panhandle, of course, but it's definitely not home.

We arrived to find that our new campsite had a lake view--a very distant one. Our best guess was that the lake had never risen to expected levels or had fallen a whole lot over the years since it was built.  According to my research, the drought we'd experienced over the last few years had shrunk its acreage considerably.

The Texas parks website says:
O.C. Fisher was effectively dry in early 2015, but water levels improved in spring. TPWD has restocked the reservoir with largemouth bass, white crappie, blue catfish, channel catfish, and bluegill. Although a few large fish can be caught, most fish are small as they are only one to two years old. Contingent upon favorable water levels, fish populations will continue to improve and expand.

 

The campground was immediately made memorable--Harris' Hawks, two of them, patrolling the desert scrub! Beautiful birds!

 

 

I wrote this campsite review:
posted:
review RA013, Loop: RED ARROYO
         Fri Nov 6 (2:00) - Mon Nov 9 

Well-separated sites with peaceful views over Texas scrub landscape. There are two "camping units"--the South unit is along the shore of the drying remnants of the O.C. Fisher Reservoir; the landscape is gently rolling hills with low mesquite trees, cedar and a few scrubby oaks. Lots of prickly pear and a whole lot of evil little prickly burrs that hurt like heck and leave bristles behind when you pull them out. Harris' Hawks patrolled the hillside. Our site and the ones next to it had lake view (in the far distance).
The North Unit was along the river, with medium-sized deciduous trees providing shade and smashing fall colors. It seemed to be mostly tent sites and horse camping sites with corrals.
Our site was roomy, almost level (4" blocks under front levelers needed), and surfaced with small gravel. Covered concrete picnic table. Fire pit and barbeque grill. Only 1/2 occupied in November; quiet neighbors; very clean. Too close to city for good star viewing. Our only annoyances were the wind and the prickly burs in the mowed grass along the road, all to be expected in West Texas. Lots of well denoted walking trails and good map to them. The buffalo and the longhorn herds are in a fenced area; go during the morning feeding time if you want to see them.

I also saw a few birds: Brown Thrasher. Lots of cormorants, blackbird sp., coots, gulls. Didn't get close enough to ID the gulls, but I'll take some pictures tomorrow. Great Blue and Great Egret. Meadowlark. Strange little stripey birds eating thistle--could they have simply been house finches?   If so, all were female or immatures.

Lot of walking at Garner State Park

Thursday Nov 5
High 84; low 60

Ed and I decided to do pancakes for breakfast, which was not a great idea because the milk was still frozen. We carry along small bottles of frozen milk for pancakes, and ideally we'd get the idea the night before so we could thaw the milk out in the refrigerator. But we hadn't done that. Fifteen minutes in a pan of hot water turned enough of it into liquid to do the job, but it still took an hour for me to get breakfast on the table.

 Our friend Bob was was inspired by my bird-watching mania--he saw and took a picture of the Golden-fronted woodpeckers which inundated the campground.  Nice birds, big and gaudy and don't mind us campers a bit. 

 

 

After the very slow breakfast, we took the short drive down to the day use area with our friends. The day had started out overcast but was clearing by noon. it was gorgeous down there and not supremely crowded.

When we returned from our drive, it was not time for lunch yet, so Theresa and I took a long walk with Molly and their younger dog Rojo. We started out on the little cross-country route at the campground, hiking through low scrub oaks and mesquite. When we hit the end of that trail, another one began, so we ended up walking all the way that we'd just driven, up over the top of the scenic overlook and down the other side to the in-park cafe. On the way back we took a shortcut trail by the river, thus agreeing with my principle of never returning by the same route as the outbound one.

The trees were starting to turn and it was, of course, gorgeous. The trail was just a little bit hard to follow, but how could we possibly get lost sandwiches between a cliff, a road, and a river?  We did fine and only had to question which was the real route and which was a lazy human cut-through.

All in all, it ended up being an hour of brisk walking. We planned to tell the guys we'd stopped for lunch at the cafe, but that lie was exploded when we walked back into camp famished for lunch.

I didn't succeed in seeing any birds other than the black-crested titmouse. There were jackrabbits all over the campground, though, and huge red ants...but not a horny toad in sight. Sigh.

Desperate to see some birds at last, I took Molly for a walk at about four p.m. I stopped at our friends' camp and found T annoyed because her phone would not download the Times daily crossword puzzle. She decided to come along and see if she could get a better signal out on the road.

As we were walking by the first (actually it was the last as in highest numbered) campsite in the loop, I noticed there was a little path down to the water and the sun setting over the water was amazingly beautiful. So down we trek'ked, and it was indeed beautiful.

Then we went back up and wandered around the road a little until her puzzle downloaded. Dog walked, job done.

For supper Ed and I heated up our food and carried it over to their picnic table. He had the burrito meat I'd made at home and frozen; I had a Boca burger chopped up in a big salad with a little avocado. It was good but left me hungry later. On our next trip I either need to spend a little more time preparing easy-to-fix meals for myself, or else I need to plan more interesting canned or frozen foods to bring. Such as the sweet potato hash with spicy veggie sausage--easy, tasty and filling. Maybe I'll do that again or else bring some spicy veggie crumbles and put them in Neogiri noodles.

Seminole Canyon day trip

Wednesday, November 4

High 83/low 54

The plan for the day was a Jeep trip over to Seminole Canyon, so we pretty much just hung out at camp until time to leave. The drive took us almost due west until we were close to the Mexico border and we could see mountains--but what were they?  Were they the northern end of the Sierra Madre Oriental, in Mexico, or the southern end of the Rockies, in America? Will we ever get to go there?

No matter, it was amazing to see mountains again. Far off in the distance, just a smudge, but mountains!

Here is the Amistad Reservoir, on the US-Mexico border.  Great-looking place but there are no campgrounds with water/electric along the edges. Maybe someday we'll get up the courage to boondock.

The park at Seminole Canyon was lovely. It was very windy--flags were flapping hard and continuously. Does the wind always blow in the desert? It hadn't been blowing like that when we left in the morning.

And yes, we were very much in the desert. All the plants were desert plants--sage, ocotillo, sotol, agave, yucca, prickly pear cactus and several other low cacti hiding in the underbrush. They've built an excellent little interpretive trail with tons of interesting plants labeled. The resurrection plant was in its "dead" phase, we guessed--it looked like a dead Christmas cactus. Okay, I said tons of plants, but it was more like 25 or so. Still, I enjoyed it greatly. Lots of Black-throated Sparrows were hanging out by the headquarters. Common as heck, but another new life bird for me!

I wish I'd taken the time to get a picture, but by the time I was ready the sparrows had hidden themselves.  We didn't get to take the tour because I'd brought the dogs and leaving them unattended in the car was forbidden in State Parks. Oh, well--another time. We took the little trail instead.
 

We returned to a shrimp dinner--courtesy of dear friends Bob and Theresa. From their home near San Antonio, this park was only a couple hours drive for them, and they'd volunteered to fix supper. Grilled shrimp and vegetables, yum. The only thing keeping it from being a fine restaurant meal was a lack of crusty bread and a garlic dipping sauce. (Hmmm...would that be a fun dinner for us to fix, someday? Shrimp, crab legs, bread and sauce?)  We provided cookies for dessert and then we had a good chat by their fire.

Leaving Lake Brownwood for Garner State Park

Tuesday November 3
High 78; low 46

After a quick breakfast, it was time to pack up and move out. I'd been surprisingly lethargic and unenthusiastic about all and everything. On Monday I'd passed up hundred of opportunities to see birds, so after walking the dogs I snuck out alone and tried to take a picture of the gulls and coots in the water. I may have gotten that pied-billed grebe...I think.

Here's a killdeer's butt:

As I was idly watching the red-winged blackbird crew, I noticed a couple of different birds. Just robins, I thought--they'd hopped a little and robins are of a similar size and shape, with one difference being that robins hop while red-winged blackbirds walk. But no--these birds started to walk, too--and they were distinctively yellow underneath. Meadowlarks, of course--but western or eastern? Impossible to tell.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lake Brownwood State Park to Garner State Park (Site: 343, Live Oak loop)
Our route:
TX-279 S to US-377 South in Brownwood
US-377 S and US-190 W/U.S. Hwy 190 W
FM 1311 to US-377 South to Junction
Get on Interstate 10 Eastbound for a second
US 83 South to Garner State Park, planned 198 miles, Google time 3:17
Our actual mileage was 214.7. We had two unnecessary detours--the first one happened when I set my phone navigation to stop at the Pilot Truck Stop in Junction. For no apparent reason the phone app routed us eastbound on I-10. We had to go to the next exit, make a U-Turn, and come back to our gas station, which would have been a simple turn on the right just past the on-ramp. Then later we missed the park entrance as I describe below.

 

The drive, which took about four hours, turned out to be surprisingly tiring.We drove through some very hilly country but mostly the hills were to the left or the right and our drive was simply slow uphills and slow downhills. The road was mostly two-laned with climbing/passing lanes placed every five to ten miles. We stayed behind a truck pulling a trailer for an annoyingly long time, with no chance to pass except uphill, where Ed couldn't summon the power to speed up.

Then we were stuck behind an RV pulling a trailer (I think) for nearly forever, until we went around a courthouse to the left while he went to the right. Several wrong turns later we ended up--guess what--behind him again. But a passing lane eventually let us by.

I'm thinking that was the same guy we met again at the entrance gate. I'd thought we wanted to come in the south entrance, so we passed up the Google Maps recommendation and went on. It turned out that one was closed, so when we went back to the north one, there the guy was. He parked closer to the door than I did, but I outran him.

Later it occurred to me that if I'd been planning this trip in the old way, with paper road maps, I'd not have taken that route. Especially not the FM (Farm-to-Market) portion. I might not have chosen the shortest route, or the fastest route--for cars--but I suspect I'd have chosen the better route. I've mentioned before that the RV can't speed up and slow down as fast as a car, so going through small towns with traffic lights really does a number on our drive times.

For the conclusion of this lecture, see my trip end notes.

I'd read horror stories about check-in at Garner State Park, one of the most popular state parks in Texas. People wrote of two-hour waits in long lines of cars. That was one of the motivating factors in doing our Lake Brownwood stop instead of driving straight through--I didn't want to arrive at closing time.

But we had none of that, since it was a weekday and not peak camping season. Also it looked like Texas had spent a lot of money setting up a check-in process that reminded me of an airport ticket counter--you parked in the huge parking lot, took a number on the way in, then stood in line until one of the clerks behind the counter called you up. (Actually, when we arrived it was empty, so we breezed on through)
As expected, our camp site was in a flat clearing in a low mesquite/post oak woods with nothing special to recommend it. It was only about two-thirds full. On the way in we took a wrong turn and ended up driving the Mammoth down to the day use area. It was full of people--nice people, I'm sure, but so many! Ug.

But back at the place we belonged, we found the spaces decently spaced and not at all noisy. There were only a few kids running around, although I wouldn't have expected any at all. The campers weren't all old people, like us--there were quite a few young people. With a pandemic still raging in the U.S., a lot of people are out of work...although you wouldn't guess it to drive through McKinney at rush hour.

We were greeted by a Black-Crested Titmouse--new life bird for me! No picture, though, I was too busy helping set up.

We did take a short walk down to the water:

Zack in the Rio Frio.

Lake Brownwood Day 2

Monday, November 2

High 71; low 42
Birds seen so far: Kingfisher. Osprey. Gulls. Coots. A bevy of small ducks. Mockingbird. Little birds by water, probably Yellow-rumped warbler. Great Blue Heron. Red-winged blackbirds.

Although we got up early thanks to the time change, we didn't eat breakfast until after nine. Sunrise over the water was even more gorgeous than sunset the day before.

The only thing on the agenda for the day was a little hike up to the "Wildlife Viewing Area". 

 

 The little hike ended up being a very long hike (for Zack) because we lost the trail on the return trip. It followed the lake shore, so it was impossible to get really lost, but you couldn't see the lake most of the time due to the eight-foot-tall scrubby oaks all over. I didn't want to return by the same route we went out on, which was very rocky and difficult to carry our little old Shi-tzu dog over. So we took the right fork, went along for a while, lost the road and ended up bushwhacking down the hill on a deer trail. Deer are not notorious for being good trail makers,so we waded in knee-high grass part of the way.

 

 

 

 

It was quite an adventure for us old folk, and once I'd picked the cactus spines out of my thumb, I was enthusiastic about our journey. We found a really old CCC era camping spot out in the brush, with giant-sized chairs and a fireplace hearth:

By the way, the Wildlife Viewing Area was an old deer blind on the ground with a plastic chair next to it. But there were a couple of deer there when we arrived--I imagine that if you spent a couple of hours there at dusk, you'd see some interesting critters.

 

 

In the afternoon we took a little jaunt in the new Jeep, exploring the rest of the park. There wasn't much to look at except the outsides of the the recreation hall until I noticed on the map a reference to The Grand Staircase. 

 

It was some very massive old CCC era stone work--they'd build a boat landing on the lake with a great big staircase leading up to the recreation hall and adjoining dance pavilion. It was...well...massive.

During World War II, the park served as a rest and recreation site for soldiers stationed at nearby Camp Bowie. The camp was part of a huge encampment for the years of the war, but there's not much left of the camp--most of the land is occupied with a national guard site, businesses, football stadiums, and parks. Like the one we were in.
 

Mammoth Heads Southwest

Sunday, November 1, 2020

Home to Lake Brownwood State Park
1. Planned distance: 216 miles
2. Map time estimate: 3:21
3. Adjusted estimate:
4. Actual distance:
5. Actual time:  
6. Stops:
7. Average mph trip: unknown

Temperature: high 71, low 45

So we were off to Seminole Creek via Lake Brownwood State Park, Garner State Park and San Angelo State Park. I'd planned the Lake Brownwood Park as a stop on the way to Garner STate Park, which is supposed to be one of the busiest parks in Texas and rumored to have horrendous long lines at checking. So this Stop would make the drive the Garner only take a couple of hours, leaving plenty of time for congestion at check-in. I'd chosen to leave on a Sunday afternoon so that Ed could get in a Sunday morning at church and then have an easy afternoon drive.

None of these things happened as expected. And I failed to account for the annual arrival of "The Great Daylight Robbery" . It was going to get dark an hour earlier than we expected.

Ed had been working on the towing hookup and brakes for the Jeep all week long, and he wasn't quite finished by Saturday evening. So I went to the Whataburger alone and didn't even bother going somewhere to get edible food for myself. (I don't consider Whataburger edible) I just got myself a fish sandwich and onion rings, which weren't very good but fooled my body into thinking it was getting nutrition.

So he skipped church on Sunday morning to finish his work, and still we got a pretty late start.

Since I didn't make any notes during the drive, I have to assume it was uneventful. We arrived at about four o'clock and found the site with a little difficulty. It was one of those typical Texas state parks by a lake, with waterfront sites, little elevation change, and small oak trees all over. And by "waterfront" I mean well away from the water but with nothing between you and it except bushes and well-mown grass. It was a pleasant place to walk the dogs.

Funny thing was, when I booked the site the web page said, as usual, that the campground was near 100% capacity. And it wasn't. My only explanation for this is that due to Covid, the state parks are marking half of the sites as "Reserved" rather than simply marking them "Unavailable." Maybe they need a web site change to make sites unavailable. In some cases they put up an orange cone to block off the closed sites; in others they simply stay vacant.

So I had chosen the best site I could right next to the tent camping sites, and from Google Satellite view I couldn't tell if it was waterfront or not. I kind of thought, not. But I was totally wrong and pleasantly surprised--we had a lovely, unobstructed lake view. Plus, none of the tent sites were in use so I could walk the dogs all in and around the tent camping area without bothering a soul. (Except the Great Blue Heron who liked to hang out in the water there)

Notes from the time:
Sunset gorgeous. There had been a full moon last night, but where is it now? Light wind out of the north all day and tonight it's supposed to get down to 37 or so. Gorgeous place. Flat and boring, but clean and pretty and very, very quiet. I heard killdeer, of course, and Great Blue Herons, but another cry that sounded like a Yellowlegs and still another that I could have sworn was a loon. It's time for loons, isn't it?

We'll see what birds show up tomorrow.