Adventurenet.net

February 10th, 2024 10:10pm Austin, Texas. Cloudy. 57° F (14° C)

Tuesday, Feb 6: I looked up Mayhaw berries for the Mayhaw jelly that I purchased in Fredericksburg, Texas.

Fascinating little fruit. Not a common one.

This reminds me of Mustang Grapes which I discovered in rural Texas about two years ago.

I was in a rural commune area and saw a vine on a fence and took a few pictures to identify the plant with a mobile app and this is how I discovered Mustang Grapes.

I hear that they’re not great on their own, but that they make a nice jelly.

Mayhaw is commonly foraged in wetland and marshland areas in the South.

I found a YouTube video where some folks were farming them, but it seems that this is not a common practice.

Wednesday Feb 7.

I want to make roleplaying game adventures again.

I’m starting to get the itch to be a game master for a group again.

I’ve purchased a new solo-RPG tool that should arrive soon.

Maybe this will scratch the itch.

On Saturday my partner Lauri will be busy most of the day with a Kung Fu event and so I am looking into State Park events to visit since I’ll have the car.

I made a list of all events within driving distance and broke down the drive time and which parks I’ve already been to and the only event that is within my range, within my time frame and also at a Texas state park that I have not yet visited is an “all ages” valentines day card crafting event.

Lauri thinks that “all ages” means all ages of children. This had not occurred to me before.

My biggest issue with finding Texas state park events is it is difficult to tell what is intended for children and what is intended for adults sometimes.

Thursday Feb 8.

A postcard for Tony where I discuss the all ages question.

Besides Tony there is also Antony.

The ant colony has died down and Antony is the sole survivor. I do not know if they live by Highlander rules, but he is the last one that remains.

He has been thriving and doing well but on this day I could not find him.

Also the tunnels are collapsing.

Is there not enough moisture?

Is it too much for a single ant to maintain?

I do not know, but I am concerned about Antony.

Later in the day I did find him.

He is doing well.

No idea where he was hiding.

Friday Feb 9. Lauri & I woke up early and went on a shopping run before work. We grabbed some groceries at the Super H-E-B and then I bought a new white ink gel pen from Michaels.

It was nice to be up and about before work.

It set the day up right.

Saturday February 10.

My adventure bag was ready to go, I topped off my water bottle, drank my prepared coffee drink and croissant and grabbed some dinner rolls to eat for lunch as we ran out the door to take Lauri to her Kung Fu meeting followed by my drive to a Texas state park.

Unbeknownst to me today was a rainy one.

I made a list of events and picked one and planed out backups and alternatives and then tossed all of that out the window and focused on finding the park with the least amount of rain.

I went West.

Forget about the all ages valentines event which is probably for kids.

I’ll head to the Lost Maples state park which is dryer than the rest right now!

About 45 minutes into the drive I pull over and check my map to see if I have anything interesting along the way.

Three hours is a long ride and it would be nice to break it up with an additional stop or two.

the Lyndon B. Johnsen State Park is along my route.

I’ll stop in there for a quick tour and get my passport stamp.

First things first, check in at the park HQ and look around the store.

Oh, hey. They have Mayhaw jelly, too.

And for a few dollars cheaper than the jar I purchased in Fredericksburg, Texas.

They did not have Mustang Grape jelly. I checked.

What they did have, and I did not expect this, is a working farm area that uses late 1800s technology to prepare food.

There is a group of volunteers that dress in period attire and make food and clothing with period appropriate machinery.

Our recent trip to Fort Vancouver National Park had a similar setup and it was absolutely amazing, so I asked a ton of questions and eventually left the HQ to make my walk to the farm.

I purchased a pathtag, a postcard and a coke and headed out.

This walk took me past their pair of longhorns named Biscuit & Gravy.

Eventually I did make it to the gate which I was warned in advance is closed, but may be entered and that the weighted gate would close itself.

The weight on a chain did, in fact, pull the gate closed behind me.

The park volunteers and workers were eating lunch and so I gave myself a small tour through the various buildings so that I would not interrupt their meal.

So. Um. The volunteer who told me the history of the houses was… “surly.”

I don’t think I was particularly annoying, I think it’s just this fellow’s personality.

I didn’t take it personally, but I did keep my questions short because I felt like I was irritating him.

Luckily another park ranger joined the conversation and helped break up the conversation.

There was one question that I brought up and I think I annoyed this guy. I asked about the windmill.

It looked to me like it was hooked up to a water pump and so I asked if it was still called a “windmill” if it wasn’t used for milling because wind turbine folks will correct you if you call a wind turbine a windmill as it’s not milling grains, it’s generating electricity with a turbine.

Surly volunteer insisted that it is still a windmill even if it is used for pumping water.

I did not challenge him, but I do feel the need to double check this.

The water system is truly amazing.

They have a small water silo above an enclosure and the windmill (let’s just roll with this term until I have an answer) pumps water from a well into the silo.

This silo feeds to other areas through pipes and hoses and with the pressure of the raised water it can be used like our tap water. No electricity.

There is an overflow pipe that will alert them when the silo is full and there is a braking mechanism to halt the spinning of the windmill blade.

The ranger was kind enough to show me how they stop and start the windmill.

From here I gave myself another self guided tour around the farming areas of the plot.

One thing that stood out to me is this fence.

As far as I can tell it’s only wood & bailing wire.

I plan to gather some dirt soon to repot some of our plants and I’m thinking about trying to make a small version of this fence in a flower pot with some jewelry wire and some sticks.

I did lift a loose piece of wood to ensure there was not hidden bolt hidden inside of the wood holding things together.

Other parts of the barn had additional metal like rivets & nails.

And a sick pulley to get stuff to the loft of the barn.

Guess what?

Chicken butt.

Please enjoy a slideshow of further images from this farm.

Time to walk back to the car.

There is another nice museum area that has thoughts of early settlers inside of mailboxes.

Oof. Hard work farming life would be quite the surprise.

Gender disparity would be a frustration.

I took a quick peek at the video they were playing in the theater and I must say that this theater is amazing.

I absolutely love the old style seats.

Aaaaand then I chatted with the volunteers and rangers in the HQ for an hour.

We discussed Meyhaw berries, Mustang grapes, RV life, the part of the park with LBJ’s airplane that is under renovations, green grape pie and more.

This is when I discovered that one part of the park store that I did not check had Mustang grape jelly for sale.

And I had brought dinner rolls with me.

And my adventure pack has travel silverware in it.

Lunch sorted.

Delicious.

So Mustang grape jelly is like regular grape jelly, but it has a deeper flavor to it.

I really love it.

It is still possible for me to make it to the park that is two hours away as originally planned, but Old Tunnel state park is only a 30 minute drive and I figure I’ll just head there and then figure out what to do next since I’ve already used up far more time in my day that I had intended.

But then I drove through a gnarly storm.

I do not have any pictures during the storm as we were all driving about 20 mph with our emergency flashers on while trying to dodge folks who pulled over to the side of the road where there wasn’t much of a shoulder.

Luckily the worst of it only lasted about 10 minutes and then it was clear sailing again.

It’s hard to take selfies at these things.

This is a bat flying by a train display with three head holes.

This park is very small.

And I couldn’t find the headquarters to stamp my state park passport book.

I do not believe there is a HQ here. I checked the maps and the website and as far as I can tell there are bat viewing areas, some picnic tables, a hiking trail and a few parking lots.

I drew a stamp in my passport book.

But I would not let this stop me from having fun.

They have a hiking trail & I will hike it!

And then I got to the stairs and I turned around and went back to my car to grab the hiking poles.

It was very steep.

I emptied out about half of the items in my adventure backpack so that I could put my water bottle into it and not carry too much weight and I hiked.

I was hoping to find the old train tunnel that had become the home for the bats, but I could not find it on the hike…

Until I got back to where I started.

There it was.

Underneath me the whole time and with my back to it when I began my hike.

I walked around the overflow parking lot a bit to see if there was maybe something on the other side of it, but no luck.

This is a very small park with very few amenities.

A hiking trail and some viewing spots for when the bats come out in the evening.

It is a nice park and the hike is fantastic, but I would suggest setting expectations if you ever want to visit this location.

To keep my spirits high I chose to eat the rest of my dinner rolls and have a little picnic.

I keep napkins in my car glove compartment, as I’m sure many people do, and so on top of the other items that I just happened to have or bring with me with no planning I had all that I needed for a quaint meal on a hill overlooking a bat cave.

Also, I thought it was weird that they kept a dumpster underneath the bathroom and then I realized it was not a dumpster filled with garbage, probably.

It is a poo container.

Another postcard written.

I took a bunch of notes on the map and in my planner as well. I drove past a few places that I want to look up to see if they’re worth checking out such as the Schaffer Bend recreational area, exotic resort zoo, a wild looking post office west of Johnson City, Texas, Rhinory, Hill Country trails & the Marble Falls visitor center.

It was time to return to pick up Lauri and the Kung Fu folks were kind enough to invite me to dinner.

It was a good day.

I never did make it to the valentine’s day card event or to Lost Maples state park, but I had a fantastic time.

Keanu of the night says “Hi.”