Cooling it in the Hill Country

Celebrating my wife's very recent (like last Thursday) retirement, we hitched up the trailer and headed south to spend a long weekend in the hill country. Our destination of choice was Garner State Park. Which, by the way, is a great place to be on the weekend if you're looking for a campground frat party. Not so great if you want to actually sleep nights. Also, it turns out there was some sort of HD thing in the hill country (albeit not in the park). Every town, every restaurant, was swamped with literally hundreds of cruisers. The guys I talked to were all quite friendly, if a little perplexed that I was on four wheels instead of two.

Here's home for the next three nights.


This little guy was hanging around the camp. I think it's a Scarlet Tanager.


At the heart of the area is the Frio River, where all the high school kids went to party when I was growing up in San Antonio.


Check the water erosion over the rocks.


Here's a closer look.


Cruising near Ingram, we ran across this interesting fence line, where work boots go to retire.


Turns out hill country wildflowers are scarce as far SW as Garner. But we found this beautiful field of Indian paintbrush right smack in Fredericksburg.




Wild verbenas?


I found this field south of Fredericksburg.


But the best we saw was when we were on our way home. I routed us back through Fredericksburg. And when we hit 16 toward Llano, we found what we'd been looking for.


We saw stretches like this all the way from F-burg to Llano, then on to Burnet.

When my wife & I were driving west toward Vanderpool, we found ourselves behind cars, identical, and obviously traveling together. Three compact cars. Each had a serial number of some sort on the rear window. Each had a paper licence plate, but I didn't catch what kind, exactly. And each had a gigantic diamond-grilled, reinforced push bar system that set fully a foot in front of the car - something that would look more in place on a Humvee. Any ideas?

Tire testers from Ulvalde.

BTW, great shots.

I like the picture of the shoes on the fence posts coming into Curve+ville.

Sounds like a refreshing weekend.

RB

Thanks. I wondered about tire testers. But what's the purpose of a cowcatcher bumper that could push a tree over?

Deer.

mr-roboto said:

I like the picture of the shoes on the fence posts coming into Curve+ville.

Sounds like a refreshing weekend.

RB

Click to expand...

Yeah, that was fun. That boot line stretched for well over 100 yards.

There are also some pickups that test on the Leakey, Vanderpool, Utopia loop. To have come upon them several times in the twistys with no way around. Frustrating.

Desert Skies said:

Deer.

Click to expand...

yep, the grill guards are for deer. and yep, they were tire testers.

Law abiding citizen that you are, Tim, you may not have noticed that they did not exceed the posted speed limit by even one mile.

Springtime in Texas, heck yes.

They were 10 under, Gina, and didn't make it easy to pass. The Jeep is quite the speedster, though.

Desert Skies said:

Deer.

Click to expand...

Having been born and raised in Kerrville I can attest, the bumpers are for deer slaughter. I had the front end of two trucks blown out completely before I finally broke down and made one of my own with some drill stem and an arc welder.

Those boots are along the fence of Panther Creek Resort. I remember when there were only a few pair. Panther Creek Resort is up for sale in several parcels, if anyone is interested.

Beautiful flowers. We ask our kids, remember when we made you get out in traffic, then sit in a pile of fire ants, so we could get those pictures of you with the flowers? They say "no!" And we say, "exactly!"

tshelfer said:

They were 10 under, Gina, and didn't make it easy to pass. The Jeep is quite the speedster, though.

Click to expand...

Way to go!

Nice pictures Tim,we went out for a Sunday drive and found some good patches also near Burnet and M-falls.

I just discovered that my 2nd picture, the scarlet tanager, was AWOL. Don't know if it's been that way since I originally posted, but I just fixed it. Any bird experts who can confirm that's a scarlet tanager? Calling Meriden.

Tim that is a Vermilion flycatcher.

Bingo, you're right. Dang, the two look a lot alike. Thanks, Drew.

mr-roboto said:

I like the picture of the shoes on the fence posts coming into Curve+ville.

Sounds like a refreshing weekend.

RB

Click to expand...

Someone has started doing that on the Willow City Loop too
(Flowers not as good this year)

Thanks for the great pictures T. I always wanted to go to Garner SP, never have.

Montejay said:

Thanks for the great pictures T. I always wanted to go to Garner SP, never have.

Click to expand...

You're welcome. For the record, I was just informed last night that Garner is the most popular state park in Texas. You can also translate that to mean the most crowded on weekends, the one with the longest check-in line, the one that attracts the most frat party crowds who drink beer and yell all night, ad infinitum.

Beautiful area, but I won't be back unless I can go midweek when the kids are in school.

I had the same experience years ago when we were into the camping thing. Not a place to relax, at least on the weekends.

Tim, don't know if you've ever been, but probably since you were an SA guy. I highly recommend South Llano State Park if you want some relax time with a river and without the frat parties. You can cut out from Llano and head to Mason then down. Really nice set up there, relaxing, shade, plenty of wildlife, flowers and cool water. Just a suggestion.

Good suggestion. Actually, I'm from San Antonio, although I haven't lived there since 9th grade (and that was several decades ago). The main decision for Garner was that, when I tried to make reservations two months in advance, every other park in the hill country was completely booked. Had it occurred to me, I could have called Robinson Park (Llano City Park) where the Stromathons are held, and reserved a site in their RV section.

Great photos. Looks like a nice trip. Except for the frat party atmosphere. We camped Garner in early March down in the New Garner area. Thankfully, it was pretty quiet by 10:00.