Arriving in Texas

Here we are in Rockport, Texas, staying at the Lagoons RV Resort. After being at the Pastel Convention for a week, we headed south to Las Cruces where we visited COAS to leave a couple of bags of our already read used books for a couple of bags of soon to be read used books.  Had lunch at our favorite winery and then moved east to Ft Stockton for the night and then further east to Boerne where we planned to stay while day tripping over to San Antonio to stock up at Trader Joe's before heading down to the Gulf.  
Somehow, things are never what you plan.  In Ft Stockton we had one of those "end of the world" kind of thunder and lightning displays for most of the night, not over yonder, but right over our heads.  Murray and Elsie, who don't normally take any note of thunder, were buried under the covers, and I was waiting for the rv to take a direct hit from a bolt of lightning.  Since we were parked on dirt, we had to carry the quadripeds to the dog park where there was some grass.... otherwise we were looking at mud from stem to stern... on the underside of the dogs, then tracked into the rv.

The next day we checked into the Top Of The Hill in Boerne and planned for a little stroll through the town, but foiled again with a parade for some local German ancestor which lasted over 4 hours.
But... we were able to find a place to eat, PoPo's, a local family restaurant which serves, what else, family fare WITH SIDES.

 Yep, we are now in SIDE country, a sort of midwest thing.  Allan was thrilled to find fried chicken on the menu and I decided on a pork chop....  I stayed with my low carb diet with green beans and salad, Allan went whole hog with the creamed corn and baked potato with all the fixin's.   One thing that we completely forgot about Texas, is that smoking is allowed in restaurants...  and that instead of cream for the coffee... they serve creamer, ugh.    However... on the good side for Texas... they have fireflies.  

The people who owned this restaurant travel one month out of the year and collect plates.  There were over 2400 plates on the walls from all over the world.
While we were in San Antonio, we had to find a gas station to get gas for the crv..... well, in Arizona, there would be a gas station on every freeway intersection... here in Texas, there are churches on every intersection... with flashing neon billboards advertising the preacher's sermon.  These are not churches with steeples and columns and pillars... no, those are reserved for the entrances to large ranches or car dealerships... the churches here look like warehouses with parking lots that are larger than Costco's parking.  Never heard of most of the denominations either... wonder what happened to the old time religions of Catholic and Methodist?

Anyway... we are here in Rockport and have signed up to help at the local art festival next weekend... selling coke at the refreshment booth for a morning.   We also head over to the pool in the afternoon for a swim.  As you can see from the photo, it is an indoor pool... so no insects and the water is clear and cool.  Unfortunately, the park takes children in the summer, so we plan our swim accordingly.  Although we have some mosquitos in the early morning... not many and I have set up all my citronella candles to ward them off in case they get any ideas about drinking Arizona blood.  The days are humid, but not unbearably so and the temps are in the 90's.  Allan has been taking photos and I have done one experimental painting which will never see the light of day.  But will continue to persevere.