Texas

Wow…it has been awhile since I last did this! We have been rather busy the last couple of weeks and have not had much Internet service either. We had a great time in Texas and found a couple of towns that we really liked but before I get to that let me tell you how we found them.

We left New Mexico and headed to San Antonio on a Friday morning about 9:00am. ….670 miles later we got to San Antonio at about 10:00pm that night. What a long day! The kids were not too happy about it either. Long days do not go over very well. We went through El Paso on the way and quickly check that place off the list. We will not be living there! As we in Alaska say, “Bethel is the arm pit of Alaska”, I would say, “El Paso is the arm pit of Texas”. We did not like it although I do have to say we did not spend any time there.

The next few days we spent getting a new leveler ordered for the motor home, as one broke in New Mexico. We also took time and drove all over San Antonio looking for the perfect place to live. The first couple of days we did not find anything that jumped out at us but on day three we found a little college town by the name of San Marcos. What a cool place! There is a river the runs right through the town and the kids had a blast playing in it with all the college students. The only down fall we found were fire ants. Heidi found a hill of them and before she knew what was going on they were biting her foot and leg. At first I thought she was doing some kid of new dance but I quickly figured out that was not the case, as new dances are not usually followed by shouts of pain. It was our first run in with them but now we have learned to look where you are standing! They are viscous little bugs!

We also found that the San Antonio River Walk is something everyone should see. What a cool place. It is located in down town, right by the Alamo. There are many shops and restaurants located along the walk. So if you ever get to San Antonio make sure that you check out the river walk.

By the end of the first week we had figured out that we liked the hill country north of San Antonio but really did not like the southern part (too flat and a little more run down then the northern part). That next Friday we went to stay at my Aunt Clara's and Uncle Neil's place at Pipe Creek, north of San Antonio. The kids fell in love with their place as they have some cows that they got to feed each day. I did not know that Kevin’s alarm actually worked until we got there. He always told me he could get up in the morning if he wanted to but I did not believe him. To top that off Tristan and Calista were getting up with him. I was shocked!

Each morning at 7:00am his alarm would go off and all three kids would jump up and get ready to feed the cows. I’m telling you it was the most amazing thing too see! I now know that they can get up when they want to. They also had the chance to feed wild deer and wild turkeys at a neighbor’s house while in Pipe Creek. At that same time another neighbor had some baby goats that were only 3-5 days old, all the kids fell in love with them. We are now doomed to have many animals wherever we end up. I’m not much into lots of animals but I might not have a choice.

It was while in Pipe Creek that we found the second place that we liked. It is a small town named Boerne. That Saturday we had driven to pick up our new leveler for the motor home and were told about this town by my cousin Lavonne. It has a very old down town area that has been restored that we liked a lot. So it is on the list as a maybe. Then on Monday we drove to a town named Kerrville that we also liked a lot. It is also a small college town and farm community among other things. If I had to compare it to another town I would say it is a lot like Fairbanks but WARM!

So as you can tell we have found some places that we like. We are not sure if any will work out at this time but we do know that they have some potential and that is a start. We do know that we like the weather in the San Antonio area. It was nice the whole time that we were there. We are now getting ready to head to Orlando on Tuesday. We plan on getting there by Thursday night, March 9th.