Author: Roger Engdahl and Susan Green

Alamo Springs is about 25 miles south of Fredericksburg as the car goes. Crows have a much straighter path. It is mostly narrow twisty state and county roads that lead towards the Old Tunnel State Park which is right next to the Alamo Springs Ranch wherein lies the Alamo Springs Cafe.

Old Tunnel State Park is an abandoned (1942) railroad tunnel of the Fredericksburg and Northern Railway. It was made into a state park in 2012. Most of the visitors to the park are bats who come and go each evening.

The Alamo Springs Cafe is famous for hamburgers and onion rings. Those seem to be Texas favorites along with chicken fried steak.

An unassuming spot. But a popular destination.

Big burgers of almost any variety.

And onion rings.

And the “See If You Can Eat It All” burger. It is probably close to four pounds of ground beef.

Rudy and Carolyn drove up from San Antonio to join us the first time we went.

Chuck and Jeanie from Midland TX joined us the second time.

As did Max and Mary from Houston. All Foretravel owners who stopped in at Fredericksburg.

Free advice on the wall.

So my advice is when you are in the area, find the Alamo Springs Cafe and have lunch. Good!

More later,

Roger and Susan

We left Jim Hogg and headed for Fredericksburg, TX. We had reservations at the Fredericksburg RV Park which is just a few blocks from downtown. Fredericksburg is sort of at the western end of the Hill Country and is in the heart of the German community in TX. Lots of Germans came to this part of Texas looking for land and a new life. That heritage is evident on place names, restaurants and just about everything else.

When we got there Mike and Jackie, Bill Blackmon, Dave Cobb and Ted and Karen were already there. They are all Foretravelers. And Norm and Shirl too, who sold their FT to Dave C. They bought a fifth wheel that they live in for the winter in the RV park and store it nearby for the summer when they go home to Colorado. Everyone was on different schedules but we managed to do something with someone nearly every day.

We went to Opa’s Smoked meats to get some German Sausage and treats. We ate at Nury’s, Wheelers, Whataburger, Cranky Franks, Porky’s Hamburgers and Onion Rings, the Airport Diner and a couple other spots in town. Sort of an eclectic mix, mostly for lunch and all pretty good. Maybe not all German food but we did have our fair share of German potato salad, red cabbage, Dusseldorf Sausage and other good stuff.

• Admiral Chester Nimitz was born in Fredericksburg from sturdy old German folks.
• The National Museum of the Pacific War is located in Fredericksburg.
• The Enchanted Rock is nearby.
• The LBJ Ranch is a short drive to the east.
• There was an Olive Ranch to visit.
• The Alamo Springs Ranch and Cafe were not too far away.
• The Camp Verde General Store was also on the list of places to see.
• And we drove by the Wild Seed Farm and had to go back. They said it is the largest wild flower seed farm in the country.
• And shopping.

My cowgirl!

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The RV park is well laid out with lots of trees.

We walked or rode bikes around the campground almost every day. 1-3/4 mile around once. I tried to walk the whole thing twice most days. I got up to four times one day on my bike. That is about 7 miles. There weren’t any designated bike paths in town so we didn’t get out much on the streets. Bill Blackmon is a bike rider too and he got a bike route map that both of us agreed was not what we wanted to do. Mostly along back highways with little or no shoulders just didn’t seem the way to go.

The campground had a very nice laundry and rec room building. We got together there several evening to play Uno or Quiddler (card games) or just to share a desert and conversation.

Dave, Norm, Shirl and Mike.

Mike and Jackie and Susan.

Jackie figured it out after just one hand. Get rid of the high point cards.

Ted (in the hat) played one evening too. The practice round went on for more than two hours and he Uno’d out first.

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There were lots of different camping things in the park.

A 13 ft Casita trailer. Quite compact.

A 1947 trailer with a 1953 plate. This one had a door on both sides. Very nice.

Made by the Spartan Aircraft Company.

And lots of interesting tags.

On the back of an Airstream.

And quiet places to sit in the evening.

Complete with fish, alligators, a water feature and ducks.

OK, this is long enough. But the story is not over.

More later,

Roger and Susan

Our plans for a quiet Easter didn’t stand up to the great plans made by Amanda and Douglas. Their friends Melisa and her husband Mike came in their camper. Melisa’s sister Alice came with her husband Colt and their daughter Caroline and Colt’s mother Cheryl. And more friends Chate and Michelle came with their young son Arya. And there were several dogs too. Alice is nearly due pregnant and Melisa announced that she too was pregnant. A baby boom!

We had Korean barbecue on Saturday night and a pot luck lunch on Sunday.

Amanda was determined to get pictures. She worked hard to wrangle the herd.

Even with two cameras it was a challenge.

But finally they were together.

Here are the visitors. Colt, Alice, Caroline, Cheryl, Mike, Mellisa, Arya, Michelle and Chate. Mellisa and Alice are sisters.

Colt brought a very serious fishing boat so a few of them got up at dawn on Sunday to go fishing. They were back about noon in time for lunch. They caught and released fish so no fresh fish of the day for us.

There were colored eggs filled with confetti. They were colored empty egg shells with a hole in the bottom. Confetti was inside and the hole sealed up with a paper mache like cover of the same color. When the kids broke the eggs confetti flew all over. Pretty neat. The eggs came in a regular egg carton from a local store.

It didn’t take long before everyone was pooped. The dog stood guard over Alice and Caroline and baby to be.

It was nice to meet some of Amanda and Douglas’s friends and share the day with them.

Update: Alice had her baby, a boy, Baby Jackson.

A room full of well wishers including Grandma.

Uncle (almost) Douglas and Auntie (almost) Amanda were pretty pleased.

More later,

Roger and Susan

We took a little day trip to Marble Falls, TX one day with Douglas and Amanda to have lunch at the Bluebonnet Cafe. Marble Falls is about 45 minutes south of Jim Hogg COE. The Bluebonnet Cafe has been there for a long time. There are lots of Bluebonnets (the Texas State Flower) everywhere. I bought some seeds to bring home and plant in Hastings. They are supposed to grow there. We will see.

The menu required serious consideration, maybe prayer.

And then choices.

There was pie too.

We ate too much.

Pretty good lunch and then some driving around down by the river. Lots of ducks and geese, a few boats. We checked out an RV park that we will not stay at.

And then back to Georgetown for s’mores and card games.

Good friends.

More later,

Roger and Susan

As time has it there was a birthday while we were on the road. Roger’s.

A good friend hoped we would never have this kind of surprise. Me too.

And of course there was some Texas humor. Susan has to remind me to zip up my pants every couple of days or so. I guess these wishes weren’t too far from the mark.

And of course there was cake. A two layer carrot cake with plenty of cream cheese frosting as it should be. Our friends Amanda and Douglas were also at Georgetown while we were there. We went to Chili’s for lunch and had cake that evening while we played a game of Uno.

We started out playing to 250 points but had two hands in a row where we had to go through the deck three or more times so as soon as someone got to 200 we called it a game. Lots of fun as always. We played some very competitive games of Quiddler as well.

So that event is past. I am heading for 70 now. Our average age is just a few weeks shy of 70. We are grateful for each other, our health, our families, our friends and all of the opportunities that come our way.

More later,

Roger and Susan

I have to admit that we both like Fixer Upper on HGTV. Chip and Joanna Gaines started this show five or six years ago in the seemingly sleepy town of Waco TX. You could buy houses and property cheap and with an “all in” budget of way more than that they would transform what often seemed like dumps into a palace any of us would love.

Waco is far enough north in TX to get ice storms in the winter and even some snow and several months in the summer where 100° days are pretty common. Four months have average high temps over 90°. There have been as many as 44 days in a year over 100°. So March was a pretty good time to visit, it was warm and windy and dusty and only an hour and twenty minute drive from our campground.

First stop the Visitor’s Center where we learned Waco is bigger than we thought and it is the home of Baylor University. Probably a lot more too but we were on a magnolia mission. There was all of the ordinary Texas memorabilia and a wooden cutout of Chip and Joanna. It might have been shiplap, I forgot to look. We were surprised that if this was life sized then they were much shorter than we expected.

Right next door was the Texas Ranger Museum.

Lots of guns and hats and guns and saddles and guns and other stuff. The Texas Rangers are still in operation as a state police force.

Back to ChipLap. Fixer Upper is all about Magnolia. They had a construction and realty business before TV and a development named Magnolia as we have heard.

Their presence in town is around the Silos.

A bit rustier than we were expecting, but there always has to be room for something to fix up.

There was a gigantic building next to it that was the heart of the commercialized Fixer Upper world.

30,000 visitors a day at this time of the year. And they all went in this building to look at the stuff for sale. A lot of stuff for sale.

There was a big open area with artificial grass and things for the kiddos to do, food trucks to get something to eat, a seed and garden store where you could buy more stuff (even seeds) and a stage area where every once in a while there must have been some entertainment.

Joanna’s cupcake shop was off to the right with a very long line at 11 AM and just as long a line at 3. We didn’t stand in line.

There was a very nice Fixer Uppered 53 Willys Station Wagon.

This was in very good restored condition.

We ate at a local place, we were trying to find Chip’s new breakfast place that was just about to open but couldn’t.

And then back to Georgetown the back roads way. It was a nice drive along a hilly county road mostly. Much more enjoyable than the interstate.

It was fun to visit, probably about what we expected. We thought there might be more about the TV show and some of the projects but in order to protect privacy there is no list or addresses of any of the homes they did. There were no maps showing all of the sites. Probably just as well or some of these older neighborhoods would have had a steady parade of cars driving down their street every day.

More later,

Roger and Susan

We drove across the northern part of the Texas Hill country from Onalaska (a small town) to Georgetown (a bigger town). We went around the top of Georgetown to Lake Georgetown which is behind a dam on the North Fork of the San Gabriel River just north and west of Georgetown. It is an Army Corps of Engineers dam. As is often the case there are campgrounds (3) and boat launch ramps on the lake. It is a much smaller lake than Lake Livingston and looking at the shoreline the water level is down quite a bit from normal.

We stayed at the Jim Hogg campground which is up on a short bluff above the lake. There were paths down to the lake. Across the lake was the Cedar Breaks campground and further up the lake was the tents only Russell Park campground. We drove over to the Cedar Breaks CG and it had some nice waterfront sites. It appeared to have more trees around the campsites which we thought would be OK especially since it is on side of the lake where most of the wind comes from. And there was a lot of wind.

Even though it was cloudy on several days it really only rained once . Most days were sunny, windy and comfortable. Depending on the wind direction some days were low humidity and some high. Big swings.

Evenings were very nice.

A coolant leak!

When we got to Jim Hogg we noticed some coolant leaking. After we backed in I stuck a bucket under the point where it was leaking. After a while when things cooled off I crawled under and could see a bit of coolant leaking from a short 2-1/2″ diameter hose. When I started poking at it coolant would spray out. There definitely was a soft spot in the hose but no hole. Pretty obvious on the onside.

I called Coach-Net which is a help provider for RV owners. I told them what was going on and they offered to have the coach transported to Austin for repairs. I said I just needed someone to come to where we were and replace the rubber hose (which we got at a local O’Reillys Auto Parts store in Georgetown) and fill it up with the appropriate coolant.

They sent out a fellow from Austin (an hour and a half away) the next morning. He brought 4 gallons of coolant even though I told him on the phone before he came that it could take up to 16 gallons. He got the old hose off and the new hose on without any difficulty – he did get quite dirty though. And then put in four gallons of coolant. Not enough. So off he went to get more. 6 gallons. All of that went in and we were still not up to the top of the coolant tank. I had one gallon so we poured almost all of that in and it got to the top. We started up the engine and let it idle for a while. There was a small drip so we shut it off and he adjusted a hose clamp, wiped everything clean and I started up again. We let it idle for about 20 minutes, no more leaks. He was there for almost 4 hrs including his trip to the store to get more coolant. He charged me $160 for the coolant and 1-1/2 hrs of labor at $75 per. Coach-Net pays for the travel time and service call charges. A very good plan for us. After a short drive and then a hundred and fifty miles we are still good.

Bike Rides

After riding quite a bit at Lake Livingston we were surprised at how much work the hills at Jim Hogg were. There are some significant hills, some long hills and heading away from the lake it is mostly up hill. So a complete loop through both of the campground loops and out to the main entrance and back twice was a bit of a ride. After a few of those we seemed to get ourselves used to it. And then we set out on the road from the campground.

There were a couple side streets with houses. The roads went in a bit and then seemed to drop downhill out of sight. We followed on a road to the right into a neighborhood of substantial homes. All stone and brick on large lots. We quickly discovered that these streets too all led downhill which meant uphill was to follow. A few of these hills were pretty steep. Back out to the main road into the camp ground and a bit further on we found a big wall on either side of the street and a sign that said “The Woods”. We rode down that street past a lot of homes of a more moderate size on pretty good sized lots, an acre or more. The funny thing was that all of these lots were grass waiting to be mowed and very few trees. We twisted and wound our way through “The Woods” and finally ended up back at the road into the campground at another sign proclaiming “The Woods”.

We got back to the campground a bit sore in the butts. It was almost 10 miles. We did this ride several more times and discovered that the grocery store was only another quarter mile so we went there for treats and even lunch one day. Somehow I have no pictures of us. But we saw a bunch of interesting campers.

These folks were reliving their school days.

Our friends, John and Caroline were wondering about a Casita or Burro. These are small and very compact. Duck going through the door, maybe stand up right down the center where the roof has a hump in it.

And this Airstream trailer was shorter than the pickup truck pulling it around. But very nice as Airstreams are. John could stand up in this one.

Pickups

It looks to us in our unscientific survey of several campgrounds that the most common pickups are now 4×4 short box four door models. The only two door models you see are really old ones. And Fords outnumbered Chevy, GMC, RAM and all the others combined by more than 4 to 1.

And while fifth wheel campers are very popular just about everywhere, down here in Texas towable trailers seem much more popular than in other areas and almost equaled the number of fifth wheels. Texas has lots of RV destinations, lots of COE parks, great State Parks and many private parks. A days drive and the scenery and climate can be completely different and they still speak Texan.

I better get this posted, internet access has been a bit iffy.

More later,

Roger and Susan

By the time you see this our blog address will have changed. Those following by email will still get your updates by email. ✅

The new official address is https://home2rv.com

All you have to do is type in home2rv.com in your browser search line and we will show up for a visit.

More soon,

Roger and Susan

We drove up from Baytown to Lake Livingston whose southern end is near Livingston, TX. We are staying at the North Shore RV Resort near Onalaska, TX about 10 miles north of Livingston.

It is a nice place, right on the lake with a swimming beach, a swimming pool, a boat launch, a fishing dock and play areas for the kids. The lady in the office is friendly. Most of the folks here right now are here for a while. On the weekends more show up for just a couple days.

Here we are for about three weeks.

This is in front of the coach looking over the lake in the evening. Very nice. There is a nice big grassy area for kids to play.

Steering Box

One of the planned for events here is to remove our slow leaking steering box and get it rebuilt and reinstalled. It has been leaking very slowly ever since we got the coach in California. I have added a quart or two of oil to the hydraulic reservoir over six years so it is not a big leak but a bit messy and still a leak. If the timing works out right I want to send it to RedHead in Washington for the rebuild and they send it back. 10-14 days total time.

This is the 120 lb steering box after it came back from a shop in Houston. The timing did not work out to send it to RedHead but I think this will be fine. All of the internal parts are new including all of the seals. They had it done in a day and our friend Rudy transported it both ways. He happened to have an AquaHot service job in the same park we are in, the folks next to us actually, so he was here anyway. And their AH required a return visit to replace some electronics part so he had to come back. Pretty fortunate for us. Thanks, Rudy!

To get the steering box out and back in we called on Beau Reece. He is a mobile service guy in this area that comes very highly recommended. The generator has to slide out forward, the generator radiator has to come out and the electric fan for the generator radiator has to come out. Then the arm on the box that moves the parts that make the wheels turn has to come off. This is the hard part that requires special tools. Then you have to have a floor jack to hold the box up while you pull the bolts and then wrestle with a big heavy thing. I am glad I didn’t tackle this myself. If I had this post would have been coming from a hospital room.

Beau got everything out by himself. When he came back he had a helper, first day on the job. Rachael did a fine job, learning on the fly and got pretty dirty too.

That’s her arm. I hope she sticks with it, she will see and learn a lot with Beau.

Bike Riding at the State Park.

At the southern end of the lake one finds Lake Livingston State Park. Is it a big park with four different camping areas, about 160 camp sites. It was a 20 minute drive to get to nice roads and trails to ride on, picnic areas and a camp store where there was ice cream.

There are swimming areas, docks, boat launches, kayak rentals and lots of people trying their luck at fishing.

The campsites just across this small bay were very nice, full hookups, spread out and many were lakefront. This is a place we would stay at as well as the North Shore RV Resort.

One loop around through the campgrounds and park roads was about 5.3 miles. We started out with one loop, worked up to a loop and a half and finished doing two loops. Six visits so far, more than 40 miles so far.

We had one mishap, a blowout. Susan’s front tire had a significant tear in it and the tube blew out. We had a spare tube, fixed that temporarily. Ordered two new tires and two more tubes from Amazon. We replaced the front tire on Susan’s bike with the one from Roger’s bike, put two new slightly more aggressive tread tires on Roger’s bike and now have a spare tire and tubes.

One day we stopped at a Whataburger (not in Minnesota) for a Mushroom Swiss burger. We split it. Plenty and good.

Another visit to NAC.

One day Rudy called me up and says a fellow and his wife he knows from Louisiana, Forest and Cindy, are coming to NAC to look at Foretravels. So Rudy drives to Livingston, jumps in our car and I drive to NAC. These folks also know Chappell and Mary Jordan so that is where we met them.

This time I managed to get a couple pictures at Chappell and Mary’s home.

Their home is like a museum. But very comfortable and welcoming. It was very nice to see them again.

We looked at a 2005 36′ U270 with a slide, a 2001 36′ U295 with a slide and a 1997 40′ U320 with no slide. By far the best of the bunch for condition, equipment and price was the ’97.

It is always a learning experience to look at as many coaches as you can and in NAC there are many to look at. Not just Foretravels but many brands. Forest and Cindy have had Newell coaches before and were looking for something smaller. They were thinking a 36′ no slide Foretravel would be a good fit.

There were significant interior differences between the 2001 and the 2005 coaches. The slides mechanisms were different and used much more interior space in the 2005. It had a dinette booth rather than a J shaped dinette. Much less leg room in the dinette booth. A lot more flexibility with the J dinette. Kitchen storage in the 2005 was much different, much less than the 2001. Much less kitchen drawer space and the kitchen layout itself was different. Basement space in the 2005 was also less. These are things you don’t easily recognize from pictures or floor plan drawings. You have to see them.

The 1997 40′ U320 no slide had all of the up scale advantages of the U320. AquaHot, the more powerful M11 engine and the more robust 4000 series transmission are the big things. It was good for them to see a non-slide coach to see how the floor plan changes the way space gets used without a slide. The 40′ adds 2 ft in the front split between the kitchen and the living room and 2 ft to the bathroom. These four feet may not seem like much but they change the bathroom layout to be more roomy and add a third closet space. The kitchen gets dramatically more storage space and has a table and chairs. And there is more room in the living room between the kitchen and the front passenger’s seat. The big thing for Forest and Cindy to see was how the floor plan used space in a different way in a non-slide coach. The extra space in a 40′ coach goes away in a 36′ but the floorplan makes the space useful.

There was coffee and cookies back at Chappell and Mary’s. Chappell had a pork shoulder on the smoker when we got there in the morning. He brought it in and it smelled wonderful. But Rudy and I had a drive ahead of us and Susan wanted me home by dark so we said our good byes, Mary sent us packing with bags of fresh baked cookies and off we went.

When we got back to Onalaska Rudy asked me to help him put in new LED headlight bulbs in his Prius. One side was easy, one side required some disassembly of things in the way but we got them in and tried them out. White and bright! Rudy reports that they were wonderful on the way home.

St Patricks Day

Spring break, a nice weekend and St Patricks day all coincided while we were here.

The beach was full of Mom’s and kids. Boats were being launched. Lots of fishing. Lots of floating things. The pool was packed. Kids were playing volleyball. There were kids and dogs on stand up paddle boards. Lots of activity. Lots of sun. A nice end to spring break week.

Lots of folks are leaving today on Sunday. We leave tomorrow for Jim Hogg COE park on Lake Georgetown

More later,

Roger and Susan

An AquaHot is an appliance in the basement of the motorhome that makes coach heat and hot water. There are many different versions and capacities of these. In our coach it is an electric and diesel fired boiler that heats antifreeze just like you have in your car. This hot antifreeze can be circulated through any of the seven heat exchanger/fans in the coach and the basement of the coach in four separately thermostatically controlled zones and another zone that circulates heated antifreeze through the engine to pre-heat it to make it easier to start when it is really cold out. It also heats 16 gallons of water and will supply continuous hot water no matter how much or how fast you use it.

There are lots of hoses coming out of the top pumps and back into the side where the red plugs are. The cover over the left end has been removed. A bunch of wires too.

If you are driving, the engine circulates hot coolant through the AquaHot providing coach heat and hot water. You can run the diesel part of the boiler at any time for more and faster heat. If you are plugged in you can run the electric side of the boiler for hot water and heat. For us that is down to about 40 degrees.

It is a pretty amazing appliance but like anything it needs maintenance. If you use it properly you can go for several years between “annual” service. This usually consists of replacing the diesel fuel filter, the nozzle that sprays the fuel into the burner chamber, cleaning out the burner chamber and the flame sensor and setting the gap on the spark starter. This is something you can do yourself or get someone else to do it. We have done it both ways.

Other than normal service we have had to replace the fuel pump (a factory recall sort of thing) and the ignition coil that makes the spark and a plastic clutch between the motor and the burner blower. Not much considering it is on almost all of the time and is 17 years old.