First Responder Meeting

Our park is starting up a First Responder team which Ray has been asked to be a part of.  There are only a few seasonal folks at the park as of now, but hopefully as the season gets underway there will be more people to add to the team.  Today we attended a meeting which was held at Waterford Garden.  We had no idea until we arrived there that we would be going to an Assisted Living Facility.  In the 7 years that Ray worked doing disaster plans for nursing homes and assisted living facilities, he has never seen one as nice as this one, which is why I had to blog about it.
The facility did a wonderful job of hosting the meeting, with a great Mexican cuisine lunch, door prizes, etc.  But what impressed us the most was the beauty of the grounds.  The pictures don’t do it justice.  There is a lovely courtyard with a fountain leading to a large garden area with more fountains, ponds, and butterflies everywhere.





We learned from the woman in charge that there is an elderly Winter Texan couple that lives in Wisconsin who still likes to come to the valley because their friends come down. They stay at Waterford Garden for the winter months. They are too old to travel down so the facility flies someone to Wisconsin to bring them down to the valley.  They do this for other people as well. Also, if someone is taking care of elderly parents and wish to take a vacation they can have the parents stay at Waterford Garden while they are gone and pick them up when they come back.
Ray and I thought it would be a lovely place for our children to put us when we get old…..of course, I’m sure it comes with a lovely price tag and chances of them visiting us very often from New York would be slim.  So, my answer to that is…..we will never grow old!

Home for the Winter

After only 3 1/2 days of driving we arrived at our winter home in the Rio Grande Valley.  It was so nice to be “home” and to get such a warm welcome from Guy & Juanita, our park managers and friends.  There are only about 6 other rigs here right now, but I’m sure within 2-3 weeks all the winter texans will start moving in. 
They had no rain here since we left in April, and you sure can tell by how dry everything is.  Fortunately there are underground sprinklers to water the landscaping around the patios, but we still lost one Esperanza bush.  The landscaping crew came on Thursday and removed the dead bush and trimmed everything back so our site looks great now.  It won’t be long until everything grows tall again to offer more privacy. 

The butterflies are so plentiful here this time of year. There are at least 10-20 on our front bush at any given time.  And of course, the woodpeckers and Vermillion Flycatcher have already come to visit.


Today Ray helped some good friends of ours, Gayle and Harvey Pagel paint their coach house while I did laundry and cleaning.  The temps have been in the 90’s so we don’t overexert ourselves.  We did manage to give the 5th wheel a washing to get all the road dirt off and it looks much better.  When the weather cools down we will do a more thorough job. All this was followed by a cool down in the pool.

On the Road Again

After spending the last six weeks with our kids, we got word that our 5th wheel repairs were finally done. It is always bittersweet for us to leave New York and our family and friends but once we are on the road we are anxious to return to our winter home and our Texas friends. 

We decided this season to only do one night stops on the road on our way down south.  We left home on a Sunday morning and were in the Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday.  I don’t think we will be doing that again, as 9 hours towing the trailer is way too grueling. 

Our first night was spent at Grandma’s campground in Shepardsville, KY.  It is a great overnight park as it is right off the highway.  Whenever we stop here we always seem to run into someone we know.  This trip we pulled in and heard someone holler “Hey, old man”.  Ray turned around and there was a couple that we met at the campground in NY.  She is from Wolcott, NY where we were staying and he is from Shepardsville.  Such a small world. 

Our second night was spent in Hot Springs, AK at Catherine’s Landing RV Resort.  Our GPS took us down all the winding and hilly back roads which made us a little nervous not knowing what may be ahead of us but it was well worth it.  We just loved Catherine’s Landing, from the large pull-thru sites to the nice lodge and pool, to the beautiful lake.  Hopefully on our way back to NY we will be able to spend more time there and explore Hot Springs and all they have to offer.

The lodge is very modern and the pool is a heated saline pool with no chemicals. 

The park also has several of these yurts to rent along with cottages.

 

 

 

 

 

The beautiful autumn colors reflected off the lake and was followed by a beautiful sunset. 

Our final night before reaching our destination was spent in San Marcos, Tx at Pecan Park campground.  While nothing special, it was fine for a one night stay.