We had also been told about all the deer in the park and was pleasantly surprised that they were so plentiful. They were very tame for the most part and came around in herds twice a day when Craig would feed them. We would have up to 30-40 deer at a time in the little yard next to our motorhome. Craig would feed them in at least three different places around the motorhome since there were so many. They loved the water in the bucket as well as eating out of the bird feeder, when the birds weren't there - loved to see all the cardinals. The yard area got so beat up that we had to start feeding on the side of the road. Time to go as we've gone through 5 (each bag 50 lbs.) bags of corn.
We had Christmas dinner at the lodge with about 35 other campers and staff and had a great time.
On Dec. 26th we went to Bandera, the cowboy capital of the world. They have gun shootouts twice a day, but when we arrived to watch the one at noon, it was really cold, windy and wet and they never showed up - apparently still on Christmas vacation. We enjoyed walking around the shops and chose not to stand outside at 2:00 to see if they would put on their show.
On the Monday after Christmas, we chose a warm day to go to the San Antonio Riverwalk to see the Christmas lights, along with about every other holiday visitor. We took the boat ride throughout the waterway and was getting off the boat about dusk, when the lights were really getting visible.
We went to Fredericksburg to see what all was there and to visit a couple of wineries. We walked around town, visited the St. Mary's church, looked over the Pacific War/Nimitz Museums, and visited three wineries. Lots of history within this little German town and we didn't even get through half the shops.
In the afternoon we went to three wineries; Fredericksburg winery, Rancho Ponte and Messina Hof. Rancho Ponte was our favorite of the three and we met a wonderful couple who told us about the lights in Johnson City, so on our way back to camp, we drove through the town and enjoyed the lights, especially at the electric company's location.
We definitely would like to come back and visit Pedernales Cellars, Becker Vineyards and Grape Creek vineyards. We would also like to spend more time around the Marble Falls area so we may just need to camp in the area for a week.
Here are some of the lights at Johnson City:
We went back to Fredericksburg to spend the day going through the national Museum of the Pacific War (World War II). This included the Admiral Nimitz Museum, the George H. W. Bush Gallery, the Pacific Combat Zone, the Japanese Garden of Peace, Memorial Courtyard and the Plaza of the Presidents. Admiral Nimitz grew up in Fredericksburg and his museum was in the old Nimitz Hotel where he grew up with his grandfather. What a history lesson and a very sobering recollection of all the lives lost in this war and the sacrifices made for our freedom.
Back at camp on one of the nicer days, we did our first prime rib on the smoker/grill. Wow - it turned out great, except for I added a little too much kosher salt to the rub. The smoking process and the reverse sear were excellent. Best Prime Rib we've ever had.
Lexie was showing some signs again that it was time for another platelet injection so we found a vet in San Antonio who had the equipment to do this. She went in for blood work and an analysis on one day and then we took her back on Thursday, Jan. 9 to have the procedure done. They were also able to clean her teeth, do annual shots as well as do Kyna's teeth and her shots. Full day for "the girls" and while they were being looked after, Craig and I ran errands and then went to the Alamo to include watching the film "The Price of Freedom" at the IMAX theatre.
When we picked up "the girls", we were quite impressed that the vet had sat aside about an hour to go over his examination of both Kyna and Lexie. He was quite impressed with Kyna that she let them clean her teeth with no anesthesia and he confirmed her current condition of her eyes. He also did additional X-rays of Lexie's spine and hips and told us that she was much worse than we thought as she had so much more going on than her right front leg that has bursitis, elbow dysplasia and arthritis. Four vertebrae in her spine has fused together to include bone spurs and both hips had dysplasia with one being a lot worse than the other. He agreed with how we were treating her, pain meds, general daily care and the injections but informed us that cold laser therapy may help her so we will be looking into the equipment where we can do this ourselves as we travel.
Over the weekend, San Antonio area was again expecting the arctic air coming from the North with precip coming out of the gulf, so the prediction was freezing rain, snow and a high temperature on Friday of 34 degrees. So we took "the girls" into town on Friday to do bath day and also a visit to Costco before we head south into Corpus Christi next week. We also enjoyed watching football when it was cold and Craig finally had to do the changing of the flags on the motorhome window.
We stayed a couple of extra days beyond our three weeks in the park as we experienced an electrical problem in the motorhome on New Years Eve - some wires in the electrical breaker box were loose and arching. About 2:00 am as we were heading to bed, Craig and I noticed the smell of burning wires and as he took the panel off, a wire was arching. A little scary so we shut off all electrical systems for the night and went to bed with flashlights and fire extinguishers near by. Next day, my very handy husband found the issue and was able to make quick repairs and then turn on the power again - it was great to have the heat as we were experiencing another cold spell in the area.
RV TIP: The electrician told us that with the heating of the wires, this is not that abnormal for the connections to become loose. Something to check on an annual timeline.
We found an RV repair place to take it to, and they were quite impressed with Craig's work so he said that all they could do was "pretty up" the control panel and so we stayed 3 extra nights at Lake Medina and got the motorhome fixed on Wednesday. Craig was so impressed with the owner, as he turned down a phone call from the Extreme RV producers while he was with Craig. They wanted to do shows on two recent custom RVs they were working on and Craig and the owner were more interested in talking about the owner's 1967 Camaro (Craig had a 1969).
We left on Thursday heading south towards Portland, Texas, across the bay from Corpus Christi.
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