On The Road…Again

We are once again in travel mode, after a brief stopover in Rockport, Texas.  Jim got his dental check-up taken care of, the dogs got groomed, and we lived to tell of our hail/lightning/wind/rain experiences at The Last Resort.

It was about 4 a.m. on Sunday morning, January 9.  My first thought was, “Hey! No flash photography allowed in here”, and then I realized I wasn’t dreaming, and those constant flashes were lightning.  The wind was howling by this time, and I jumped out of bed at the sudden noise of the thunder and hail.  Jim was already up, trying to get on the computer to look at the radar, but of course we had no internet connection.  We tried to shout to be heard above the din of the hail, but couldn’t even hear each other shouting.  By the time we communicated about whether to bring in our slides, the hail let up and things started to quiet down.  Later on that morning, we found out a tornado had possibly touched down in Rockport.  It could have been worse!  We have some damage to our air conditioner fins, but we’ll wait until we get to Arizona to have an adjuster take a look to determine just how much damage there is. 

Others in the park and the community weren’t so lucky, there were many broken windows,  vent covers shattered, and hail dents galore.  When we went out to start checking things and cleaning up, there was still a lot of hail on the ground.  I’m glad that storm passed as quickly as it did!

A week later, about the same time on Sunday morning, we got another storm, but this one brought just a lot of rain, nearly 3 inches in some places.  Of course, our site was located in one of the low areas of the resort, so we had quite a bit of water around our Castle, kind of a moat, I guess!

The highlight of our time in Rockport was spending time with Deb and Rod, and getting to see Donna and Nolan as well.  Of course, as with any RV’ers gathering, this involved food.  Deb, Rod, Jim, Nolan and Donna enjoying dinner at Finn’s in Port Aransas:

One day the four of us, Deb & Rod and Jim & I, took a drive over to the little town of Lamar to see if we could find some Whooping Cranes.  Deb & Rod had seen them over there last year when they were in the area.  Sure enough, we did see a family of 3 Whoopers.  We also saw a few Roseate Spoonbills and some Sandhill Cranes.  Our pictures were not good, so you’ll just have to take our word, we did see them!

The weather was generally cloudy and chilly nearly all the time we were in Rockport so we’re ready to be on the way “Out West” to the Arizona desert.   We plan to travel our usual – about 200 miles a day.  I’ve been informed that we won’t be traveling on Sunday – seems there will be some football games that must be attended to!

We are looking forward to this journey, especially since Deb and Rod are going along. They recently made the change from a 5th Wheel to an Allegro Bus, and this will be their first boondocking adventure.

Deb and Rod, going down the road in their Bus:

 

Tonight we are back in San Antonio at Braunig Lake RV Resort, tomorrow – Westward!