Fort Davis and Javelinas in the Sun!

Sunday, January 28, 2013

Today started out with a decision to stay two more nights. After checking the weather we discovered that a strong windstorm is on its way. We had planned to drive to Guadalupe Mountains National Park and Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico. The wind storm is hitting them today and arriving here tomorrow, but the wind started here this afternoon. We feel that we are in a somewhat sheltered spot here, so we will hunker down tomorrow and see what things are like on Wednesday. Tomorrow they are predicting wind gusts of 70-80 mph. We don't want to be driving in that!

At midday, we unhooked and drove to town, made some phone calls and decided to finally eat lunch out. We found a Mexican restaurant with a buffet (I have no will power. Ate too much!) and then walked around town. The wind was starting to gust and we had to hold on to our hats. Fort Davis has several nicely restored hotels and a nice main street commercial area of a few blocks. We did notice a fair number of homes and businesses for sale. Greg noticed the signs on the door of the businesses that stated whether or not they allowed you to carry a concealed weapon inside!

We found the old restored drug store, which is mostly just a restaurant, so we sat on the counter stools and I had a Blue Bell Ice Cream cone and Greg had a key lime milkshake made with freshly squeezed key limes. He made the best choice! They were selling bottles of Mexican Coke which is made with cane sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup. I really wanted to take photos of the cowboys eating there, but couldn't sneak any.

We visited the store Javelinas and Hollyhocks. I made Greg go in even though it was a toy store and gift shop. His obsession with javelinas needed to be fed. We hadn't seen any since Rio Grande Village. The shopkeeper wanted to know where we were from and that started a great conversation when she asked, “What made you pick up and leave Maryland and wind up in Fort Davis, Texas?”.

During the conversation we discussed fulltiming, geology, marriage, Alaska, wind and weather and discovered that in the past she had a pet javelina!

We decided to make a quick visit to the Fort Davis National Historic Site. The temperature was dropping and the wind was picking up, so we quickly toured the museum and a few of the soldier's residences. Fort Davis was established along the route from San Antonio to El Paso to protect travelers from Comanche, Kiowa, and Apache raids. After the Civil War, Buffalo Soldiers were stationed here. Some of the buildings have been restored. What surprised me is that it was not a stockaded fort. They rode out from here to areas that we having problems.

We drove back to the campground to a new site that we felt would be better in the wind. Just before we arrived we came across a small pack of javelinas! Greg got to see them in the sunshine, instead of just the moonshine! Since we were still full from our noontime gluttony, we decided that we would have cheese and crackers for dinner. I found and chilled a bottle of champagne left over from New Year's Eve, that had gotten buried in the laundry basket/liquor cabinet on the floor of the shower. (Don't ask...) We toasted life on the road and watched a few more episodes of Battlestar Gallactica.