News Flash:

Morgane and I are taking the plane this Thursday from Phoenix, Arizona to Vancouver, BC to visit my mom and stepdad and friends and celebrate my birthday on the 13th. Then we’ll fly back to meet up with Ghis in time for Busses By The Bridge – a HUGE gathering of VW van owners at a campground – in other words, a HUGE party!

Marfa was our main reason for coming to the area, so I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t as close to the mountains as Alpine and Marathon. But soon we learned that it’s the people and the culture that make Marfa special. That and the mysterious ghost lights sometimes seen on the horizon.

We walked around and visited some beautiful galleries and saw art and photographs. There are many beautiful buildings in Marfa – even the bookstore has a modern minimalist kind of feel.

We stopped in one little shop and found lovely sheets of coloured felt made from recycled pop bottles. Morgane bought some to make more clothes for her stuffed animal friends. We talked with the owner and found out that she and her husband travelled all around in a van, too, and that they ended up staying in Marfa.

We drove around to look at a few more things including a house that someone had told Ghis about. It looked like a box piled on top of another box and Ghis wondered if it had been made out of shipping containers (something he is interested in). We stopped and he went to talk to the owner. That’s how we met Candid who lives there when he is working as an architect in San Antonio or teaching in Barcelona, Spain. He let us tour the house and take pictures.

The house has windows that are like slits, like when you wake up and your eyes are barely open. But because these slits are at just the right height, you see everything when you are seated on the sofa or sitting at the desk.

We hung out and had a drink with these friendly folks and then left, promising to see them again at a free show in town that night. A musician (who has played with Beck) was going to be providing a live musical soundtrack for a silent movie from 1928. We decided it would be worth keeping Morgane up for.

One last stop – we checked out the bar owned by friends of the other VW travelling family – The Bodeswells.

We cooked in the van outside the public library (internet!) and then went to the show. It was held at the Ballroom, a beautiful venue. We were treated to an opening act which was a cowboy reading poetry. This was the best part of the show for Ghis and me. Morgane wasn’t so sure. Then the movie started. The Wind was about a woman moving to Texas from Virginia and how the wind was always blowing. Supposedly it would drive her crazy.

We didn’t stay to find out. After maybe thirty minutes, the music started to give us a headache, so we left and went to bed.

We stopped to sleep in Alpine, partly because we needed propane for the van and they couldn’t fill it until the morning. I was happy to visit Front Street Books, the local independent bookstore – they have a branch in Marathon, too, but were closed on New Year’s Day.

We asked the bookstore staff where the best place to eat Texas BBQ was and ended up on the other side of the tracks (literally, not figuratively). The amtrak train brings people from San Antonio.

Morgane is reading menus and ordering on her own now. She ordered a burger. Ghis and I consulted with our waitress and decided to split a plate with pulled pork, sliced brisket and jalapeno sausages.

The waitress brought us gigantic mugs of pink lemonade and she was quick to refill them. The place filled up with people in cowboy hats while we waited. When the food came, we ate all we could and then still had some to bring to Carmanah in the van. We didn’t feel too hot, so maybe Texas BBQ is not our thing.

We got in the van and headed to Marfa.

We didn’t see many towns as we drove through the hills. Then out of the blue we arrived in Marathon. Marathon is the first of three towns – Marathon, Alpine and Marfa.

We stopped and had the best hot dogs ever and a good milkshake at a little diner. People were very friendly and they fell in love with Carmanah. I walked down the street and found a little French grocery with lots of organic produce and other stuff we like to eat – a definite sign of tourism.

We could have stayed longer, but wanted to get to Alpine to fill up the van with propane – we need it to heat the van at night.

On the way out of town, we saw a pack of wild boars by the side of the road. There are three million feral pigs in Texas and they are not friendly. They were a ways back, so I stopped to take a picture. The pigs were already running in the opposite direction, but Ghis came out holding a big stick just in case. My hero!

We said goodbye to the deer and the caverns and drove along a backroad where we passed a lot of ranches and saw some donkeys and horses alongside the road. We even saw an armadillo!

I felt like my camera couldn’t begin to capture how big the landscape is.

A few times we got out of the van to look around. I got really prickly little things on my shoes that hurt my fingers.

I woke up early since my back sometimes aches when I sleep in the van. I slipped on my jacket and my shoes and grabbed my camera and went outside. Sure enough, there were deer nearby.

I walked around for awhile, watching the deer watching me watching them…

We finally got the hammock up. It took a long time to find spare time plus two strong trees the right distance apart. Morgane found it very amusing.

In the late afternoon, we drove the van to the main building so we could get wireless internet. I started feeling sorry for Carmanah when it started getting cold. I imagined her all by herself. But when I went to get her, she was quite happily watching deer.

Did I mention there’s a lot of deer?

We woke up in the quiet campground on New Year’s Eve and after hula-hooping with our tenting neighbours, we went on a tour of the famous caverns – a first for us! Carmanah stayed behind and soaked up some rays. She seems to really love this climate – dry, cool, sunny.

They warned us not to touch anything in the caverns or the tour would end. At the entrance, it was our last chance to change our minds before descending more than 100 feet underground.

It was humid in the cave, but not really scary or claustrophobic because there is so much space down there. There is a paved pathway that we followed through the caves. The different rooms have their own names.

Morgane was impressed and forced me (twist my rubber elbow) to take a ton of photographs.

The only part I didn’t like was when we were at the very bottom, we sat down on benches and our guide shut off all the lights so we could experience total darkness. Well, I didn’t find that amusing for long.

After the tour, we bought sacks of dirt and Morgane got to sluice and find her own gems and minerals. Lots of fun!

After the caverns, we decided to stay another night and spend New Year’s Eve with the abundant deer. We sat outside the shop and the resident peacocks came around looking for something to eat.

Once it got dark, it was very cold (below freezing) and we cuddled up in the van and watched Tinkerbell on the laptop and ate macaroni and cheese.

Before bed, I walked to the washroom and when I heard a funny sound, I jumped, in turn startling two deer who were very close by. Then we went to sleep without being woken up by fireworks or any other festive noises.

Yesterday we finally went on a hike! Our Austin hosts recommended Enchanted Rock near Fredericksburg, Texas. It felt good to hit the road in the morning and the fog had dissipated by the time we arrived in Llano, a small town on the way.

We walked by the river which was clear and green. We also admired all the prickly cacti. The town is picturesque with buildings a little over 100 years old.

After lunch, we arrived at the rock. Morgane and I wanted to go straight up, but it was Ghis’s turn to pick so we followed a trail that made a circle around it. Morgane was a very enthusiastic hiker!

It was steeper around the back, but once we were three-quarters of the way around, we spotted some climbing trails leading up. We attempted them and ended up climbing under and in between enormous boulders.

But the trail proved elusive so a bit further on, Ghis and Morgane scrambled up a steep, but safer slope of rocks. As Morgane said, “I was born to climb!”

I continued on until I found a gentler way up. Once we were all sitting together on top, Ghis realized it was Morgan’e first 360 degree mountain-top view. We could see a lot of Texas and maybe even all the way to Mexico.

It was really windy on top and on the way down, but not cold. The day was sunny and hot, not bad for December 30th.

Once in the car, we headed west and drove a couple of hours to the Caverns of Sonora where we camped for $15. It is very quiet here and at night the moon was so bright, it felt like day.

Austin is proud of being weird. It’s a city full of artists with lots of students thrown into the mix.

Yesterday we finally made it to town. Our first stop was at Whole Foods. Yes, we know the joke: Whole Paycheck! Still it was fabulous. It is the hugest healthy food store we’ve ever been in. There is so much to eat and it all looks so good. We contemplated spending the next month of our trip in their parking lot.

Things got even better – there was an REI next door! That’s like a Mountain Equipment Coop for all you Canadians. I picked up a couple of nice things on sale.

Then we drove to the capitol building and walked all around. It’s on the top of a hill and you can see down a street called Congress Street.

Finally we drove to SoCo – South Congress – which is just across the river. We passed some more Airstream trailers selling cupcakes and BBQ and other foods. We stopped at Fran’s and ate burgers and then I browsed in some of the vintage shops. Vintage is huge in Austin. You could buy old family albums from people you don’t even know.

Eventually we came back to Whole Foods and ate again. We found a skating rink on the roof that was open so Morgane went skating. She loved it. It was real snow, not the plastic that she skated on in Savannah.

We meant to go listen to some of Austin’s great live music, but the place we went to wasn’t starting until later. We decided we were all too tired so we headed back.

This morning Ken and Susan treated us to a Tex-Mex breakfast with eggs and black beans on crunchy corn tortillas and tamales as well. It was excellent and a welcome change.

Ghis wanted to get the oil changed so he dropped Morgane, Adriene and I off at the Children’s Museum. It was busy, but we amused ourselves.

Before they went out tonight, Ken made queso which is a somewhat spicy cheese dip eaten with tortilla chips. Excellent. Another miracle Velveeta cheese recipe.

We are very happy here. Our only complaint is that we are all a bit under the weather. Tomorrow we are taking off – we’re not sure exactly where yet. We’re thinking of heading to Southern California to pass the coldest months and then coming back to New Mexico when it’s warmer.

We may go to a place called Marfa, Texas, which is eight hours from here. We could meet up there with another VW van family and apparently kids can come to bars in Texas so there will be lots of kids at the bar on New Year’s Eve (depending on the bar, I’m sure). We only hope we’ll feel well enough to stay up so late.