If we’ve become a little neglectful lately in our journal writing it’s because Texas has been getting into our senses; in our eyes and ears, and noses and, mouths and, yes, even in our skin.
We chose this time to ride across Texas on purpose and we haven’t been let down. We’ve experienced a touch of summer, a bit of winter and a lot of spring.
The wind has roared through ears and around our heads with great velocity. There have been other trips that it would have been a curse and we would have met it with a stream of profanity such as “oh you dad-gummed wind, stop it!” or “oh fudge, Wind you are certainly a miserable, rotten sort of air!” You know, really nasty sayings that I learned in the Marine Corps. This trip was different which meant that our attitude has been different. Our daily destinations have been only general and we have been able to use the wind to our advantage. On only a very few occasions have we not been able to adjust our destinations where those spring winds did not help us in some way and when that happened we just found ourselves a cozy place and sit it out.
But, more often than not, it’s been howling and pushing at our back. We call it our tumbleweed philosophy of travel.
We’ve had flowers painting our path from the get go, but as we move east they became wide swashes of color along the side of the road. During the Bastrop to Bryan segment the floral displayed reminded me of the closing shots at a forth of July fireworks display.
Mornings greeted us with the smell of pine since we made our way out of the Hill Country, past the Escarpment, into the green hills of East Texas (Oh yeah, just because you leave the Hill Country doesn’t mean that you’re out of hills). In places it has the real feeling of being in the mountains because of the cool weather, but even the natives talk about how hot and humid it gets in the summer. (So much for that fleeting mountain feeling).
As far as Texas taste, everything we’ve eaten has been great, but then when you ride a bicycle 50 miles a day, it all tastes great. There are lots of Mexican Restaurants standing side by side with BBQ shacks. One, I saw the other day, said Tacos and BBQ.
A bicycle trip is a real sensuous experience as one takes in all the sounds and smells and colors, but let’s not forget that inner aspect of adrenalin pumping, lungs sucking air, and muscles crying for oxygen as we compete for space on a four-lane highway with no shoulders, lots of hills and a 70-mph speed limits. We’ve been doing that a lot lately; but I’ve got to tell you that all the traffic has been treating us really good.
We chose this time to ride across Texas on purpose and we haven’t been let down. We’ve experienced a touch of summer, a bit of winter and a lot of spring.
The wind has roared through ears and around our heads with great velocity. There have been other trips that it would have been a curse and we would have met it with a stream of profanity such as “oh you dad-gummed wind, stop it!” or “oh fudge, Wind you are certainly a miserable, rotten sort of air!” You know, really nasty sayings that I learned in the Marine Corps. This trip was different which meant that our attitude has been different. Our daily destinations have been only general and we have been able to use the wind to our advantage. On only a very few occasions have we not been able to adjust our destinations where those spring winds did not help us in some way and when that happened we just found ourselves a cozy place and sit it out.
But, more often than not, it’s been howling and pushing at our back. We call it our tumbleweed philosophy of travel.
We’ve had flowers painting our path from the get go, but as we move east they became wide swashes of color along the side of the road. During the Bastrop to Bryan segment the floral displayed reminded me of the closing shots at a forth of July fireworks display.
Mornings greeted us with the smell of pine since we made our way out of the Hill Country, past the Escarpment, into the green hills of East Texas (Oh yeah, just because you leave the Hill Country doesn’t mean that you’re out of hills). In places it has the real feeling of being in the mountains because of the cool weather, but even the natives talk about how hot and humid it gets in the summer. (So much for that fleeting mountain feeling).
As far as Texas taste, everything we’ve eaten has been great, but then when you ride a bicycle 50 miles a day, it all tastes great. There are lots of Mexican Restaurants standing side by side with BBQ shacks. One, I saw the other day, said Tacos and BBQ.
A bicycle trip is a real sensuous experience as one takes in all the sounds and smells and colors, but let’s not forget that inner aspect of adrenalin pumping, lungs sucking air, and muscles crying for oxygen as we compete for space on a four-lane highway with no shoulders, lots of hills and a 70-mph speed limits. We’ve been doing that a lot lately; but I’ve got to tell you that all the traffic has been treating us really good.
I love your blog, thanks for taking time to post it. I hope someday to convince my wife to do something like this.
ReplyDeleteCliff
Thanks, Cliff! It's nice to know that someone else beside us is enjoying the blog!
ReplyDelete--Kamala and Charley