Austin To Fort Stockton
I woke early in the Cracker Barrel parking lot in Round Rock, TX. There were other people overnighting, but it was very quiet. I made myself a bowl of cereal and then went to Starbucks. I spent some time in Starbucks planning how I was going to get to Terlingua. I wanted to visit Big Bend National Park in Texas. I had trouble finding a place to stay and realized there was a Walmart in Fort Stockton. It was a slight diversion but why not. There were a few places on the way and I thought I might stop along the way.
San Antonio
San Antonio was on the way and I thought it would be familiar. Years ago, I spent a week in the city working for AT&T, where I helped install software for a new telephone switch.
On the outskirts of San Antonio, much to my surprise, an almost empty warning message appeared on the dash. I had broken my rule of always keeping the tank half full when possible. I pulled over and had the Outback dashboard recommend the closest gas station, which was a Circle-K about 3 miles away. I took the opportunity to also top up the ice in the cooler and buy a few drinks for the road. I noticed the racks of syrup boxes for the soda machine and reministed about another project to track soda usage and warn when the syrup was almost empty.
I was about 10 miles from my destination, The Alamo. I arrived and had my usual problem of not being able to park in the parking lots because they were full or had a height restriction. As usual, I headed away from the center of parking and found street parking about 10 blocks away. It was Sunday, and the parking was free.
When I got to the Alamo, there was a musket demonstration going on. There was a large crowd and I decided to watch. It took them about 10-15 minutes to talk their way to actually firing the muskets.
As I waited for the musket firing, I took photos of some other things nearby.
A guy was watching me photographing and said, “If you want some interesting photos, there are murals a few blocks in that direction”. He pointed behind the Alamo. He was a construction worker and had worked on many of the buildings in the area. He said that some of them were made by famous artist from around the world. One was an architect from Mexico. I never found the murals, and no one seemed to know anything about them. I did find a lot of street graffiti in the same direction.
On my way, there was a Haagen Dazs a block from The Alamo and I had to stop for a banana split.
A woman gave me directions to where she thought there were murals. I passed a lot of homeless people on my way. I eventually came to a large building with some interesting graffiti on the side. The gate was slightly open and I walked through. A guy said to me, “No homeless people allowed inside here.” I told him that I wasn’t homeless and just wanted to photograph the graffiti on the side of the building.
His name was JC, short for something I’m sure. I had watched him pull up on a motorcycle. He was a plumber and came in sometimes to get away from things. The company made portable kitchens for vendors and there in front of me was the Ramsey Lewis street truck for the Hell’s Kitchen shows. He let me take photos and asked if I had any questions.
The city had worked with the company to pay for the artists to paint the side of the building. It was obvious these were professionals.
Further down the street, I took a photo of a mural with a girl in it. As I took the photo, a woman wrapped in blanks on a mattress sat up and said, that’s a picture of me. There was a strong resemblance and I wondered what had happened since the mural was painted.
I found my way towards the river which I remembered from my first trip here. The area had been heavily developed and the waterway rerouted to be the center piece of a walking area. I didn’t recognize anything.
Walk along the river. It had changed so much since I was there 40 years ago. It was all built up and the water has been rerouted to create an underground complex. There was now a huge mall where there once was small shops and restaurants.
I found my way back to The Alamo to get photo in better light.
I headed out of San Antonio in the afternoon. I didn’t have much else planned.
Uvalde Texas
On my way into town there was a woman selling puppies on the side of the road. She had just sold one to a woman for $750. Her entire family was there, Father, husband, an aunt, her sister and her kids. I met most of the family and they tried to sell me a dog. They were cute, but I explained it wasn’t going to work in my car.
I stopped at a Starbucks and noticed I was in Uvalde Texas. I thought, why do I know that name. As I was driving through town, I saw a fountain in the town center with a lot of small crosses and stuffed animals. At that moment I remembered the school shooting that recently happened here. I stopped to visit the memorial and then walked around the area.
Besides the memorial in the center of town, there were murals around town of the children killed that day. I thought to myself, how does a town begin to heal after something like that. There were “Uvalde Strong” messages in many business windows around town.
Amistad National Recreation Area
I stopped in the Amistad National Recreation Area at the Rock Quarry to take some photos at sunset. The sun was creating some interesting colors on the rocks in the distance and the water was a very deep vibrant blue. There were other things that looked interesting as I stopped for photos.
Fort Stockton
I made it into Fort Stockton around 9:00 pm and found the Walmart. The parking lot was filled with around 30 RV vehicles. It looked like a campground. I got the car ready and then made a sandwich before climbing in the car to sleep. I pulled out the computer and was immediately connected to the Walmart network. To my surprise, I was able to stream the Big East Woman’s basketball tournament. The huskies won and moved on to the Big East final. Thank you Walmart.